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Question

Which term denotes a minimal contrastive unit in a language's sound system, such as /p/ and /b/, which distinguish the English words pat and bat?

The correct answer is

Phoneme

A phoneme distinguishes words through a sound contrast. Replacing /p/ with /b/ changes pat to bat, so these sounds represent different English phonemes. A phoneme need not carry an independent meaning; a minimal meaningful unit is a morpheme.

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Important Questions from Knowledge of English Sounds - Teaching

  1. What is the meaning of lexical?

  2. The process of word formation is studied under which of these branches in linguistics?

  3. Human language unlike that of animals, is organized in two layers and this technically called: Choose the right option:

  4. The smallest distinctive unit of sound in a language is known as a

  5. Which of the following is an example of an Onomatopoeic word?

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