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When two phrases are pronounced alike but have different spelling and meaning, can we call them homophones? e.g. "ice-cream" and "I scream", "nitrate" and "night rate", "that's tough" and "that stuff". Or is there another term for them? What linguistic phenomenon distiguishes these near homophones?

I've checked the putative duplicate at "I scream, you scream, we all scream for ice cream"- Is there a term that describes this 'word play'?
but it isn't exactly what I'm asking here.

Centaurus
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    They're not really homophones in the sense that *prince* and *prints* are to most Anglophones. Or *dear* and *deer* to all Anglophones. – FumbleFingers Jul 17 '14 at 02:00
  • Is it a silent "t" in prints ? In England ? – Centaurus Jul 17 '14 at 02:02
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    I've never met anyone who pronounces prints/prince differently unless they're grossly caricaturing normal speech. Many people think they normally differentiate them, but they're usually mistaken. See this discussion – FumbleFingers Jul 17 '14 at 02:14
  • icecream is [ˈʌɪskɻim] but I scream is [ˈɑɪskɻim]. Furthermore, the [ɑ] is held longer than the [ʌ], however you care to represent that. You can call those allophones if you’d like, but they are sufficiently distinct for it to make a difference. Which means it’s something else. – tchrist Jul 17 '14 at 02:29
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    @tchrist Perhaps to you. To me, the initial vowels are exactly the same; the only thing that makes the two different is the aspiration of the /k/ and subsequent automatic devoicing of the /r/. – Janus Bahs Jacquet Jul 17 '14 at 08:19
  • @FumbleFingers I (can) pronounce prince and prints differently, especially, as that thread mentions, in larger units. The insertion of a [t]-like sound between the /n/ and the /s/ is automatic, and I have it too. But the phonemic quality of the /t/ in prints is assured to me by the fact that I have a mandatory glottal closure towards the end of the /n/ in prints, while this same glottal closure is optional in prince and tends not to show up in larger units, like Prince/prints of Denmark, which is then [pʰɹ̥ʷɪnʦ] vs. [pʰɹʷɪnʔʦ]. – Janus Bahs Jacquet Jul 17 '14 at 09:01
  • When I say ice cream I notice I accent the first word; I accent the second in I scream. Moreover, I agree with @Janus about the emergence of the /t/ sound when prints is spoken slowly, but when it's said quickly there's usually no difference between "the prints of Denmark" and "the Prince of Denmark" (though in the former I would probably speak slowly to enunciate the difference between lithography and royalty). – Robusto Jul 17 '14 at 09:06
  • @Robusto I scream can be stressed on either word; just say “*I* scream (not you, but *I*)”. – Janus Bahs Jacquet Jul 17 '14 at 09:12
  • @Janus: Yes, but in that case the stressed I is also held a little longer, distinguishing the phoneme further. So would scream be emphasized and lengthened slightly if one were saying something like "I don't shout, I scream". – Robusto Jul 17 '14 at 09:17
  • @FumbleFingers - I've just recorded myself and listened back. I do pronounce the "t" in "prints", just as I would for "prinz" in German. My children mock me for the way I pronounce "issue", "tissue" though, so I may be a little old-fashioned. I'm British, by the way. – Phil M Jones Aug 11 '14 at 15:11
  • @PhilMJones How do YOU pronounce "issue", "tissue", "Asia" and "Indonesia" ? – Centaurus Aug 11 '14 at 15:28
  • @Luis ˈɪsju , ˈeɪʒə , ɪndənˈiːziə (I'm not fluent in IPA, but I think I've got that right). – Phil M Jones Aug 12 '14 at 08:44
  • @FumbleFingers I've answered my own question. – Centaurus Aug 12 '14 at 16:32
  • @PhilMJones Do you pronounce "issue" [i'sju] ? And "tissue" [ti'sju] ? Do other native speakers pronounce it that way or is it only you ? – Centaurus Aug 12 '14 at 16:35
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    There are others like me, but we are massively in the minority these days, as general pronunciation in the UK has become less precise. Many sloppy pronunciations are pervading the UK, such as the inclusion of an extra "i" in the pronunciation of "mischievous", to make it "mischievious" with the stress a syllable too late. There are many others, but I stick to how words were pronounced when I learnt them. – Phil M Jones Aug 12 '14 at 17:58

3 Answers3

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The simple answer is no. Ice cream and nitrate are not homophonous with I scream and night rate.

If you go by tchrist’s comment above, it appears that some dialects of English pronounce the initial vowel in I scream [ɑɪ] and ice cream [ʌɪ] differently, but this is not universally applicable, and I would venture that this split is limited to a minority of dialects.

What distinguishes the two sets in all varieties of English is their syllable boundaries: morphological boundaries nearly always create phonemic syllable boundaries. In phonemic writing, indicating syllable boundaries with a period ‹.›, the two pairs look like this:

Ice cream /ˈaɪs.krim/ and nitrate /ˈnaɪ.treɪt/
I scream /aɪ.skrim/1 and night rate /ˈnaɪt.reit/

In English phonology, it is a well-known and universal fact2 that an unvoiced plosive /p t k/ is aspirated when it both occurs immediately before a stressed vowel and syllable-initially, but not in the syllable coda; in the case of /t/, this aspiration usually shows up as a slight affrication with little true aspiration. The initial aspiration applies only if the plosive is the first sound in the syllable, so initial /sp st sk/ are not aspirated. If an approximant (such as /r l j/) immediately follows an aspirated plosive, the aspiration of the plosive is carried over into the approximant, which is rendered devoiced.

If you notice, the first line in the quote above has syllable boundaries that cause the /k/ and the /t/ to be the first sound in the second syllable, while the second line has syllable boundaries that result in this not being the case. Therefore, in the first line, the plosives are aspirated and the following /r/ devoiced, while in the second, the plosive is unaspirated and the /r/ voiced; phonetically (in generic, Broadcast American):

Ice cream [ˈaɪs.kʰɹ̥ʷiːm] and nitrate [ˈnaɪ.tˢɹ̥ʷɛɪt]3
I scream [aɪ.skɹʷiːm] and night rate [ˈnaɪt.ɹʷɛɪt]

Since syllable-final /t/ is often reduced to an unreleased [t̚] or even just a glottal stop [ʔ], the second pair can be even further distinguished:

nitrate [ˈnaɪ.tˢɹ̥ʷɛɪʔ] vs. night rate [ˈnaɪt̚.ɹʷɛɪt̚] or [ˈnaɪʔ.ɹʷɛɪʔ]

 

 

Notes:

1 I don’t mark the stress in this one since it’s a phrase, not a lexeme: it can be stressed on either syllable, depending on emphasis.

2 I’m not sure whether it applies in Indian English, and there are probably quite a few variants of African English where it doesn’t apply either; so understand ‘universal’ here to refer to ‘all dialects of British, Irish, Scottish, US, Canadian, South African, and Antipodean English’.

3 The sequence [tˢʰ] followed by the retroflex [ɹʷ] (or in American English more commonly [ɻʷ]) will normally merge somewhat, causing the /t/ to become retroflex as well. A more accurate phonetic notation would be [t͡ʂɹ̥ʷ], but for the sake of simplicity, I’ll ignore this here and just write [tˢɹ̥ʷ].

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Janus Bahs Jacquet
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    I have a friend from Kentucky who pronounces ice cream as ass cream. – Frank Jul 17 '14 at 09:01
  • @Frank Though he probably pronounces I scream as ah scream, too, right? And would pronounce ass cream more like ayes cream (as in ‘for aye’, not as in ‘the ayes have it’). – Janus Bahs Jacquet Jul 17 '14 at 09:04
  • I don't know, I've never heard him say I scream but his 'I' is generally quite 'Ah'ish so you could be right. I shall ask him next time we meet (I'll also ask him to say ass cream which I think will sound like ess cream). – Frank Jul 17 '14 at 09:09
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    The reason I have [ʌɪ] in icecream is classic Canadian Raising before an unvoiced consonant. This version is common in North America, and may even be the dominant majority: my suspicion is that it is. It also occurs therefore in high school [ˈhʌɪskul] (said altogether, the normal way, with a single stress) but not a high school [ˈhaɪ ˈskul] for just some school where everyone is high. This is how we still tell writer from rider despite the middle consonant turning into as simple [ɾ], since the raising happens in the first one only. – tchrist Jul 17 '14 at 14:04
  • And yes, I of course meant Raising not Rising. The /aɪ/ > [ʌɪ] version is super-common over here, but comparatively uncommon in England. Only in the Deep South where /aɪ/ is subject to monophthongization would I expect never to hear it occur, although exact details vary greatly between dialects and speakers. You cannot expect a native speaker untrained in phonology even to notice this unless very carefully pointed out to them. – tchrist Jul 17 '14 at 14:30
  • @tchrist Frank Janus and FumbleFingers I've edited the question. Please read. – Centaurus Jul 17 '14 at 21:56
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    @Luis The only name I know for this is near-homophone. – Janus Bahs Jacquet Jul 17 '14 at 21:58
  • @JanusBahsJacquet I've answered my own question. – Centaurus Aug 11 '14 at 14:09
  • This answer seems to be about "I scream" and "ice cream" not actually being pronounced quite the same way, but that misses the point of the question, which is whether there is a term equivalent to "homophone" that applies to phrases rather than single words. I scream/ice cream was just an example. – nnnnnn Dec 29 '19 at 02:33
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HOMOPHONIC PHRASES are also called oronyms (also called a continunym or a slice-o-nym)

JUNCTURES help differentiate homophonic phrases.

  1. A term used in modern linguistics to describe a distinctive feature of language. Juncture is defined by H. Whitehall in his Structural Essentials of English as an interruption of normal transition between contiguous speech sounds.

  2. Linguistics - The transition from one speech sound to the next, either within a word, as between (t) and (r) in nitrate, or marking the boundaries between words, as between (t) and (r) in night rate. http://www.yourdictionary.com/juncture

  3. The set of phonological features signalling a division between words, such as those that distinguish "a name" from "an aim". http://www.thefreedictionary.com/juncture

  • The exact site of juncture is what helps us differentiate "I scream" from "Ice cream" and perceive they are not true homophones.

Juncture, usually symbolized by the sign "+" is marked by a fading off of the voice and a pause. In the two groups "peace talks" and "pea stalks", juncture occurs after the [s] in peace and after the [i] in pea. Other examples of this differentiation by juncture are:

  • I scream x Ice-cream
  • a name x an aim
  • night rate x nitrate
  • that scum x that's come
  • that's tough x that stuff

Structural Essentials of English, H.Whitehall, Longmans, 1966.

Other references: 1. http://www.amazon.com/Structural-essentials-English-Harold-Whitehall/dp/B0006AUFAO 2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juncture

Centaurus
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The phonetic representations I would argue are:

Ice cream = [ʌis.kʰɹ̥im]

I scream = [ɑi.skɹim]

This uses Canadian raising, as I'm from western Canada, which distinguishes the I's.

Also note the k is aspirated, with a spread glottis for 'Ice cream,' and unaspirated(, not necessarily with a closed glottis, though), for 'I scream.'

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