Talk:Phonology

Article Checklist for "Phonology"

Workgroup category or categories	Linguistics Workgroup [Categories OK]
Article status	External article: from another source, with little change
Underlinked article?	No
Basic cleanup done?	No
Checklist last edited by	John Stephenson 01:02, 12 March 2007 (CDT)

To learn how to fill out this checklist, please see CZ:The Article Checklist.

---

Orthography?

I have a question/comment about the intro paragraph.

Phonology is a subfield of linguistics which studies the system speakers use to represent language; this includes units of sound, letters on a page, hand movements in a sign language, and even the dots and dashes of Morse code. For example, cat can be expressed through the utterance [kæt], the letters c, a and t, or a sign made with the hands.

Do we really want to say that phonology is concerned with orthography and even Morse code? I don't think that's correct, except perhaps to the extent that certain writing systems can reveal something about the phonemic inventory of the language. But I don't think that is what's intended by the paragraph, and if it is, I think the paragraph as written is misleading.

Where did this content come from, anyway? It sounds similar to the intro of the Wikipedia article on phonology, but there's currently no language about writing systems there. Aaron Jacobs 02:08, 25 March 2007 (CDT)

Well don't I feel dumb? I could have sworn that I checked the first revision of this article and that the language about orthography was in there, but I just checked again (or for the first time) and it turns out is was actually added by John Stephenson. I'm still not sure it's correct. Does anyone have any comments? Aaron Jacobs 02:15, 25 March 2007 (CDT)

The composition of signs in sign languages is considered to be analogous to the phonological structure of oral languages, so they certainly belong here. As for Morse Code, I'm not so sure. In fact, I'm not sure that phonology can be ascribed to any written form of a language. --Joe Quick (Talk) 03:11, 25 March 2007 (CDT)

Yeah, that's basically what I'm saying. I'm not disputing that sign languages have a system that is analogous to spoken language phonology. But I don't think that orthography and Morse code (!!) belong in a list of subjects phonology is concerned with. If no one posts any objections within the next day or so, I'll remove the language in question. Aaron Jacobs 13:24, 25 March 2007 (CDT)

Phonology isn't really concerned with orthography, but in some systems, such as English, orthography is concerned with phonology - orthography is another way of representing the same system. Each letter, or combination of letters, represents phonemic information, although there is a morphemic element as well so that we describe the system as 'morphophonemic'. What I was saying was that phonology is not 'brain phonetics' - it's not actually about sounds themselves, but the units used to represent language. These units, i.e. combinations of phonological features, may be spelt out as vibrations in air pressure produced by the vocal organs, or by signs, and effectively by other mechanisms too. Since Morse code uses dots and dashes to represent letters of the alphabet, it follows that it's phonologically-based too.

I don't mind losing the Morse code stuff as it might be confusing, but I was trying to avoid people getting the idea that phonology is about sound. As has been pointed out, e.g. by Davenport and Hannahs (2005: 3), phonetics and phonology are only "accidentally related". John Stephenson 01:36, 31 March 2007 (CDT)

I see what you're saying and I think you're essentially right, but I still disagree with the wording of the paragraph I quoted earlier (specifically the parts I removed from the article). It seems to be saying something different, even if by accident. Aaron Jacobs 02:47, 31 March 2007 (CDT)