/a/,
the central open short vowel, has [a.]’ a half-long form, as
positional variant. While [a] occurs in the word-final position, [a.]
occurs elsewhere. This vowel has no special limitation in its
distribution, e.g.,
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/u/, the back close unrounded
vowel, has three positional variants. These are: [u.], a half-long
form of [u] occurring in the mono-syllabic words, [U], a short form
of [u] produced at a slightly lower tongue height than the one
required for [u], occurring before aspirated stops and in closed
syllables except in the word-initial position of the mono-syllabic
word and [u] occurring elsewhere. Given below are few words
illustrating the occurrences of these three positional variants.
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/o/, the back half-closed
rounded short vowel, has three positional variants. There are : [o]
occurring before aspirated stops, [ ],
a half-open rounded from occurring before approximants and [A&]
a back rounded short form produced midy-way between half-open and
half-close positions occurring elsewhere, e.g.,
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A consonant is designated as that speech sound in whose
production a closure or narrowing of the air passage in the vocal
tract is present. The difference in the closure of the air passage
(i.e., the different types of modifications the airstreams undergoes)
in the vocal tract is known as manner of articulation. The manner of
articulation. The manner of articulations take place at certain
points/places in the vocal tract and points/places where the
articulation takes place are known as points/places of articulation.
The manner and the place of articulation form the two important
variables in describing a consonants. A complete description of a
consonant, however, needs the information of al least two other
variables, viz., the position of the vocal cords, and the position
of the velum. To this one may add, the degree of the pressure on
muscles (Lenis/fortis articulation). Thus, a complete description on
a consonant must need at least four variables viz., the position of
the vocal cords, the position of the velum, the place of
articulation and the manner of articulation.
General Statement.-As far as the consonants in this language are
concerned, the four major types of manner of articulation are :
complete closure (stops including nasals and affricates); partial
closure (laterals); intermittent closure (flaps and trills) and
narrowing of the air passage (fricatives and approximants). These
four major types could be further sub-divided, for instance:
depending upon the presence or absence of the closure in hte nasal
passage, the stops show a two-way opposition, i.e., the stop in
whose production the closure of the nasal passage is absent may be
designated as nasal stops and the stops, in whose production the
closure of the nasal passage (lowering the velum) is present may be
designated as oral stops, though ordinarily they are known
respectively as nasals and stops. Hereafter, these consonants would
be referred to as such. Though theoretically all the consonants
(excepting the glottal stop) can be further sub-divided on the basis
of the presence or absence of the vibration of the vocal cords, in
this language this opposition is available only with the unaspirated
stops. The stops in whose production, the vibration of the vocal
cords is present are known as voiced stops and the stops in whose
production the vibration is absent are known as unvoiced stops. In
this language, voicing is present also in the case of the vowels,
the nasals, the flap, the lateral and the approximants whereas, the
voicing is absent in the case of fricatives. Voicing/unvoicing
however is a redundant feature with these consonants and the vowels.
Some of the consonants could be further differentiated on the basis
of the presence or absence of extra puff of air at the time of the
release of the consonants. Thus, the consonants in whose release
extra puff of air is present are known as aspirated consonants and
the consonants in whose release extra
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]
sa]
la]
