The classification and description of speech Sound: Consonants

The classification and description of speech Sound: Consonants

       Speech sounds are very broadly divided into two categories - Vowels and Consonants.

      The word consonant was derived from the Latin word 'consonare', which means the sound produce with the help of some other sound. Both the ancient Greeks and Indians defined the consonants as a sound produced with the help of vowel.

       Another definition or the modern definition by phoneticians and linguistics is that it is a sound which is produced by a stoppage of breath. In the production of consonants the movement of air from the lungs is fully obstructed, as a result of narrowing or complete closure of air passage.

Generally,

"When we produce some sounds, air escapes through mouth with friction and these sounds are called 'consonants'."

Consonants can be described by three ways:

1. According to the position of glottis they are considered whether they are voiced or voiceless.

2. According to the stricture involved in articulation, plosive, affricate, nasal, fricative are labels given to consonants.

3. According to their places or articulation. It can be described as Bilabial, Velar, Alveolar, Post - Alveolar, Labio-dental , Dental, Palato, Palatal Glottal.

         There are twenty-four distinctive consonants in English. Six of them are plosives, two are affricates, three are fricatives, one is lateral and three are approximants. 

1. Plosive consonants:

        Plosive sound is produced with a stricture of complete closure and sudden release. During the articulation, soft palate is raised, by shutting off the nasal passage. When the oral closure is released, the air escapes with a small explosive noise. For example, /p/, /b/, /d/, /k/, /g/ are plosive sounds.

2. Affricate sounds:

        Affricates are consonants sounds produced with a stricture of complete closure and slow release - /d₃/, /t f/ are affricative sounds. During the articulation of /t f/ the tip of the tongue make a firm contact with alveolar ridge and the hard palate. Both separates slowly and air escapes with friction. So /t f/ is a voiceless palato-aveolar, /d₃/ in the articulation of this, vocal cords vibrates so it is voiced consonant For example: /t f/ - chess, picture, snatch /d₃/ - joy, enjoy, age.

3. Nasal sounds:

         A nasal sound is articulated with a stricture of complete oral closure. During the articulation, soft palate is lowered, shutting of oral passage so air comes through nasal passage.

     

         For example, /m/, /n/, /J/. During the articulation of /m/, the two lips make firm constant with each other and soft palate is lowered. The vocal cords vibrate producing voice. /m/is bilabial nasal. During the articulation of /n/, the tongue touches to alveolar ridge and soft palate is lowered and vocal cord vibrates. So /n/ is a voiced alveolar nasal consonant.   During the articulation of /J/, back of tongue touches soft palate, and soft palate is lowered so it is voiced velar nasal consonant. For example: /m/ - minimum, complete, shame, /n/ - native, snail, sudden. /J/ - young

3. Fricative sounds:

       Fricative sounds are articulated with a stricture of close approximation. For example /f/, /v/, /q/, /ð/, /z/, /f/, /3/, /h/.

        For example: /f/ - Fat - safe, /v/ - visit - save,  /q/ - earth - think,  /ð/ - that - other, /z/ - zone,  /f/ - shape- cash /3/ - measure - vision /h/ - hat - behind.

4. Lateral sounds:

       A lateral sound is articulated by the stricture of complete closure in the centre of the vocal tract. The tip of the tongue touches the alveolar ridge. Vocal cords vibrate during the production of sounds.  For example /l/ - last - soil.

5. Approximants sounds:

       Approximate sounds are articulated with a stricture of open Approximation. There are three Approximants in English - /r/, /j/, /w/. For example /r/ - reach - dry, /j/ - sure, /w/ - wait - sweet.

The description of consonants includes five kinds of classification:

1. The nature of air - stream mechanism:

 

     Most speech sounds and all normal English sounds are made with an aggressive pulmonic air- stream mechanism that is the air pushed out of lungs.

2. The state of glottis:

     A consonant may be voiced or voiceless depending upon whether the vocal cords remain wide apart (voiceless) or in a state of vibration (voiced).

3. The position of the soft palate:

      While describing consonants, we have to mention whether they are oral sounds or nasal sounds.

4. An articulation involved:

      In the description of consonants, the various articulations are involved. The articulations are active and passive. In the production of a consonant the active articulator is moved towards the passive articulator. The chief points of articulation are,

1) Bilabial:

Labial is regarding lips. In the production of sound lips becomes the important part. For example - mile - /m/, pile - /p/.

2) Labiodentals:

Dental suggests teeth. Labiodental suggests that lips and teeth are involved in the production of some sound. For example, /v/ - vine, /f/ - fine.

3) Dental:

Dental suggests teeth. The tip of tongue touches to the front upper teeth. For example - thin - then.

4) Alveolar:

The tip of blade touches the teeth ridge. The tip of the tongue is n active articulator. For example - tin, din, sin, and love.

5) Post Alveolar:

Back side of teeth ridge is hard palate; the tip of tongue goes towards that part but doesn't touch the hard palate. This part is post Alveolar. For example - try, dry.

6) Palato Alveolar:

The front of the tongue is raised towards the hard palate.

7) Palatal:

The front tongue is the active articulator and the hard palate is passive. For example - yes.

8) Velar:

The back tongue moves to soft palate. For example - back, bag, bang.

9) Glottal:

       Glottal sounds are produced at the glottis and the two vocal cords are the articulators. For example- hat.

    

      In the case of some consonant sounds, there can be a secondary place of articulation in the addition to the primary. Therefore we can say that, the classification of the consonants can be done according to the place of articulation

5. The nature of stricture:

      

      The nature of stricture, suggests manner of articulation. It suggests the relationship between the active and passive articulators. It is based on the complete closure and sudden release, complete oral closure, complete closure and slow release, close approximation, open approximation, quick closure and release, and partial closure.

The Age of Elizabeth - Drama

The Age of Elizabeth - Drama

Introduction:

     The age of Elizabethan or Renaissance is divided into four parts,

During the renaissance, many types of literature has produced, like, The New Classicism, The New Romanticism, translations, spirit of independence, the development of drama, the popularity of poetry and prose and novel. Different kinds of poetries were produced like, dramatic poetry, lyrical poetry, descriptive and narrative poetry religious and satirical poetry.

Origin of Drama:

As per W. J. Long,

"Drama is but an old story retold to the eye, a story put into action by living performers, who for the movement "make believe" or imagine themselves to be the old heroes"

There are three period of drama,

1. The Religious Period:

       Same as Greece, Europe also contains the origin of drama in religion. First characters were from 'New Testament'. First there were dramas upon moral lessons of good and evil. The church later divided the plays into Mysteries and Miracle plays.

Miracle plays:

      In France, the name miracle is given to any play which represents the lives of saints. In England, the distinction was different, the Miracle denotes the plays based on Bible or the lives of saints.

Mystery plays:

         The word mystery refers to the plays, which represents the life scenes from the life of Christ. In England Mystery plays used for distinguishing different class of plays, which were not religious.

       Among these both kinds of plays, Miracle was famous and the first Miracle play was "Ludus de Sancta Katharina" in Dunstable. Four centuries after the Miracle plays got fame and popularity. From the starting plays were allowed to perform in church because of religious purpose but after that people have started enjoying it and then it was for the purpose of entertainment and then it was replaced by the Elizabethan Drama.

The Miracle plays started taking popularity and then divided into two parts, 

1. At Christmas: plays on birth of Christ

2. At Easter: plays on death and triumph of Christ

       This cycle of drama represents human life from birth to death. The authors of Miracles were priests and their chosen assistants and they were carefully selected and trained. There were movable theatres, each of these theatres consisted of a two-story platform, set on wheels. The lower story was the dressing room for actors and the upper story was the stage proper.

      The plays were written according to general outline of the Bible stories, no change was tolerated, the only variety was in new songs and jokes, and in the pranks of devil. 

2. The Moral Period:

      This period of moral drama came in existence because of Morality plays. In this the characters were connected with the themes of - Life, Death, Repentance, Goodness, Love, Greed and other virtues and vices. To include charm to Morality plays, the devil of Miracle plays was introduced in Morality plays. There was also a character Vice, and the important role of this character was to protect 'virtues' by mischievous pranks, and especially make devil's life a burden by beating him with bladder or a wooden sword. The Morality playd generally ended in the triumph with virtue.

      There were two best authors of Morality plays, John Skelton who wrote "Magnificence" and "The Necromancer"; the second author is Sir David Lindsay, he used to write in a satirical style, he used to make rulers uncomfortable by telling them unpleasant truths. 

The Interludes:

       These plays were grew after Morality plays and the best part of these plays were that it was short, witty and with simple plot. In the early part of the sixteenth century political subjects began to be used, and public officials were satirized under allegorical names. The interludes originated, undoubtedly, in a sense of humor. John Heywood is an important writer who contributed in Interludes to the distinct dramatic from known as a comedy.

3. The Artistic Period:

     This is the final stage of the development of English drama. The chief purpose of this form of drama was to present human life as it is.

     The first play of this period was comedy named "Ralph Royster Doyster" by Nicholas Udall, and first acted by his schoolboy before 1556. The play is an adaption of the 'Miles Gloriosus', a classic comedy by Plautus. The next play was "Gammer Gurton's Needle", it is a domestic comedy, which represents peasant class. The first wholly English comedy was by William Stevenson "Dyccon of Bedlam" in 1552.

    The first tragedy was "Gorboduc" by Thomas Sackville and Thomas Norton, and was acted in 1562. This was the first play written in blank verse.

Classical influence upon Drama:

      In fifteenth century, English teacher has began to let their students (boy) to act on Latin plays, just to increase their interest, and those plays were the part of their reading of literature. Seneca was the favourite Latin author, and between 1559 and 1581, his tragedies were translated in English. In the same time, English playwrights were also writing plays.

Dramatic unities:

   There were three unities in the classic drama,

          Unity of time, place, and action were strictly observed. Time and place in the play must remain same from the starting to the ending. The play should be completed within twenty - four hours. The characters should be the same from the starting to ending, and the scenes of bloodshed and crime were not allowed to perform on stage. There was a strict line between comedy and tragedy.

      

          The English drama was different. it has started representing whole life in a single play. They have presented characters not at a single place, on limited time and with one action.

       

        There were two schools of English drama, the university wits, and popular playwrights. They have disregarded the unities to present the real life plays and its experience. The first plays of English literature were of romantic types. The first playhouse known as "The Theatre" was built in 1576 by James Burbage in Finsbury Fields, in London. A Dutch traveller, Johannes de Witt, who visited London in 1596, has given new interior of the theatre. They were built of stones and wood, in round octagonal shape, and without a roof. The stage in all the theatres was an uncovered platform, with a curtain. 

         Before Shakespeare, there were many dramatists, the plays performances started by the school masters and their trainings, then the choir-masters, there was a dramatization of Chaucer's stories, and finally English drama got regular playwrights like, Kyd, Nash, Lyly, Peele, and Marlow and after that there was Shakespeare. 

Works Cited

Long, W. J. "English Literature." Long, W. J. English Literature. n.d.