NATURE OF SPEECH AND ITS INTERPRETATION 131 



In order to understand the construction of the articulation lists 

 and also to interj^ret the results of this investij^ation, I desire to 

 give here a brief classification of the speech sounds, which is based 

 upon tiie position of the various speech organs when the sounds are 

 being produced. It is shown in the accompanying table (Table I). 



The pure vowels are arranged in the vowel triangle, which is familiar 

 to phoneticians. Starting with the sound u the lips are rounded 

 and there is formed a single resonant cavity in the front part of the 

 mouth. Passing along the left side of the triangle from u to a the 

 mouth is gradually opened with the tongue lowered to form the suc- 

 cessive vowels. Going along the right side of the triangle from a to 

 e, the tongue is gradually raised to the front part of the mouth form- 

 ing two resonant chambers in the mouth cavity. An infinite number 

 of different shadings of these vowels may be produced by placing 

 the mouth in the various intermediate positions, but the ones which 

 are shown were chosen as being the most distinct. 



The sounds w, y, ou, I and h are classed as combinational and 

 transitional vowels. As the mouth is placed in the position to say u 

 and then suddenly changed so as to form any other vowel in the 

 triangle, the result obtained is signified in writing by placing the 

 ktter w before the vowel. In a similar way we get the effect usually 

 designated by y if the position of the vowel suddenly changes from 

 e to any other vowel. An infinite variety of dipthongs can be formed 

 by changing the position of the mouth necessary to form one vowel 

 to that to form another without interrupting the voice. The most 

 distinct and principal ones used in our language are formed by passing 

 from the sound a to either extreme corner of the triangle and are 

 known as ou and I. When a vowel commences a syllable it is formed 

 by suddenly opening the glottis, permitting the air, which has been 

 held in the lungs, to escape into the mouth, which is formed for the 

 proper vowel. If the glottis remains open and the vowel is started 

 by the sudden contraction of the lungs, we have the effect which is 

 represented in writing by placing an h before the vowel. The sounds 

 1 and r are called semi-vowels because the voice train is partially 

 interrupted, although the sound can be continued. The stop and 

 fricative consonants are classified in a manner which is familiar to 

 phoneticians. 



It will be noticed that the markings are not those used in the inter- 

 national phonetic alphabet which were entirely too complicated for 

 practical use. Only the bar and accent stroke are used. These 

 can be written quickly and with little chance of error. 



In order to pronounce these speech sounds properly, they must 



