The sound systems of English and Slovene compared: a distinctive feature analysis

Abstract

This is an attempt  to show how the phonetic properties of sounds are put to work in Slovene and in English. We want to find out the number and the type of di­ stinctive contrasts employed in the two languages and how these contrasts are struc­ tured. We classified the sound systems of the two languages with the same distin­ ctive features as far as this is feasible, while at the same time aiming at a realistic phonetic and  phonological representation of the two sound inventories. Together with the phonological rules of the two languages, which are not worked out in the present article, this analysis can serve as a basis for a contrastive English-Slovene and Slovene-English sound analysis.