Sapir, E. (1933). The psychological reality of
phonemes. In The Writings of Edward Sapir
(pp. 46–60).
HIS LIFE
1st to use comparative linguistics with the allegedly
“too primitive” Native Amerindian languages
HIS RESEARCH
• Sapir (1933) was the first to argue explicitly
that the phoneme is a unit of perception, by
showing how phonemic perception could
account for a variety of otherwise puzzling
“errors” made by his native consultants. In
one example, Tony, a native speaker of
Southern Paiute being taught to write his
language phonetically, transcribed [ˈpaːˌßaʰ]
‘at the water’ as [ˈpaːˌpaʰ]. (259)
/paːpaː/
Dresher, B. E. (2011). The Phoneme. In M.
van Oostendorp, C. J. Ewen, E. Hume, & K.
Rice (Eds.), The Blackwell Companion to
Phonology (1st ed., Vol. 1 General, pp. 241–
266). Malden, Mass.: Wiley-Blackwell.
IN GRAVE NEED OF AUDACITY®, PRAAT©, AND IPA
•
…that the -ni of “this one” ended in a pure vowel with
little or no breath release, while the –ni of “it makes a
sound” had a more audible breath release, was
properly –ni’. (52)
•
It does not seem, however, that there is an actual
phonetic difference between the –s- (phonologically –
s-) of such words as tlasatl “the stick takes an upright
position on the beach” (=tla-satl), pronounced tlaṡ atl,
and the –ṡ- of –’assatl above. (55)
THE CLUB/POLE (PHONEMIC) DISTINCTION
• Or better yet, Gold…
• Obvious alloys, yellow, red, and white
• Purity? 18k vs 24k?
• /p/  [pʰ] / #___
[p] / s__
etc…
“pot”
“report”; “apply”
“top”
“spot”
“empty”; “apple”
https://www.ualberta.ca/~tnearey/Ling205/Week3/WBP
honemesAndAllophonesEngCs4Up.pdf
“TO THE NAÏVE SPEAKER AND HEARER…”
Yellow gold is yellow gold
• 18k or 24k
• Diamond and graphite are different
• Even though they are both made from pure Carbon
• /p/ is /p/
• Whether it’s realized as [p] or [pʰ]
• /t/ and /d/ are different
• Despite their reduction to [ɾ]
• (e.g. “latter” vs “ladder”)
•
NATIVE SPEAKER “ERRORS” OF ANALYSIS
Trained Native Speaker (NS) transcribers of Amerindian
languages
• “Valuable evidence” for the phonemic structure of the
language
• “It is exceedingly difficult, if not impossible, to teach a
native to take account of purely mechanical phonetic
variations which have no phonemic reality for him” (48).
• Even if he is a “young man of average intelligence” (i.e.
“can read and write in English reasonably well”)
•
•
However, “…a naïve native’s phonetic ‘ignorance’ proved
phonologically more accurate than the scientist’s
“knowledge.’”
LET’S TEST IT ON…
•
Trained NS linguists of “average intelligence”
1) Find words in American English with [ʒ] in them
•
Asia, seizure, leisure, pleasure, garage, ...
2) Which [ɾ] in “international” is a tap and which is a
flap? Which vowels are nasalized?
•
•
The 1st is a tap (in), the 2nd a flap (out)
All of the vowels are nasalized
WAS IT BECAUSE YOU WERE “CARELESS,” OR
BECAUSE YOU TEND TO JUST, “CONFUSE
SOUNDS”?
• Neither!
• Due to the phonology of the language
• Ex. Southern Paiute
[θ]?
FURTHER COMPLICATIONS
•
Homonymous words (not necessarily homonyms?)
• Phonetically identical, but phonemically distinct
•
“…it is possible for perfectly homonymous words to
give the speaker the illusion of phonetic difference
because of the different contexts in which they
appear or because the different positions they
occupy in their respective systems” (52).
•
Ex. of this sort of illusion:
•
“Bored”/“board”
TRANSCRIPTION: PHONETIC VS. PHONEMIC
NSs have a subtle knowledge of the phonology of their
language, but are poor at phonetic transcriptions
“…were English not a written language…” would Sapir
believe NSs that pin/pen are different?
•
•
•
•
Ex. Korean “can’t”
•
Prounounced [mᵇot̚-tʰé] but written “mos hae”
Phonemic transcriptions are bad for learners of the
language, because they will perceive the phonemes as
their native ones
• Sp. nacional, fruta, juez, etc.
NNS TRANSCRIBERS
•
NS of English over-transcribing glottal stops
• Sapir: “But English has no glottal stop…the
glottal stop is the most unreal or zerolike of
consonants to an English or American ear” (5859)
• Yet it is a clear allophone in most dialects of
English, is it not?
• …was Sapir, then, a “victim of his phonologic
system”?
NNS TRANSCRIBERS (CONT.)
• NS of English over-transcribing glottal stops
• Still, Sapir had a good explanation:
•
Because we're not used to hearing short
vowels at the end of the word (unless it is
followed by a consonant), the transcribers
automatically placed the newly learned glottal
stop phonetic marker when they heard a
short vowel at the end of a word.
CONCLUSIONS
• Developments
1. Discribed the pros and cons of training a
NS vs. a NNS as a transcriber
2. In the process, found psychological proof of
a phonemic representation in the mind of
NSs
3. Became the first to publicly argue for the
phoneme as a unit of perception