What is a minimal pair?

What is a minimal pair?

• A. Two words that rhyme
• B. Two words with same morpheme
• C. Two words that differ by one phoneme
• D. Two identical words

Answer: (C)

A minimal pair is two words that differ by only one phoneme in the same position and have different meanings. This single-phoneme difference shows a clear contrast between two sounds in a language. For example, pin and pen differ only in the vowel sound, with the rest of the sounds being the same; bat and pat differ only in the initial consonant sound. The idea is that the rest of the word is identical, so the difference in meaning comes from just one sound. Other ideas like rhymes, or having the same morphemes, or identical words don’t capture that precise, one-sound contrast that defines a minimal pair.

A minimal pair is two words that differ by only one phoneme in the same position and have different meanings. This single-phoneme difference shows a clear contrast between two sounds in a language. For example, pin and pen differ only in the vowel sound, with the rest of the sounds being the same; bat and pat differ only in the initial consonant sound. The idea is that the rest of the word is identical, so the difference in meaning comes from just one sound. Other ideas like rhymes, or having the same morphemes, or identical words don’t capture that precise, one-sound contrast that defines a minimal pair.