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( Minimal pair)
In phonology, minimal pairs are pairs of words or phrases in a particular language, which differ in only one phonological element, such as a phone, phoneme, toneme or chroneme and have a distinct meaning. They are used to demonstrate that two phones constitute two separate phonemes in the language. As an example for English vowels, the pair "let" + "lit" can be used to demonstrate that the phones [?] (in let) and [?] (in lit) do in fact represent distinct phonemes /?/ and /?/. An example for English consonants is the minimal pair of "pat" + "bat". In phonetics, this pair, like any other, differs in number of ways. In this case, the contrast appears largely to be conveyed with a difference in the voice onset time of the initial consonant as the configuration of the mouth is same for [p] and [b]; however, there is also a possible difference in duration, which visual analysis using high quality video supports. Following pairs prove existence of various distinct phonemes in English. In the articulation of bilabial plosives, 4 phones are defined by the characteristics voiced/unvoiced and aspirated/unaspirated [p], [p?], [b] and [b?]. In different languages only some of these may occur and the number of phonemes formed may be different again.
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