Abstract
Imagine how a speaker of RP might try to convey the ways in which his speech, that of a Frenchman and that of a Spaniard sound different. We have all heard French and Spanish being spoken, and we have some kind of impression in our minds of what they sound like; we can often tell which is being spoken, even if we do not understand a word of what is being said. With our ordinary, everyday language, we can convey general impressions, in a vague sort of way; we may say that French is ‘more nasal’, ‘more musical’, ‘softer’ or ‘more forceful’ than RP, but these are not at all precise or informative expressions, and because of this, it is difficult to say whether they might be true or false.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Further Reading
For a more detailed introduction to the phonemic principle, which introduces some of the problems we will discuss in Chapter 4, see Lass (1984a), Chapter 1. We have adopted a ‘perceptual’ (or ‘psychological’) view of the phoneme; for a clear discussion of this, and two other ways of interpreting the phoneme, see Hyman (1975), Chapter 3. For source material on phonemic analysis, see the papers in Joos (1958); Twaddell’s contribution to that volume, first published in 1935, gives a good survey of the issues involved in interpreting the ‘phoneme’ notion. Anderson (1985), Chapters 2–4 and 9–12, gives a well-informed account of the history of the phoneme concept. For further exercises on phonemic analysis, see Pike (1947).
Copyright information
© 1993 Philip Carr
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Carr, P. (1993). The Phonemic Principle. In: Phonology. Modern Linguistics Series. Palgrave, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-22849-2_2
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-22849-2_2
Publisher Name: Palgrave, London
Print ISBN: 978-0-333-51908-0
Online ISBN: 978-1-349-22849-2
eBook Packages: Palgrave Social & Cultural Studies CollectionSocial Sciences (R0)