The labels and descriptions of the physical acts of speaking were new to me, but cool to learn—especially since so much prejudice has been based on the way people use these simple motions. Most of what Callary described were things we absorbed instinctively as children, and have never thought to question. One of the unfamiliar terms, Morphemes, was noteworthy because I had rarely thought about the lack of spaces in our spoken words, which is why learning so speak a new language is often so much harder than learning to read it.
One thing that I learned that really stuck out to me was the section over articulatory phonetics. I had never thought about how the sounds we make are produced in our vocal chords so it was really interesting to me to read what Callary wrote on the matter. There was also a nice diagram that I was able to refer back to while reading that helped me understand how the sounds we make are formed and what part of the vocal chords are used to make certain sounds.
I thought it was very interesting how in English we simplify words making them easier to pronounce. We often note when a person pronounces all three consonants in the middle of a word it sounds odd, yet we think nothing of deleting the letter completely from the pronunciation. I believe this is why some languages are harder to learn to native English speakers. When we are confronted with three consonant sounds in the middle of the word we want to delete or insert a sound. However, that practice won't always work as it does in English.
Everything Callary documented, I found to be true. This is, every (basically) exercise and example of incompatible consonant documented was ingrained into my speech as a child and I never thought twice about it. I just thought cupboard was meant to be pronounced "cubbered" since I read "The Indian in the Cupboard" and asked my dad how to say it. I am fascinated that every sound of speech is recorded and has a phonetic symbol, it's something I never considered. The work people have put into this and categorized things blows me away.
. Something that definitely intrigued me (and I think I actually started laughing out loud while going through the exercise) was the past tense allomorphs. Every time I tried to pronounce the “d” in “saved” the same way the “d” sounds in “coughed”, I would pronounce “saved” as “safed” – assimilating the [v] to [f].
I found it puzzling how I had this whole conception that writing is language (due to my Deaf orientated views), but Callary said it is the opposite. He emphasized that language is sound, not writing. I found it interesting how he said that letters do not have sounds and how it can be very deceiving which, “…blinds us to the principles and rules of our spoken language” (Callary 88). Callary’s example of how the English spelling has sounds like [K] and [S] that is occasionally represented by the letter C makes his point valid on why language truly is sound, not writing since spelling(s) can be misleading.
Another intriguing aspect was that of adoption. The English language is notorious for using a great deal of words from other languages. When we adopt these words, we usually keep the spelling, even if it contradicts the way we might have spelled it using our phonetic system.
In all of the complication with sounds and minuscule differences, I found something comfortingly stable about the word morpheme and its definition. It is simply enough the smallest part of a word that means something.
As Callary pointed out, in other languages it’s easy to pronounce or spell a word on the first try, but because English has evolved from its original pronunciations the current spellings of many words do not accurately reflect the pronunciations. Wouldn’t it be easier for people to learn to read and spell if “knee” was written as it’s transcribed phonetically (and pronounced): “ni”?
I thought the point about how linguists use the word ‘rule’ differently was actually pretty cool. Up until now we’ve mostly just seen people either hate the rules or love them, and use the rules to determine if language is ‘good’ or ‘bad’.
On page 92, Callary says that incorrect pronunciation is not as bad as most people think it is. While most people think that it is improper to pronounce words differently than they themselves do. Word pronunciation tends to be shared between people in the same region, town and group. I personally was made fun of for saying the word ‘catch’ with an 'ah' sound instead of an ‘eh’ sound. The people who pointed out my ‘mispronunciation’ seemed to be personally offended by it. Language is very important to people, specifically their language.
In class we have discussed different forms of dialect and word usage depending on our surroundings. Callary addresses this idea, that social situations effect more than just the dialect and words we use, but the very way we make those words sound.
The labels and descriptions of the physical acts of speaking were new to me, but cool to learn—especially since so much prejudice has been based on the way people use these simple motions. Most of what Callary described were things we absorbed instinctively as children, and have never thought to question. One of the unfamiliar terms, Morphemes, was noteworthy because I had rarely thought about the lack of spaces in our spoken words, which is why learning so speak a new language is often so much harder than learning to read it.
ReplyDeleteOne thing that I learned that really stuck out to me was the section over articulatory phonetics. I had never thought about how the sounds we make are produced in our vocal chords so it was really interesting to me to read what Callary wrote on the matter. There was also a nice diagram that I was able to refer back to while reading that helped me understand how the sounds we make are formed and what part of the vocal chords are used to make certain sounds.
ReplyDeleteI thought it was very interesting how in English we simplify words making them easier to pronounce. We often note when a person pronounces all three consonants in the middle of a word it sounds odd, yet we think nothing of deleting the letter completely from the pronunciation. I believe this is why some languages are harder to learn to native English speakers. When we are confronted with three consonant sounds in the middle of the word we want to delete or insert a sound. However, that practice won't always work as it does in English.
ReplyDeleteEverything Callary documented, I found to be true. This is, every (basically) exercise and example of incompatible consonant documented was ingrained into my speech as a child and I never thought twice about it. I just thought cupboard was meant to be pronounced "cubbered" since I read "The Indian in the Cupboard" and asked my dad how to say it. I am fascinated that every sound of speech is recorded and has a phonetic symbol, it's something I never considered. The work people have put into this and categorized things blows me away.
ReplyDelete. Something that definitely intrigued me (and I think I actually started laughing out loud while going through the exercise) was the past tense allomorphs. Every time I tried to pronounce the “d” in “saved” the same way the “d” sounds in “coughed”, I would pronounce “saved” as “safed” – assimilating the [v] to [f].
ReplyDeleteI found it puzzling how I had this whole conception that writing is language (due to my Deaf orientated views), but Callary said it is the opposite. He emphasized that language is sound, not writing. I found it interesting how he said that letters do not have sounds and how it can be very deceiving which, “…blinds us to the principles and rules of our spoken language” (Callary 88). Callary’s example of how the English spelling has sounds like [K] and [S] that is occasionally represented by the letter C makes his point valid on why language truly is sound, not writing since spelling(s) can be misleading.
ReplyDeleteAnother intriguing aspect was that of adoption. The English language is notorious for using a great deal of words from other languages. When we adopt these words, we usually keep the spelling, even if it contradicts the way we might have spelled it using our phonetic system.
ReplyDeleteIn all of the complication with sounds and minuscule differences, I found something comfortingly stable about the word morpheme and its definition. It is simply enough the smallest part of a word that means something.
ReplyDeleteAs Callary pointed out, in other languages it’s easy to pronounce or spell a word on the first try, but because English has evolved from its original pronunciations the current spellings of many words do not accurately reflect the pronunciations. Wouldn’t it be easier for people to learn to read and spell if “knee” was written as it’s transcribed phonetically (and pronounced): “ni”?
ReplyDeleteI thought the point about how linguists use the word ‘rule’ differently was actually pretty cool. Up until now we’ve mostly just seen people either hate the rules or love them, and use the rules to determine if language is ‘good’ or ‘bad’.
ReplyDelete(Emily Callan)
On page 92, Callary says that incorrect pronunciation is not as bad as most people think it is. While most people think that it is improper to pronounce words differently than they themselves do. Word pronunciation tends to be shared between people in the same region, town and group. I personally was made fun of for saying the word ‘catch’ with an 'ah' sound instead of an ‘eh’ sound. The people who pointed out my ‘mispronunciation’ seemed to be personally offended by it. Language is very important to people, specifically their language.
ReplyDeleteIn class we have discussed different forms of dialect and word usage depending on our surroundings. Callary addresses this idea, that social situations effect more than just the dialect and words we use, but the very way we make those words sound.
ReplyDeleteCody Baggerly