{"id":711,"date":"2026-06-27T08:08:46","date_gmt":"2026-06-27T12:08:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/?p=711"},"modified":"2026-06-27T08:08:46","modified_gmt":"2026-06-27T12:08:46","slug":"distributed-2-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/?p=711","title":{"rendered":"sharp"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

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

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

[plain]<\/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

Sharp sounds have a \u201cslight rise of the second formant, and, to some degree, also of higher formants\u201d (Jakobson, Fant, & Halle 1952: 31). The production of the sound involves a reduction in the oral cavity \u201cby raising a part of the tongue against the palate\u201d (palatalization). It is accompanied by pharyngeal dilation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

The feature sharp was used to contrast Russian palatalized (vs. unpalatalized\/velarized) sounds. For example, [sharp] \/ t\u02b2\/ in \/mat\u02b2\/ \u2018to rumple\u2019 vs. [plain] \/t\/ in \/mat\/ \u2018rumpled\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

History<\/h2>\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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The definition of [sharp] was rewritten in 1956 as \u201ccharacterized by an upward shift of some of their upper frequency components\u201d and made \u201cgenetically\u201d (articulatorily) with widened slit and \u201ca dialected pharyngeal pass, i.e. a widened back orifice of the mouth resonator\u201d (1956:31-32). Their 1957 revision added \u201can upward shift or strengthening of some of their upper frequency components\u201d and further clarification on the palatalization and compartmenting of the oral cavity (1957:235). Their (1968) definition is much the same. Fischer-J\u00f8rgensen (1975:162) finds it odd that Jakobson and Halle emphasize the dilation of the pharynx in the pharynx when the higher frequency components are the primarily triggered by the raising of the front part of the tongue to the high palate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Halle (1959) naturally used [sharp] in his analysis of Russian. Fant (1967) uses [sharp] (and continues to in 1983). Harms (1968) carries [sharp] into a phonology textbook, applying it to Thai \/c, c\u02b0, j\/ (1968:20) and he also cites McCawley\u2019s (1965) use of [sharp] for \/j\/ in Japanese glides.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With McCawley\u2019s (1967) withering critique of the feature [flat], it seems [sharp] similarly rapidly fell out of use. Since Chomsky & Halle (1968) moved away from the acoustic definitions of Jakobsonian features, [sharp] was replaced by a tongue-height feature [+high] and tongue body feature [-back], along with the innovative place feature [coronal] to characterize palatal and palatalized consonants.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

Chomsky, Noam & Morris Halle. 1968.\u00a0The sound pattern of English<\/em>. New York: Harper & Row.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fant, Gunnar. 1967. The nature of distinctive features.\u00a0To honor Roman Jakobson: Essays on the occasion of his seventieth birthday<\/em>, 634-642. Mouton: The Hague.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fischer-J\u00f8rgensen, Eli. 1975.\u00a0Trends in phonological theory: A historical introduction.\u00a0<\/em>Copenhagen: Akademisk Forlag.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Halle, Morris. 1959. The sound pattern of Russian: A linguistic and acoustical investigation.<\/em> The Hague: Mouton.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jakobson, Roman. 1949. On the identification of phonemic entities. Travaux du Cercle Linguistique de Copenhague<\/em>5.205-213. Reprinted in 1962 in Selected writings: Vol. 1: Phonological studies<\/em>, ed. by Roman Jakobson, 418-425. \u2019S-Gravenhage: Mouton.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jakobson, Roman. 1962. Phonemic notes on standard Slovak.\u00a0Selected writings, vol. I: Phonological studies<\/em>, ed. by Roman Jakobson, 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.\u00a0Fundamentals of Language,\u00a0<\/em>by Roman Jakobson, and Morris Halle, 1-51. 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

Jakobson, Roman; and John Lotz. 1949. Notes on the French phonemic pattern. Word<\/em> 5.151-158. Reprinted in 1962 in Selected writings: Vol. 1: Phonological studies<\/em>, ed. by Roman Jakobson, 426-434. \u2019S-Gravenhage: Mouton.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

McCawley, James D. 1965. The accentual system of Standard Japanese<\/em>. Cambridge, MA: MIT dissertation.<\/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

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

Brakel, Arthur. 1983.\u00a0Phonological markedness and distinctive features<\/em>. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.<\/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":"

[sharp] Counterpart [plain] Feature System Jakobsonian Features Definition Sharp sounds have a \u201cslight rise of the second formant, and, to […]<\/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-711","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/711","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=711"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/711\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":713,"href":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/711\/revisions\/713"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=711"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=711"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atomsofsound.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=711"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}