The frequency of occurrence of phonemes in a language may be derived from dictionary material or from continuous texts. This paper deals with the relation between the two sets of values for English. When distributions are plotted for English phonemes, classified according to manner and place of articulation, it is seen that there is a close similarity between the distribution for dictionary material and for continuous texts. The hypothesis is advanced and tested that the phoneme distribution in speech is a random sample of the phoneme distribution in dictionary material (the functional burdening of phonemes).
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