Minimal pair
From Freepedia
In phonology, minimal pairs are pairs of words or phrases in a particular language, which differ in only one phoneme, toneme or chroneme and have a distinct meaning. They are used to demonstrate that two phones constitute two separate phonemes in the language.
English "let" + "lit" proves that phones [ɛ] and [ɪ] do in fact represent distinct phonemes /ɛ/ and /ɪ/. The phones do not have to be vowels, as the English minimal pair of "pat" + "bat" shows. In fact, this pair differs in voice onset time of the initial consonant as the configuration of the mouth is same for [p] and [b]; however, there is also a possible difference in duration, which visual analysis using high quality video supports.
Phonemic differentiation may vary between different dialects of a language, so that a particular minimal pair in one accent is a pair of homophones in another. This does not necessarily mean that one of the phonemes is absent in the homonym accent; merely that it is not present in the same range of contexts.
Contents |
Examples
Differentiations in English
Following pairs prove existence of various distinct phonemes in English.
| word 1 | word 2 | IPA 1 | IPA 2 | note |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| pin | bin | /pin/ | /bin/ | initial consonant |
| rot | lot | /rɑt/ | /lɑt/ | |
| zeal | seal | /ziːl/ | /siːl/ | |
| bin | bean | /bɪn/ | /biːn/ | vowel |
| pen | pan | /pɛn/ | /pæːn/ | |
| hat | had | /hæt/ | /hæd/ | final consonant |
Differentiating consonants with same location and manner of articulation
In the articulation of bilabial plosives, 4 phones are defined by the characteristics voiced/unvoiced and aspirated/unaspirated: [p], [pʰ], [b] and [bʰ]. In different languages only some of these may occur and the number of phonemes formed may be different again.
- In English, phones [p] as in "spin" and [pʰ] as in "pin" both occur, but are allophones of the phoneme /p/ and no minimal pair can be found to distinguish them, but the word "bin" shows that the phone [b] forms a phoneme /b/ separate from /p/.
- In Mandarin only phones (and phonemes) [p] and [pʰ] occur. In the Pinyin transcription /pʰ/ is written "p" and /p/ is written "b" (using the two available latin letters for the two phonemes).
- In French and many other European langages only phones (and phonemes) [p] and [b] occur.
- In Hindi, all four phones are separate phonemes.
- In Thai, three phones occur and form three phonemes, as shown by the example:
| word | IPA | meaning |
|---|---|---|
| ใบ | /baɪ/ | sheet |
| ไป | /paɪ/ | to go |
| ภัย | /pʰaɪ/ | danger |
Differentiating vowels
The following table shows a minimal set in French distinguishing vowels, some or all of which may sound alike to an Anglophone, because the [œ] and [y] sounds do not exist in English:
| word | IPA | meaning |
|---|---|---|
| cire | /siʁ/ | wax |
| sûre | /syʁ/ | sure |
| soeur | /sœʁ/ | sister |
| sieur | /siœʁ/ | sir |
| sueur | /syœʁ/ | sweat |
Differentiating consonants
A minimal triplet of consonants in French is:
| word | IPA | meaning |
|---|---|---|
| bête noire | /betnwaʁ/ | black beast, pet peeve |
| baie noire | /benwaʁ/ | black berry (not blackberry, which is mûre sauvage) |
| baignoire | /beɲwaʁ/ | bathtub |
Because [tn] is not a single phoneme in French, this shows a minimal pair between the presence and absence of [t] next to [n], which shares its point of articulation. [n] and [ɲ] differ only in point of articulation.
There are three verbs in Hebrew which demonstrate the distinction, in some dialects, between a velar stop and an uvular stop on one hand, and a glottal stop with and without tightening of the throat on the other:
| word | transcription | meaning |
|---|---|---|
| קרא | qara' | read, call |
| קרע | qara` | tear apart |
| כרע | kara` | kneel |
In the following two Hebrew verbs, the only distinction is a glottal stop in the middle of the first word:
| word | transcription | meaning |
|---|---|---|
| לראות | lir'oth | see |
| לירות | liroth | shoot |
In Korean, phones [r] in Korea and [l] in Seoul are allophones of the phoneme /l/ and are perceived by native speakers of Korean as a single letter i.e. phoneme. The difference is that [r] is pronounced before vowels.
In Spanish, [z] and [s] are both allophones of /s/ and [z] appears only before voiced consonants as in mismo /mizmo/.
Differentiating chronemes
Latin did have and Hungarian and Italian do have distinctive length of consonants. A differentiator for length is called a chroneme. E.g. in Italian (note that IPA allows to indicate length by doubling the symbol, which is commonly used for consonants, while with vowels mostly the special lengthening sign /ː/ is used)
| word | IPA | meaning |
|---|---|---|
| pina | /pina/ | pine |
| pinna | /pinna/ | fin |
Latin did have and Hungarian, German and Thai do have distinctive vowel length, e.g. in Thai (and compare this example also to the one on tone)
| word | IPA | RTGS | quality | meaning |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| เขา | /kʰǎw/ | khǎo | short, rising tone | he/she |
| ขาว | /kʰǎːw/ | khǎo | long, rising tone | white |
| เข้า | /kʰâw/ | khâo | short, falling tone | enter |
| ข้าว | /kʰâːw/ | khâo | long, falling tone | rice |
| เข่า | /kʰàw/ | khào | short, low tone | knee |
| ข่าว | /kʰàːw/ | khào | long, low tone | news |
Differentiating tonemes
Languages such as Mandarin Chinese, Japanese, Thai and many African languages. (See: pitch accent and tonal language.) For example in Thai:
| word | IPA | RTGS | quality | meaning |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ขาว | /kʰǎːw/ | khǎ:o | rising tone | white |
| ข้าว | /kʰâːw/ | khâ:o | falling tone | rice |
| ข่าว | /kʰàːw/ | khà:o | low tone | news |
Differentiating stress
Spanish and Italian have many minimal pairs differing only in stress. Dutch has several, e.g. (stress indicated by acute accent)
| word | IPA | meaning |
|---|---|---|
| voorkómen | /foːrˈkoːmə/ | prevent |
| vóórkomen | /ˈfoːrkoːmə/ | occur |
On the other hand, English record (noun) and record (verb) (and similar pairs) are not minimal pairs, since word stress affects the quality of both the stressed vowel and the reduced vowel. The case is similar in Russian, eg. мука ('torture, pain') and мука ('flour') do not constitute a minimal pair, because unstressed vowels become reduced.
External Links
Minimal pairs for English RP — examples for all phoneme pairs in British Received Pronunciation
