Phonetics

Overlap in phonetic realization (e.g., unaspirated voiceless plosives after /s/).
Archiphoneme: Combines characteristics of distinct phonemes in neutral contexts.

Phonetic Conditioning

Refers to the way in which sounds are influenced by adjacent sounds=>phonemes vary in their realisations according to the phonetic context.

Assimilation: Phoneme change due to neighboring sounds. leading: bad girl in casual speech becomes [bag gɜ:ɫ]; frequent in Italian (Latin octo => It otto). lagging: on the site [ɒn nəˈsaɪt]
- Coalescence /ˌkəʊəˈlesns/
- Two features or segments merge into one feature -> the fusion of two different sounds
- Found in casual speech at word boundaries
- /t/ + /j/ -> /tʃ/ e.g. what◡you want
Allophonic variation
Elision: Deletion of phonemes (e.g., "tasteless" as [ˈteɪsləs]).
Liaison: Phoneme insertion for ease (e.g., linking/intrusive /r/).

Apraxia of Speech:
- Motor speech disorder; difficulty coordinating muscle movements. (brain problem. Can form sentences and understand them, cannot coordinate muscles)
- Common cause: stroke or neurological conditions.
- Includes Childhood Apraxia of Speech (genetic cause).
Aphasia:
- Damage to the left brain hemisphere; affects language skills (formulation, comprehension) (cannot form, cannot comprehend)
- Anomia: Inability to retrieve specific words.
Dysarthria:
- Weak muscles cause articulatory issues (e.g., in ALS, Parkinson’s). (muscle problem)
Cluttering:
- Rapid, incoherent speech with incorrect rhythm and syntax.
Stuttering:
- Repetitions, pauses, and blocking of sounds. ]’[‘
- Differs from cluttering (coherence vs. fluency issues).
Cleft Palate/Lip:
- Nasality due to incomplete closure of the palate.
Lisp:
- Inability to produce sibilants ([s], [z], etc.).

Secondary articulation

labialisation: lip-rounding; e.g. swan; rude
palatalisation: centre of tongue closer to hard palate; e.g. tune, Czech ťukat
nasalisation: part of airflow escapes through nasal cavity; e.g. morning; French bon
velarisation: back of tongue closer to soft palate; e.g. dark [ɫ] pill
uvularisation: back of tongue close to uvula; sounds in Arabic, Semitic languages
pharyngealisation: pharynx (epiglottis) is constricted; some Danish consonants
glottalisation: addition of the glottal stop; e.g. put (see below)

Selected consonantal phenomena

Glottalisation

Insertion of the glottal stop [ʔ] before voiceless plosives (p, t, k) - pre-glottalisation (also glottal reinforcement); e.g. pot [pɒʔt].
Insertion of the glottal stop in place of voiceless plosives (p, t, k) - glottalisation (also glottal replacement), e.g. pot [pɒʔ].

/g/-dropping

alveolar [n] instead of velar [ŋ] in –ing endings; e.g. doin’
Dropped /g/ stigmatised because of strong relation to orthography (but, curiously, [ŋg] forms stigmatised as well; e.g. West Midlands and Liverpool).

/th/-fronting

Dental fricatives replaced by labio-dental ones; thus /ð/ and /θ/ are replaced by /f/ and /v/ respectively.
nothing, brother, southern, etc.
possible age-grading feature?
Age-grading refers to features that occur in younger speakers but later disappear. This, however, does not signal linguistic change taking place as it reoccurs with every generation.

/h/-dropping

/l/-vocalisation

Dark /l/ [ɫ] is not released laterally (sides of tongue) and becomes a rounded vowel.
The vowel is somewhere between [o] and [ʊ].

/r/-dropping

Started in the 18th C, that’s why US English is (predominantly) rhotic (exceptions e.g. New York working-class English).
In the past, stigmatised for the lack of accordance with spelling.
rhymes such as morn / dawn considered vulgar
Dropped /r/ created new diphthongs, namely /ɪə/, /ɛə/, /ɔə/, and /ʊə/

labio-dental /r/

/r/ is replaced by a labio-dental approximant [ʋ].
No phonemic contrast between ring v. wing.
Considered a speech defect (imperfect children’s pronunciation maintained into adulthood) by some, for others it is a modern variant of the phoneme.

intrusive /r/

Linking /r/ supported by spelling (e.g. here is).
Intrusive /r/ not supported by spelling but inserted to avoid a vocalic hiatus across word boundaries (e.g. I saw him, law and order) as well as word-internally (e.g. drawing).
Used after /ɑ:/, /ɔ:/ and, in particular /ə/.
Extremely frequent in RP, even non-native learners encouraged to adopt it

yod-dropping

Yod refers to the /j/ sound present in some words of the GOOSE and CURE sets (boom v. mute ; poor v. pure).
In the past, yod was far more common: (e.g. chew, juice, rude, crew, blue, flew, etc.; now in RP these words are /j/-less).
Yod can be dropped in tune, student, duke, reduce, new, numerous, suit, solution; in RP all of them are /j/-full apart from the last two; in US English all of them /j/-less.
Yod-dropping frequent in Cockney, East Anglia (GB) and US English

yod-coalescence

Alternatively, yod can coalesce (merge) with the preceding plosives and fricatives to produce palatalised consonants:
within one word: tune, duke, issue;
across word boundaries: could you, don’t you, this year.
historically, yod-coalescence was stigmatised in many words where it is common today: e.g. sugar only [sju:gə] in the 18thC

whale-wale merger