Phonemes vs allophones

 

Phonemes vs allophones

In linguistics, the different sounds (or phonetic realization) of the same phoneme are called allophones. ‘Allo’ means different or variant. The variants within a phoneme category are called allophones. Slashes ‘/’ are used to indicate phonemes, and brackets ‘[‘ are used to indicate allophones. To distinguish phonemes and allophones, let’s define phonemes more clearly. Phonemes are the smallest units of sound that serve to distinguish meaning between words. When we change the phonemes in a word, we change the meaning of the word, that is, we are pronouncing different words. So if there is a problem with phonemes, people will misunderstand us. For example, 

I like the kit.

If I accidentally pronounced ‘d’ instead of ‘t’, so if I said,

I like the kid

then I am saying something entirely different from the statement, ‘I like the kit.’ Unlike the phoneme changes, when we use different allophones, we don’t change words. We just say the same word differently. In the following, we explain why people might say the same word differently using the examples of two allophones of /t/, which are the glottal stop and the alveolar flap. 

Glottal stopping for /t/, [ʔ]

Now, native speakers might pronounce the same word differently, yet are understood, to express aspects that are beyond the scope of linguistics: e.g., status, class, elegance, or modernity. This phenomenon happens in any language. For example, young people speak differently from old people. There are many means to speak differently (like uptalk or vocal fry), and saying words differently is one way. For instance, presently in the US and England, some people seem to believe that using a glottal stop, [ʔ], instead of the full pronunciation of /t/ in certain phonetic environments, is a way to show modernity and urbanness. So, for instance, instead of pronouncing the ‘T’ in “mountain” and “titan,” they will use [ʔ]: “mountain” and “titan”. This [ʔ] is an allophone of /t/ since it is a different way of realizing the /t/ sound. 

Alveolar flapping for /t/, [ɾ]

While substituting /Ɂ/ for /t/ can be viewed as a frivolous linguistic fashion statement, some allophones are so entrenched in the language that it is obligatory for us non-native speakers to know. For example, 

Can I have water?

If someone said ‘water’ in its canonical phoneme form, that is, with an aspirated voiceless ‘t’, ‘Can I have water’, then the person will be understood, but will not sound right to the American ear. To sound right to American ear, we need to use an allophone of t, called flap T, where voiceless /t/ is pronounced as a voiced alveolar flap [ɾ]. The flap T is so prevalent in American English that people call the allophone of /t/ the “American T.”