In the light of componential analysis, the meaning of a word consists of a number of distinctive meaning features; the analysis breaks down the meaning of the word into these features; it is these different fea tures that distinguish word meaning. Similarly, a phoneme is considered as a collection of distinctive phonetic features; a phoneme can be broken down into these distinctive sound features and it is these sound features that distinguish different sounds. For exam ple,"man" and “boy’’share the features of + HU MAN, + MALE and + ANIMATE but differ in the feature of ADULT; [p] and [b] are both bilabial and plosive but they differ in the feature of voicing.
In the light of componential analysis, the meaning of a word consists of a number of distinctive meaning features; the analysis breaks down the meaning of the word into these features; it is these different fea tures that distinguish word meaning. Similarly, a phoneme is considered as a collection of distinctive phonetic features; a phoneme can be broken down into these distinctive sound features and it is these sound features that distinguish different sounds. For exam ple,"man" and “boy’’share the features of + HU MAN, + MALE and + ANIMATE but differ in the feature of ADULT; [p] and [b] are both bilabial and plosive but they differ in the feature of voicing.
