Distinctive Feature Theory
Distinctive feature theory analyzes phonemes as bundles of smaller phonetic properties, allowing sound classes and contrasts to be characterized economically.
Definition
The theory that phonological segments are composed of distinctive features, the minimal properties that distinguish phonemes and define natural classes.
Scope
This topic presents the decomposition of phonemes into distinctive features such as voicing, nasality, continuancy, and place features. It covers the acoustically based feature set of Jakobson, Fant, and Halle and the largely articulatorily based binary features of Chomsky and Halle's Sound Pattern of English, the standard system in much subsequent work. It explains how features define natural classes—groups of sounds that pattern together in phonological processes—and how feature specification can be binary, privative, or underspecified. The treatment is descriptive and analytic.
Core questions
- What features are needed to characterize the sounds of human languages?
- Should features be binary, privative, or underspecified?
- How do features define natural classes used in phonological rules?
- How are features grounded in articulation and acoustics?
Key theories
- SPE binary feature system
- Chomsky and Halle's proposal of a universal set of binary distinctive features, mostly defined in articulatory terms, used to represent segments and to state phonological rules referring to natural classes.
- Acoustic distinctive features
- Jakobson, Fant, and Halle's earlier system defining features such as grave-acute and compact-diffuse primarily by their acoustic correlates, aiming at a small universal inventory.
History
Distinctive features were introduced by Jakobson and colleagues in 1952 with an acoustic orientation and reworked by Chomsky and Halle in 1968 with an articulatory basis. The SPE feature set became standard, though later work refined and reorganized features, notably through feature geometry.
Debates
- Binary versus privative features
- A continuing dispute concerns whether features are binary (both plus and minus values active) or privative (only the marked value present), with implications for which natural classes the theory predicts.
Key figures
- Roman Jakobson
- Morris Halle
- Noam Chomsky
- Gunnar Fant
Related topics
Seminal works
- jakobson1952
- chomsky1968
Frequently asked questions
- What is a natural class?
- A natural class is a set of sounds that share one or more distinctive features and therefore pattern together in phonological processes, such as all nasal consonants or all voiced obstruents.
- What does a binary feature mean?
- A binary feature has two values, plus and minus, such as [+voice] and [-voice]. Segments are described by combinations of such feature values, and rules can refer to either value.