{"id":701,"date":"2026-06-26T16:36:29","date_gmt":"2026-06-26T20:36:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/?p=701"},"modified":"2026-06-26T16:36:29","modified_gmt":"2026-06-26T20:36:29","slug":"distributed-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/?p=701","title":{"rendered":"plain"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

[plain]<\/h1>\n\n\n\n
\n
\n

Counterparts<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

[flat]; [sharp]<\/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
    \n
  1. The feature [plain] holds an anomalous status in being the counterpart to two distinctive features, [flat] and [sharp]. Plain segments (vs. [flat] ones) are not characterized by \u201ca downward shift of a set of formants\u201d (Jakobson, Fant, and Halle 1952:31). Articulatorily (\u201cgenetically\u201d), they have a wider slit and are not \u201cproduced with a decreased back or front orifice of the mouth resonator\u201d (Jakonson & Halle 1956:31). Plain sounds comprise most ordinary consonants and nonrounded vowels, segments that are not [flat]. Thus, plain vowels are neither rounded nor pharyngealized. This [flat\/plain] opposition has been termed \u201corifice variation.\u201d\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  2. As opposed to [sharp], plain vowels lack a rise of the second formant, and [plain] is used to characterize non-palatalized consonants. Jakobson & Halle (1956:31-32) define the non-sharp [plain] sounds as lacking \u201cupward shift of some of their upper frequency components\u201d and are made articulatorily with a narrower slit with a \u201cwidened back orifice of the mouth resonator.\u201d<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

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

    The feature [plain] is used as the counterpart for non-pharyngealized consonants, which are [flat], and for non-rounded vowels, which are also [plain]. Plain vowels are not rounded, so Turkish \/i,\u00a0\u0268, e, a\/\u00a0are the [plain] (nonflat); [flat] vowels are rounded, so Turkish round vowels \/u, y, o, \u0153\/ are [flat]. Non-pharyngealized consonants are [plain], while pharyngealized consonants are [flat]. The phonological validity of this feature invoked Bantu and Uzbek substitution of Arabic pharyngealized consonants with labialized ones in loanwords, demonstrating their acoustic similarity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    History<\/h1>\n\n\n\n

    This feature was not utilized in Jakobson\u2019s initial formalization of distinctive features (Jakobson 1949, Jakobson & Lotz 1949).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    The feature was first introduced by Jakobson, Fant, & Halle (1952:31) as one of several tonality features<\/strong>, along with [grave<\/strong>], [acute<\/strong>], and [sharp<\/strong>]. Tonality features are one type of resonance feature<\/strong>. [flat] has its origin as a term in music, and JFH employ the musical flat symbol \u266d in several of their examples. The counterpart to [flat] is [plain], or non-flat. Likewise, [plain] was the logical term for non-sharp sounds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Jakobson, Fant, & Halle (1952) claimed that pharyngealized and rounded sounds do not occur in the same language and were thus two variants of a single [flat] vs. [plain] opposition. They further claimed that there was no need for distinct phonetic symbols for rounded [t\u033c] and pharyngealized [ t\u0334 ] consonants. The feature [plain] underwent minor rephrasing in Jakobson & Halle (1956, 1957, and 1968). McCawley (1967) refuted the possibility of conflating rounding and pharyngealization by noting that Arabic vowels are pharyngealized adjacent to pharyngealized consonants. The formalization of a rule would require that [flat] refer be interpreted as pharyngealized when applied to a consonant or a front or low vowel, as rounded when applied to a high back vowel, and as rounded and pharyngealized when applied to a high back vowel. This critique eliminated the feature from use in Chomsky & Halle\u2019s (1968) The sound pattern of English<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    NOTE: Although Jakobson (1931\/1962) used the terms flat, non-flat, grave, and acute (1962:224), Qu (2021:164-165) showed that in the translation from Czech to English, Jakobson took the opportunity to incorporate some anachronistic terms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

    Bghazhba, X. S. 1964. Bzybskij dialekt abxazskogo jazyka<\/em>. Tblisi: Nauka.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

    Doak, Ivy Grace. 1997. Coeur D\u2019Alene grammatical relations<\/em>.Austin: University of Texas dissertation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Fant, Gunnar. 1983. Feature analysis of Swedish vowels\u2013a revisit. Speech Transmission Laboratory Quarterly Progress and Status Report <\/em>2-3. 1-19.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Jakobson, Roman. 1931. Z fonologie spisovn\u00e9 sloven\u0161tiny. Slovensk\u00e1 miscellanea,<\/em> ed. by Josef Jir\u00e1sek, and Franti\u0161ek Tich\u00fd, 155-163. Bratislava: Universum.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Jakobson, Roman. 1962. Phonemic notes on standard Slovak. Selected writings, vol. I: Phonological studies<\/em>, 221-230. \u2018S-Gravenhage: Mouton.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Jakobson, Roman, Gunnar Fant & Morris Halle. 1952. Preliminaries to speech analysis: the distinctive features and their correlates.<\/em> (MIT Acoustic Laboratory Technical Report 13). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Jakobson, Roman; and Morris Halle. 1956. Phonology and phonetics. Fundamentals of Language, <\/em>by Roman Jakobson, and Morris Halle, 1-51<\/em>. The Hague: Mouton.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Jakobson, Roman; and Morris Halle. 1957. Phonology in relation to phonetics. Manual of phonetics<\/em>, ed. by L. Kaiser, 215-251. Amsterdam: North Holland.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Jakobson, Roman; and Morris Halle. 1968. Phonology in relation to phonetics. Manual of phonetics<\/em>, ed. by Bertil Malmberg, 411-449. Amsterdam: North Holland.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    McCawley, James D. 1967. Le r\u00f4le d\u2019un syst\u00e8me de traits phonologiques dans une th\u00e9orie du langage. Languages <\/em>8, 112-123. English version: The role of a phonological feature system in a theory of language in Phonological theory: Evolution and current practice, <\/em>ed. by Valerie Becker Makkai, 522-528. New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1972.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Qu, Changliang. 2021. Roman Jakobson\u2019s forgotten Czech articles on phonology: A case of avoiding anachronism in linguistic historiography. RUS: Revista de Literatura e Cultura Russa <\/em>12(19).154-170. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.11606\/issn.2317-4765.rus.2021.186465<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

    Grigorjevs, Juris. 2013. Problems using the traditional acoustic cues for the phonological interpretation of vowels.\u00a0Baltistica<\/em>\u00a0XLVIII(2).301-312.<\/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":"

    [plain] Counterparts [flat]; [sharp] Feature System Jakobsonian Features Definition Purpose The feature [plain] is used as the counterpart for non-pharyngealized […]<\/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":"","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-701","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/701","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=701"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/701\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":702,"href":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/701\/revisions\/702"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=701"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=701"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=701"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}