THE SYLLABLE

The psychological Reality of Syllables

There are many indications that the syl. is a
psychological unit:
1- It is part of the native speaker’s intuition to
identify syllables.
2- Speakers of unwritten lges, if asked to divide a
word into its constituent parts, will usually divide it
into syls. Rather than segments.
3- Eng-speaking children before they are introduced
to the alphabetic writing system do the same thing.
• 4- In any lge, a given word will be divided into
the same number of syls. by nearly all speakers
(although they may not agree as to where the
syls. Begin and end).
• Eg: articulation, astronomical, occupy
• 5- The ease with which speakers with no lxc
training can identify the number of syls. In a
word is even more striking when one considers
the difficulty these same speakers have in
determining the number of individual sounds in
a word: eg: singer 2 syls. But how many
sounds?
• 6- Speakers of all dialects agree on the number of
syls. In most words. But even in those words
with a variable number of syls., there is generally
agreement within a given dialect: secretary:
British(3 Syls.); American speakers (4 Syls.)
• 7- Even speakers of the same dialect may vary in
the number of syllables they ascribe to certain
words, but this too falls within some predictable
limits:
• Thus, these speakers pronounce Reckoning and
wobbly with 2 or 3 syls. but not 4 or 1.
 - What precisely is a syllable?
- How do people determine the number of syls.
in any given word?
- How do speakers segment a given utterance
into discrete syllables?
- Various answers have been given to these
questions.
- The first attempt:
- Syllables can be defined both phonetically
and phonologically.
• Phonetically (in relation to the way we
produce them and the way they sound):
• Syls. are usually described as consisting of a
centre which has little or no obstruction to
airflow and which sounds comparatively loud.
• Before and after this centre there will be
greater obstruction to airflow and/ or less
loud sound.
• Eg: 1- minimum syllable: a single vowel in
isolation: are, or, err (these are preceded and
followed by silence)
• 2- Isolated sounds such as ‘m’ to indicate
agreement and ‘sh’ to ask for silence.
• Some syls. Have an onset: car, key, more
• 3- Syls. may have no onset but have a coda
(termination): am, ought, ease.
• 4- Some syls. Have an onset and termination:
run , sat , fill
• There are problems with this phonetic
description of the syllable, particularly in the
matter of deciding on the division b/w syls.:
• going /gəʊing/: 2 syls.; but where is the division
b/w the 2 syls.?
• We know that the /ʊ/ is part of the diphthong
but this is a fact of phonology not of the
phonetic structure of the syllable.
• Consider also ‘extra’: e+kstrə, ek+strə, eks+trə,
ekst+rə, ekstr+ə .
• This way of looking at the syl. is not useful.
• Looking at the syllable from the phonological
point of view is quite different:
• We will have to look at the possible
combinations of English phonemes:
• 1-What can occur in the initial position: the
word can begin with a vowel or with one or
three consonants
• 2- how a word ends when it is the last word
spoken before a pause: it can end with a
vowel, or with 1, 2, 3 or even four consonants.
• No word ends with more than 4 consonants.
• In English, if the first syllable of the word in
question begins with a vowel, any vowel may
occur, though /ʊ/ is very rare.
• If the syllable begins with one consonant that
consonant may be anything except /η/
• No sequence of stops can begin English words.
• Here we are talking about consonant clusters
and sequential constraints
• More sequential constraints:
• ## C C C
• s p r
• t y
• k w
• If a word begins with 3 Cs in English, then the first
must be /s/, the second must be /p, t, k/ and the
third must / l, r, y, w /
• Any other word initial combination of 3 Cs is
unacceptable: eg: fpl, sfl, spv.
• The if-then condition allows word-initial: spl-, spr-,
stl-, str, skl, and skr- clusters.
• In Eng. Words can begin with pl- and kl- but no
corresponding word *tlay.
• There are even severe restrictions on the
occurrence of CCy- and CCw-: when /y-/ is the
third C, the following V must be /u/ as in spew
• Also when the third C is /w/, the second
consonant must be /k/ as in square.
• In conclusion, what all these cases show is that
words and larger utterances can be syllabified
on the basis of phonotactics or sequential
constraints of a given language, thus
considering the syllable as a phonological unit.
• The pattern of the syllable in English is:
• Pre- initial post- vowel pre- final post- post-
• Initial initial final final final
• 1 2

onset peak coda

• Malmberg (1963:129) says:
• ‘ A syllable consisting of a consonant plus a vowel
represents the most primitive, and without doubt
historically the oldest, of all syllable types, the
only one which is general in all languages’.
• Whenever languages have syllable types other
than CV, complications arise in the exact
determination of syllable boundaries:
• Should a word with the structure: CVCCV be
syllabified as CV$CCV or CVC$CV?:
• Consider ‘captain’ ‘teller’ ‘employ’ ‘exploit’
• As mentioned before, for phonological
purposes, only a single division is relevant
namely bet. 1)The onset and 2) the core
including the peak and the coda.
• This analysis of the syllable is represented by
Pike and Pike (1974): Syllable

• onset core

• peak coda
• There are two types of the syllable:
• Open as opposed to closed syllables:
• An open syllable ends in a vowel while a closed
one is checked or arrested by a consonant.
• Thus, the onset is irrelevant in determining the
phonological properties of a syllable.
• The basic assumption in phonological
approaches to the syllable is that there is an
intimate relationship bet. Word structure and
syllable structure: the same sequential
constraints which operate at the beg. Of a word
should be operative at the beg. Of a syllable
• Similarly, the same sequential constraints
which operate at the end of a word should be
operative at the end of a syllable.
• For this purpose, Pulgram (1970) proposes 3
principles:
• 1- a principle of maximal open syllabicity
• 2- a principle of minimal coda and maximal
onset
• 3- a principle of the irregular coda
• By the first principle a syllable boundary is inserted after
every vowel or diphthong /ru$stə/ / ma$stə/
• Employ /e$mploy/ or /em$ploy/
• By the third principle, the coda should bear the irregularity
of the phonological sequences rather than the onset:
• Example: the Spanish word
• Transcribir: /tra $ nscribir/
• /tran $ scribir/
• /trans $ cribir/