{"id":634,"date":"2026-06-17T08:53:26","date_gmt":"2026-06-17T12:53:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/?p=634"},"modified":"2026-06-17T08:53:26","modified_gmt":"2026-06-17T12:53:26","slug":"fundamental-source-features","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/?p=634","title":{"rendered":"Fundamental Source Features"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Fundamental Source Features<\/strong><\/h1>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n
\n

Counterpart<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Resonance Features, Secondary Consonantal Features<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

\n

Feature System<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Jakobsonian Features<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Definition<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Fundamental source features correspond to what today are usually called\u00a0major class features<\/strong>. Jakobson, Fant, and Halle (1952) posited two such features:\u00a0Vocalic<\/a>\/Nonvocalic<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Consonantal\/Nonconsonantal<\/strong>. The feature Vocalic applies to vowels, which bear no consonantal features. The feature Consonantal applies to consonants without vocalic properties. Liquids are complex segments bearing properties of both vowels and consonants. The glottal \/h\/ and word boundary lack both features.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/td>a<\/td>i<\/td>l<\/td>m<\/td>b<\/td>h<\/td>#<\/td><\/tr>
Vocalic\/
NonVocalic<\/td>		+<\/td>+<\/td>+<\/td>\u2013<\/td>\u2013<\/td>\u2013<\/td>\u2013<\/td><\/tr>
Consonantal\/
Nonconsonantal<\/td>		\u2013<\/td>\u2013<\/td>+<\/td>+<\/td>+<\/td>\u2013<\/td>\u2013<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Purpose<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The Fundamental Source Features are always listed first in a feature matrix. The features capture the two questions which must first be answered regarding the nature of the segment\u2013is it vowel-like, and is it consonant-like? These can then lead the analyst to determine the distinctive features which must be specified, and those which are not relevant for further feature specification.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

History<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The term \u201cfundamental source features\u201d was introduced by Jakobson, Fant, and Halle (1952:18). Jakobson & Halle (1956) later grouped Vocalic, Consonantal, along with Compact\/Diffuse, Tense\/Lax, Voiced\/Voiceless, Nasal, Discontinuous\/Continuant, Strident\/Mellow, and Checked as the nine sonority features. Preliminaries<\/em> opposed Fundamental Source Features to Secondary Consonantal Features (Interrupted\/Continuant, Checked\/Unchecked, Strident\/Mellow, and Voiced\/Unvoiced) and Resonance Features (Compact\/Diffuse, Grave\/Acute, Flat\/Plain, Sharp\/Plain, Tense\/Lax, and Nasal\/Oral).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Chomsky & Halle (1968), [vocalic], [consonantal], and the then novel [sonorant] were grouped as the three major class features, a term still in wide use. Their term Source feature, not to be confused with Fundamental Source features, puts together [heightened subglottal pressure], [voice], and [strident].<\/p>\n\n\n\n

References<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Chomsky, Noam and Morris Halle. 1968. The sound pattern of English<\/em>. New York: Harper and Row. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jakobson, Roman; C. Gunnar M. Fant; and Morris Halle. 1952. Preliminaries to speech analysis: The distinctive features and their correlates<\/em>. M.I.T. Acoustics Laboratory Technical report<\/em> No. 13.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jakobson, Roman and Morris Halle. 1956. Phonology and phonetics. Part I of Fundamentals of Language<\/em> (Janua Linguarum, 1), 1-51. \u2019S-Gravenhage: Mouton.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jakobson, Roman, and Linda R. Waugh. 1987. The sound shape of language, 2nd<\/sup> edn<\/em>. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Further Reading<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Van der Weijer, Jeroen (ed.) 2023.\u00a0Representing phonological detail: Part I: Segmental structure and representation<\/em>. (Phonology and Phonetics 32). Berlin: De Gruyter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Author<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Paul D. Fallon<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Fundamental Source Features Counterpart Resonance Features, Secondary Consonantal Features Feature System Jakobsonian Features Definition Fundamental source features correspond to what […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"disabled","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"disabled","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-634","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/634","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=634"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/634\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":638,"href":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/634\/revisions\/638"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=634"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=634"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=634"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}