영어 문자소와 음소의 역사적ㆍ음운론적인 연계를 위한 연구 - 〈gh〉단어를 중심으로

Bridging the Historical and Phonological Gap Between English Gramphemes and Phonemes: A Case Study of the Words with <gh>

  Although the English spelling system is primarily based on phonetic alphabets, its discrepancies between graphemes and phonemes have been accumulated through the history of the English due to sound changes as well as spelling fixations. The worst case of the irregular spellings in English is considered the words with the diagraph 〈gh〉 which represents three different phonetic values; consonants /g/ and /f/, and null phonetic value /Ø/. This study analyzes all the words with the diagraph 〈gh〉 listed in the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) and tries to bridge the gap between the graphemes 〈gh〉 and its phonemic values /g, f, Ø/ by reviewing the historical developments in their spelling and sound and also formulating relevant spelling rules and/or constraints to determine a proper phonemic value according to its position within a syllable. Out of 10,773 words with 〈gh〉 listed in OED, only 237 words are the subject of this analysis, because 414 archaic and obsolete words, 9,332 compounds and derivatives, and 790 words with the morpheme/word boundary between 〈g〉 and 〈h〉 were excluded due to their irrelevant properties. The diagraph 〈gh〉 is pronounced as /g/ when located in the onset position in a syllable, /Ø/ when followed by 〈t〉, either /Ø/ or /f/ when located at the end of a word. In order to find out the practical applicability of the spelling rules formulated in this study, a pilot study has been done with 40 college students before and after acquiring the spelling rules for the 〈gh〉 words. The rate for finding a correct phonetic value for 〈gh〉 has been improved by 15.3% for familiar words (i.e. frequently used words) and 9% for unfamiliar words.