The following are crucial components of generative phonology:

• Levels of phonological representation
  • ​Generative phonology posits two levels of phonological representation:​
    • An underlying representation is the most basic form of a word before any phonological rules have been applied to it. Underlying representations show what a native speaker knows about the abstract underlying phonology of the language.
    • A phonetic representation is the form of a word that is spoken and heard.
• Phonological rules
  • Phonological rules map underlying representations onto phonological representations. They delete, insert, or change segments, or change the features of segments.
• Derivations
• Distinctive features
  • Distinctive features make it possible to capture the generalities of phonological rules.
• Linearity
  • ​A stream of speech is portrayed as a sequence of discrete sound segments. Each segment is composed of simultaneously occurring features.