The functional aspect of the phoneme

Date: 2015-10-07; view: 811.

The phoneme is a minimal abstract linguistic unit realized in speech in the form of speech sounds opposable to other phonemes of the same language to distinguish the meaning of morphemes and words.

The phoneme as a functional language unit performs 3 functions: distinctive, constitutive and recognitive.

The phoneme fulfills the distinctive function distinguishing one morpheme from another, one word from another or one utterance from another. The opposition of phonemes in the same phonetic environment differentiates the meaning of morphemes and words: e.g. said – says, light – like. The opposition of phonemes can distinguish the meaning of the whole phrases: He was heard badly. – He was hurt badly.

The phoneme is material, real and objective. It is realized in speech in the form of speech sounds, its allophones. The phonemes constitute the material form of morphemes, so this function may be called constitutive function.

The phoneme performs the recognitive function, because the use of the right allophones facilitates recognition. The listener may pick up a lot of information about the speaker: about the locality he lives in, regional origin, his social status, age and emotional state (angry, tired, excited). Most of this social information comes from phonetic distinctions.