John Harris (phonologist)

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John Harris
Born1954
Education University of Edinburgh (PhD)
Scientific career
Fields linguistics
Institutions University College London
Thesis Linguistic change in a nonstandard dialect: phonological studies in the history of English in Ireland  (1983)
Doctoral advisor Roger Lass, Gillian Brown
Other academic advisors Jim Milroy, Lesley Milroy, John C Wells, Nigel Gotteri

John Harris (born 1954) is an Irish linguist and Emeritus Professor of Linguistics at University College London. He is best known for his works on phonetics and phonology. [1] [2] [3] [4] A festschrift in his honor titled Sonic Signatures edited by Geoff Lindsey and Andrew Nevins was published in 2017. [5]

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Glottis</span> Opening between the vocal folds

The glottis is the opening between the vocal folds. The glottis is crucial in producing sound from the vocal folds.

Phonology is the branch of linguistics that studies how languages systematically organize their phones or, for sign languages, their constituent parts of signs. The term can also refer specifically to the sound or sign system of a particular language variety. At one time, the study of phonology related only to the study of the systems of phonemes in spoken languages, but may now relate to any linguistic analysis either:

Received Pronunciation (RP) is the accent traditionally regarded as the standard and most prestigious form of spoken British English. For over a century, there has been argument over such questions as the definition of RP, whether it is geographically neutral, how many speakers there are, whether sub-varieties exist, how appropriate a choice it is as a standard, and how the accent has changed over time. The name itself is controversial. RP is an accent, so the study of RP is concerned only with matters of pronunciation, while other areas relevant to the study of language standards, such as vocabulary, grammar, and style, are not considered.

An affricate is a consonant that begins as a stop and releases as a fricative, generally with the same place of articulation. It is often difficult to decide if a stop and fricative form a single phoneme or a consonant pair. English has two affricate phonemes, and, often spelled ch and j, respectively.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Glottal stop</span> Sound made by stopping airflow in the glottis

The glottal stop or glottal plosive is a type of consonantal sound used in many spoken languages, produced by obstructing airflow in the vocal tract or, more precisely, the glottis. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ⟨ʔ⟩.

Pronunciation is the way in which a word or a language is spoken. This may refer to generally agreed-upon sequences of sounds used in speaking a given word or language in a specific dialect or simply the way a particular individual speaks a word or language.

English phonology is the system of speech sounds used in spoken English. Like many other languages, English has wide variation in pronunciation, both historically and from dialect to dialect. In general, however, the regional dialects of English share a largely similar phonological system. Among other things, most dialects have vowel reduction in unstressed syllables and a complex set of phonological features that distinguish fortis and lenis consonants.

An obstruent is a speech sound such as, , or that is formed by obstructing airflow. Obstruents contrast with sonorants, which have no such obstruction and so resonate. All obstruents are consonants, but sonorants include vowels as well as consonants.

Geoff Lindsey is a British linguist, writer and director. He has written episodes for television series including the BBC soap opera EastEnders and The Bill, and runs a YouTube channel focusing on linguistics.

Government Phonology (GP) is a theoretical framework of linguistics, and more specifically of phonology. The framework aims to provide a non-arbitrary account for phonological phenomena by replacing the rule component of SPE-type phonology with well-formedness constraints on representations. Thus, it is a non-derivational representation-based framework, and as such, the current representative of Autosegmental Phonology. GP subscribes to the claim that Universal Grammar is composed of a restricted set of universal principles and parameters. As in Noam Chomsky’s principles and parameters approach to syntax, the differences in phonological systems across languages are captured through different combinations of parameter settings.

Flapping or tapping, also known as alveolar flapping, intervocalic flapping, or t-voicing, is a phonological process involving a voiced alveolar tap or flap; it is found in many varieties of English, especially North American, Cardiff, Ulster, Australian and New Zealand English, where the voiceless alveolar stop consonant phoneme is pronounced as a voiced alveolar flap, a sound produced by briefly tapping the alveolar ridge with the tongue, when placed between vowels. In London English, the flapped is perceived as a casual pronunciation intermediate between the "posh" affricate and the "rough" glottal stop. In some varieties,, the voiced counterpart of, may also be frequently pronounced as a flap in such positions, making pairs of words like latter and ladder sound similar or identical. In similar positions, the combination may be pronounced as a nasalized flap, making winter sound similar or identical to winner.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Near-close near-back rounded vowel</span> Vowel sound represented by ⟨ʊ⟩ in IPA

The near-close near-back rounded vowel, or near-high near-back rounded vowel, is a type of vowel sound, used in some spoken languages. The IPA symbol that represents this sound is ⟨ʊ⟩. It is informally called "horseshoe u". Prior to 1989, there was an alternative IPA symbol for this sound, ⟨ɷ⟩, called "closed omega"; use of this symbol is no longer sanctioned by the IPA. In Americanist phonetic notation, the symbol ⟨⟩ is used. Sometimes, especially in broad transcription, this vowel is transcribed with a simpler symbol ⟨u⟩, which technically represents the close back rounded vowel.

Charles Reiss is an American linguistics professor teaching at Concordia University in Montreal.

A phonological rule is a formal way of expressing a systematic phonological or morphophonological process in linguistics. Phonological rules are commonly used in generative phonology as a notation to capture sound-related operations and computations the human brain performs when producing or comprehending spoken language. They may use phonetic notation or distinctive features or both.

Elisabeth O. Selkirk is a theoretical linguist specializing in phonological theory and the syntax-phonology interface. She is currently a professor emerita in the Department of Linguistics at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.

Raymond Kevin Hickey is an Irish linguist specialising in the English language in Ireland, especially in the capital Dublin, working within the sociolinguistic paradigm of language variation and change. Hickey has also worked on the Irish language, specifically the phonology of the modern language. For both Irish and English in Ireland he has carried out extensive fieldwork for over three decades.

Monik Charette is a French-Canadian linguist and phonologist who taught at SOAS the University of London, in the United Kingdom. She specializes in phonology, morphophonology, stress systems, vowel harmony, syllabic structure and word-structure, focusing on Altaic languages, Turkish, and French.

Colin J. Ewen is Emeritus Professor of English Linguistics and Phonology at Leiden University. He is known for his works on phonology and is an editor of the journal Phonology.

Elizabeth Cook Zsiga is a linguist whose work focuses on phonology and phonetics. She is a Professor of Linguistics at Georgetown University.

<i>Phonological Knowledge</i> Book edited by Noel Burton-Roberts, Philip Carr & Gerard Docherty

Phonological Knowledge: Conceptual and Empirical Issues is a 2000 book edited by Noel Burton-Roberts, Philip Carr and Gerard Docherty in which the authors deal with different approaches to describing and explaining the nature of phonological knowledge in the speaker’s grammar.

References

  1. "John Harris - Publications". academictree.org.
  2. "FIST Project". www.fistproject.org.
  3. "English Sound Structure | Wiley". Wiley.com.
  4. "English sound structure. By JOHNHARRIS. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 1994".
  5. Lindsey, Geoff. "Sonic Signatures". John Benjamins Publishing Company.