A Critical Introduction to Phonetics presents core areas of the subject from refreshing new perspectives. It takes a new stance on the presentation of basic phonetic skills for students of linguistics. Using examples drawn from a wide-range of languages Ken Lodge introduces the key aspects of phonetics, examining the difference between speech and writing, the physiology of speech production, basic and detailed articulation, and acoustic phonetics. The book contains a practical guide to transcriptions from sound recordings, and a section on applications of phonetics to fields of study such as language variation and accent. A Critical Introduction to Phonetics provides comprehensive coverage of all the key areas of the subject, and contains chapter summaries to help the reader navigate the text. Critical thinking is prompted throughout, and this will therefore be essential reading for students on introductory phonetics courses both at undergraduate and postgraduate levels.