Lecture 2 The Functional Aspect of Speech Sounds

Phonological schools in Russia and abroad
The phoneme theory was first formulated at the end of the 19^th century. Its founder was Prof. I.A. Baudouin de Courtenay (Kazan, St. Petersburg). Though his theory lacks consistency and there are some drawbacks in it. It initiated the development of the phoneme theory in Russia as well as abroad.
The various phonological schools chiefly differ in their solution of the two main problems of phonology: (1) the definition of the inventory of the phonemes of a given language and (2) the definition of the phonemic status of speech sounds in unstressed positions.
The phoneme theory in Russia is developing in two directions. Hence, two phonological schools are distinguished here: the Moscow School and the St. Petersburg School.
To the Moscow School belong R.I. Avanesov, R. I. Reformatsky, P.S. Kuznetsov, N.P. Yakovlev, V.N. Sidorov and their supporters. They have developed Baudounfs morphonological conception of the early period. They investigate the phoneme mostly on the basis of the Russian language.
To the St. Petersburg school belong L. Scherba and his followers (L.R. Zinder, O.I. Dikushina, M.I. Matusevitch, V.A. Vassilyev, G.P. Torsuyev and others). They investigate the problem on the basis of foreign languages.
Prof. L.V. Scherba has adopted and developed I.A. Baudouin de Courtenay's psychological conception of the late period. Continuing the work of his teacher L.V. Scherba has created a truly materialistic phoneme theory and was the first to advance the idea of the distinctive function of the phoneme.
The representatives of the Moscow phonological school consider that the same speech sound may belong to different phonemes. For instance, the following pairs of words are pronounced identically:
Луг- лук рос – роз
Рот - род кос – коз
Бачок - бочок вода - вод
(The voiced consonants in final position are devoiced; the vowels in unstressed position are reduced.)
According to the Moscow School the /k/ sound of the word "