The Syllable

The Syllable

Introduction:-

        Language is made of different sound. One sound is one syllable. It is a unit of some length. It consists one or more speech sounds. Consonants and vowels joined together make them. Any word is made up at least of one or more syllables. We can notice and analyses in a word. But we can’t restrict them.

Monosyllables:-

        There are some word which have only one sound or syllable. They are called monosyllables or monosyllabic words. Notice the words girl, boy, shirt, came, go,, ant, up, cut etc. They are monosyllables.

Multi – syllables:-

        There are some words which have more than one sound called syllable. If there are more syllables, they can be recognized according to their numbers. Syllables division is marked by a hypen. e.g. tai-lor. As there are two syllables it is a disyllabic word. Remember’ has three syllables‘re-men-ber’. ‘Population’ has four and ‘examination’ has five syllables.

        But all the time marking by hypen is not possible some alphabets represent two sounds. Look the word ‘example’. Here ‘x’ represents two sounds /g/ and /z/. How to separate them. //g/ sound goes with /i/ and `z/ sounds goes with /a:/. To avoid this problem phonetic transcription is helpful. Syllable marking is done there easily. e.g.

Cigarette à si-g-ret.

Captain à kæp-tin

Possibility à p-s-bi-li-ti

        Often it is not easy to find out /point out ot show where one syllable ends one the other  begins. ‘Cigarette can be the divided into two ways: ‘si-g-ret.’ And ‘sig - -ret. But as far as phonology allows it can be done. Meaning is important.

Syllable Composition:-

        Syllable is or can be a composition of consonants and vowels. There are a few syllables which are made of only vowels e.g. ‘ah’, ‘oh’, ‘I’. /u/ and /a:/ spoken respectively. If a syllable has more than one speech sounds. One of them will be a vowel and rest consonant. e.g. ‘any’ it is made of /e/ and /ni/. Dipthong is considered a single sound unit. To understand the composition of a word some terms should be useful.

The vowel in a syllable is a centre unit. It is known as ‘nucleus’.

First consonant of a syllable is called ‘releasing consonant.

Where the word ends, the last consonant is called ‘arresting consonant’.

A consonant is symbolized by C.

A vowel is symbolized by V.

Now lets take an example.

        A word cat has structure of CVC. Phonetic transcription ‘kæt’ helps us to understand. /æ/ is nucleus. /k/ is realizing and /t/ is arresting consonant. Nucleus arrests /t/ sound.

Some syllables have only the nucleus. They have V structure only. e.g.

I = /ai/

Eye = /ai/

Oh = /u/

Ah = /a:/

Some syllables have VC structure. The vowel arrests the following consonant. e.g.

Am = /æm/ /a:m/

All = /: l/

Up = /^p/

Ass = /æs/

Some have CV structure.  .e.g.

Be= /bi:/  taper = /tei-p/

She = /si:/        see = /si/

So = /su/        go = gu/

Some have CVC structure.  e.g.

Boat - /but/    room = /rum/

Come = /k^m/  spme = /s^m/

Gone = /g^n/.

        English Language allows three consonant to begin a syllable and four syllable to ends. i. e. CCC in the beinging and CCCC at the end. Thus there can be consonant clusters.

Closed and open syllable:-

        A syllable that ends in a consonant is called a closed consonant. E.g. ‘bad’, ‘good’, ‘dog’, add’ etc. The syllable ends in a vowel is called open syllable e.g. ‘tea’, ‘go’, ’bee’, ‘be’, ‘she’, ‘crow’ etc.

Syllable consonant:-

        As we have seen that nucleus is important. It joins releasing and arresting consonants. But there are some cases where consonants join purpose of nucleus or a vowel. This is also a reason that even thought they are consonant. treated as vowel and articulated as V e.g.

Kettle = ke-tl/ cattle= /kæ- t;/        little = /li-tl/

Cotton = /k-tn/      sudden = /s^-dn/      ridden = /ri-dn/

        Such syllables are called syllabic consonants. And their structure is CV, as /m/, /n/, /l/ and /r/ occupy the V position in some syllables.

        Thus understanding of syllable will help us in understanding phonology are phonetic levels which are very much useful in poetry and tones