The Drama of the Phoneme

I remember getting funny looks from my fellow English majors (and alums, later) when I talked with enthusiasm about my Phonemics class.

Not everyone felt it was odd, but some did. Phonemics is the study of what phonetically gives a language its meaning. The "bilabial fricative" made famous by the late (and lamented) George Carlin is phonetic, but not phonemic (well, formally, anyway).

From at least the Renaissance, writers on poetry have been fascinated by the subject. Especially, which phonemes fit their aesthetic, and which do not. Dante wrote about it (I read a translation of the book, I forget the title, as an undergrad. For fun. No kidding.), as have others.

The funny looks came more from the free-verse poets. That's natural. A Jackson Pollack is going to look pretty much the same in oil as it does in tempera, or just wall paint. It's the materials of the unconscious that are important in that particular aesthetic practice, IMHO.

Now, Pollack fans are going to assail me over that, as would any free-verse fans: the details do matter to them, they might say, just not in the same way. That's OK. Diversity is important. IGT.

But to the formal poet (even part-time), the technical details of what, say, makes a "d" sound like a "d" are important, as what certain phonemes sound like in combination, also.

As well as the "supra-segmental phonemes." (The wha ... ?)

In English, they are: stress, pitch and juncture, as best I recall. Which makes for a dramatic language, don't you think?

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Afternote: (2/8/11) The book by Dante was De Vulgari Eloquentia. I don't recall the translator's name.