Content s introduction Chapter I phonological schools in linguistics and their theoretical concepts

/d/

/t/ archiphoneme

/t/

This unit may have different features in other languages. The unidimensional, privative, proportional opposition, the members of which are in similar relations with each other, combined into correlation: /p-b/, /t-d/, /s-z/, /ʃ-ʒ/, /f-v/, /θ-ð/, /ʧ-ʤ/, /k-g/. Such pairs of phoneme are called as correlation pairs and the feature voiced - voiceless (resp. fortis - lenis) is called as the feature of correlation.

Constant oppositions are those, which are not neutralized in some positions and always preserve their distinctive features. However, there may be cases when two phonemes are opposed in some position, but not in others. For example, English /p/ and /b/ are not opposed after /s/, because only one of them can occur after /s/ as in the word spin. Such types of neutralization is called contextual which appear in many languages. After N.S. Trubetzkoy’s definition of neutralization there were attempts to classify neutralizations into several other types.

N.S. Trubetzkoy advanced a valuable theory and methods available in paradigmatic analysis of phonemes i.e. in establishing phonological and non-phonological oppositions. However, there are some shortcomings in his description of syntagmatic relations of phonemes. B. Trnka⁸, J.Vachek, by V.A. Vassilyev and A. Cohen⁹, applied N.S. Trubetzkoy’s theory to the description of the phonemic system of English.