The use of the terms phonetics and phonology in the description of disordered speech

Abstract

We discuss the use of the distinction between phonetics and phonology both in traditional descriptive linguistics and in psycholinguistic models of speech production and perception. We note that both these ways of using this distinction have been applied to the description of speech and language disorders. We describe three problems in applying the terms phonetics and phonology to clinical data: one problem involved describing speech error data; one problem involved using a binary distinction in modeling speech production; and one problem derived from these two differing approaches to the terms, that is, the problem of disentangling the speaker's production from the listener's perception. We conclude by offering some suggestions for refining our classificatory systems while retaining the basic insight offered by the division into phonetic and phonological domains.