Types and Aspects of Neutralization

Abstract

            The current research deals with neutralization as a phenomenon to determine the function of phonetic and phonological representation while perceiving and producing speech. This is achieved through reviewing the types and aspects of neutralization. Neutralization refers to phonological rules that devastate the difference among two phonemes in specific conditions; thus, two distinct phonemes might be acknowledged phonetically by a similar phone. The study concludes that neutralization represents one of the main phonological processes in which the difference between two phonemes is vanished in a particular setting. Thus, neutralization exists when a phonemic distinction disappears in a particular phonological context.