To put it simple, a phoneme is a unit of sound. This means we use it alongside other sounds to form a word, a phrase, a sentence, or a full speech. It could also simply be a groan, a sigh, a hum, or a sign of surprise, pain, realisation, or wonder. We are, quite frankly, animals, albeit very articulate ones. If we look around the animal kingdom and how they are able to express themselves very clearly without the use of a vast array of words, it is easy to understand where humans have distanced themselves from nature: we lost the power of sensual communication that our non-human co-habitants still have. This is why they are so much more intuitive and instinctive than the average human. Or even the top-of-the-range one.
Let's play a game. You need at least one other person to play this with. Think of a one-syllable word, then without making a sound, say the word to your counterparts. Here are some ideas:
BAD MEAN PEN WIDE GOT QUITE
VAN READ FEEL KIT BONE BOUGHT
You see, when you take the sound out of the spoken word, these words could be absolutely anything similar. Bad could be misunderstood for pad, pan, ban, mad, man, bat, ban, or a number of other words, and the same goes for all the others. So now remember that context will make this all easier. Adding the rest of the sentence may make it easier to identify the word used through the context, but not necessarily water-tight.
The phoneme is therefore so important to us as humans, that one slight variation can change the meaning entirely. Try this:
I'd like a whiter cup of coffee / I'd like a wider cup of coffee
It's time for a nap / It's time for a lap
I watched her screen / I watched her scream
There are even times where a slight pause between phonemes, for example a glottal stop, can make a big difference:
I'd love a nice tea / I'd love an ice tea
And then, there are words that change meaning depending where you put the stress. Think about the differences here:
conduct, conduct
desert, desert
contest, contest
record, record
object, object
present, present
upset, upset
Firstly, these two-syllable words put the stress on the first syllable when they are nouns, and on the second when they are verbs. Many times, the meaning changes accordingly:
"Your conduct was disgraceful!" and "Copper conducts electricity very well."
"They were lost in the desert," and "He will never desert his post."
"The contest was very exciting," and "They wanted to contest the decision."
"She set a new world record," and "I want to record this conversation."
"There's a mysterious object in the garage," and "I object to your behaviour."
"He got a very large present," and "She use to present the evening news."
"By winning the league, they caused the upset of the year!" and "I was upset by their behaviour."
There are plenty of other words of this kind where the verb/noun difference causes the stress to move, but where the main meaning doesn't change:
permit, import, increase, insult, reject, transfer, protest, progress, transport, etc.
We also spell a lot of words fully but leave out many of the letters when we speak. For example, what happened to the t in Christmas, listen or whistle? Where is the b in lamb, climb, doubt or debt? We often think we "hear" these letters because we know how the words are spelled, but the truth is, they're not actually there.
Why do we keep them, then?
For very good reason, actually. Words are easier to identify by the way they are spelled. When we speak, we understand the word from its context, or the way it's pronounced. When it's written, this is not so clear. So often, words keep their spelling, even if the pronunciation has changed over time. Here are some examples of homophones:
rein / rain / reign
write / right / rite
allowed / aloud
through / threw
weather / whether
hour / our
weak / week
male / mail
And then there are some words that don't change spelling but are pronounced differently (homographs):
minute
live
read
lead
wind
wound
bow
close
house
We have long vowel sounds and short vowel sounds:
reach / rich
leave / live
peel / pill
hate / hat
mile / mill
and many others.
I won't bother you with shortening the words beach and sheet; I'm sure you can work that out for yourself...
In the picture above, some smarty pants has daubed "Real eyes realize real lies" onto the side of a tunnel in the town I live in. It's phrases like these that make us think (or even overthink) about our ability to comprehend words and phrases that sound very similar.
The moral of the story is, pronunciation matters, and especially in English. As the word order of English sentences is more or less fixed, with a few possibilities for deviation, the way we pronounce words and how we stress them can make a great deal of difference. We spell words in what seems like a random sequence sometimes, not for fun, but often to distinguish a word from a similar-sounding one, or because the pronunciation has changed over time but the spelling not. It helps readers to distinguish one word from another, which is why any "reformation" of spelling is simply a bad idea: it would remove English from its roots and make it a shadow of the delightful language it is.
Raymond Goslitski
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