227 research outputs found
Cross-linguistic study of vocal pathology: perceptual features of spasmodic dysphonia in French-speaking subjects
Clinical characterisation of Spasmodic Dysphonia of the adductor type (SD) in French speakers by Klap and colleagues (1993) appears to differ from that of SD in English. This perceptual analysis aims to describe the phonetic features of French SD. A video of 6 French speakers with SD supplied by Klap and colleagues was analysed for frequency of phonatory breaks, pitch breaks, harshness, creak, breathiness and falsetto voice, rate of production, and quantity of speech output. In contrast to English SD, the French speaking SD patients demonstrated no evidence pitch breaks, but phonatory breaks, harshness and breathiness were prominent features. This verifies the French authors’ (1993) clinical description. These findings suggest that phonetic properties of a specific language may affect the manifestation of pathology in neurogenic voice disorders
Models and Analysis of Vocal Emissions for Biomedical Applications
The International Workshop on Models and Analysis of Vocal Emissions for Biomedical Applications (MAVEBA) came into being in 1999 from the particularly felt need of sharing know-how, objectives and results between areas that until then seemed quite distinct such as bioengineering, medicine and singing. MAVEBA deals with all aspects concerning the study of the human voice with applications ranging from the neonate to the adult and elderly. Over the years the initial issues have grown and spread also in other aspects of research such as occupational voice disorders, neurology, rehabilitation, image and video analysis. MAVEBA takes place every two years always in Firenze, Italy. This edition celebrates twenty years of uninterrupted and succesfully research in the field of voice analysis
Models and Analysis of Vocal Emissions for Biomedical Applications
The MAVEBA Workshop proceedings, held on a biannual basis, collect the scientific papers presented both as oral and poster contributions, during the conference. The main subjects are: development of theoretical and mechanical models as an aid to the study of main phonatory dysfunctions, as well as the biomedical engineering methods for the analysis of voice signals and images, as a support to clinical diagnosis and classification of vocal pathologies
Phonetics and phonology of the three-way laryngeal contrast in Madurese
Madurese, a Western Malayo-Polynesian language spoken on the Indonesian island
of Madura, exhibits a three-way laryngeal contrast distinguishing between voiced,
voiceless unaspirated and voiceless aspirated stops and an unusual consonant-vowel
(CV) co-occurrence restriction. The CV co-occurrence restriction is of phonological
interest given the patterning of voiceless aspirated stops with voiced stops rather than
with voiceless unaspirated stops, raising the question of what phonological feature
they may share. Two features have been linked with the CV co-occurrence
restriction: Advanced Tongue Root [ATR] and Lowered Larynx [LL]. However, as
no evidence of voicing during closure for aspirated stops is observed and no other
acoustic measures except voice onset time (VOT), fundamental frequency (F0),
frequencies of the first (F1) and the second (F2) formants and closure duration
relating to the proposed features have been conducted, it remains an open question
which acoustic properties are shared by voiced and aspirated stops.
Three main questions are addressed in the thesis. The first question is what acoustic
properties voiced and voiceless aspirated stops share to the exclusion of voiceless
unaspirated stops. The second question is whether [ATR] or [LL] accounts for the
patterning together of voiceless aspirated stops with voiced stops. The third question
is what the implications of the results are for a transparent phonetics-phonology
mapping that expects phonological features to have phonetic correlates associated
with them. In order to answer the questions, we looked into VOT, closure duration,
F0, F1, F2 and a number of spectral measures, i.e. H1*-A1*, H1*-A2*, H1*-A3*,
H1*-H2*, H2*-H4* and CPP. We recorded fifteen speakers of Madurese (8 females,
7 males) reading 188 disyllabic Madurese words embedded in a sentence frame.
The results show that the three-way voicing categories in Madurese have different
VOT values. The difference in VOT is robust between voiced stops on the one hand
and voiceless unaspirated and voiceless aspirated stops on the other. Albeit
statistically significant, the difference in VOT values between voiceless unaspirated
and voiceless aspirated stops is relatively small. With regard to closure duration, we
found that there is a difference between voiced stops on the one hand and voiceless
unaspirated and aspirated stops on the other. We also found that female speakers
distinguish F0 for the three categories while male speakers distinguish between F0
for voiced stops on the one hand and voiceless unaspirated and voiceless aspirated
stops on the other. The results for spectral measures show that there are no
significant differences in H1*-A1*, H1*-A3*, H1*-H2*, H2*-H4* and CPP between
vowels adjacent to voiced and voiceless aspirated stops. In contrast, there are
significant differences in these measures between vowels adjacent to voiced and
voiceless unaspirated stops and between vowels adjacent to voiceless aspirated and
voiceless unaspirated stops.
Regarding the question whether voiced and voiceless aspirated stops share certain
acoustic properties, our findings show that they do. The acoustic properties they
share are H1*-A1* for both genders, H1*-H2* for females, H1*-A3* and H2*-H4*
for males, and CPP for females at vowel onset and for males at vowel midpoint.
However, they do not share such acoustic properties as VOT, closure duration and
F0. Voiceless unaspirated and voiceless aspirated stops can be distinguished by
VOT, F0 and spectral measures, i.e. H1*-A1*, H1*-A3*, H1*-H2*, H2*-H4* and
CPP. However, these two voiceless stop categories have similar closure durations.
As regards the question if [+ATR] or [+LL] might be responsible for the patterning
together of voiceless aspirated stops with voiced stops, our findings suggest that
either feature appears to be plausible. Acoustic evidence that lends support to the
feature [+ATR] includes lower F1 and greater spectral tilt measures, i.e. H1*-A1*,
H1*-A3*, H1*-H2* and H2*-H4*, and lower CPP values. Acoustic evidence that
supports the feature [+LL] includes lower F1 and greater spectral tilt measures, i.e.
H1*-A1*, H1*-A3*, H1*-H2* and H2*-H4*, and lower CPP values. However, the
fact that voiceless aspirated stops are voiceless during closure raises a problem for
the feature [+ATR] and the fact that F0 for voiceless aspirated stops is higher than
for voiced stops also presents a problem for the feature [+LL].
The fact that not all acoustic measures fit in well with either feature is problematic to
the idea that the relationship between phonetics and phonology is transparent in the
sense that phonological features can be directly transformed into their phonetic
correlates. Following the view that not all phonological features may not be expected
to be phonetically grounded, for example, when they are related to historical sound
change, we hold the idea of a phonetics-phonology mapping which allows for other
non-phonetic factors to account for a phonological phenomenon. We also provide
historical and loanword evidence which could support that voiceless aspirated stops
in Madurese may have derived from earlier voiced stops, which probably retain their
historical laryngeal contrast through phonologisation
Phonetic Properties of Oral Stops in Three Languages with No Voicing Distinction
Almost all studies on the phonetics of oral stop voicing patterns focus on languages with a voicing distinction. This gives rise to some debate regarding which aspects of voicing patterns arise from inherent articulatory effects related to the production of a voicing distinction, and which aspects are intentional adjustments by speakers meant to enhance a phonological contrast.
This study investigates the phonetic properties of oral stops in three No Voicing Distinction (NVD) languages; Bardi (bcj), Arapaho (arp), and Sierra Norte de Puebla Nahuatl (azz). NVD languages do not utilize the larynx to maintain a contrast between any two sounds in their phoneme inventory. NVD languages do not use the larynx to produce any contrasts, and therefore present an opportunity to determine whether laryngeal defaults will emerge in this situation. Although NVD languages do not have a voicing distinction, there are a number of commonly accepted acoustic correlates of laryngeal properties that are based on observations from languages with a voicing distinction. The acoustic properties of NVD languages can be compared with patterns seen in languages with laryngeal contrasts as well as compared across the three languages to determine what phonetic patterns are shared across NVD languages.
Acoustic correlates of voicing distinctions were measured from labial, coronal, and velar oral stops in four phonological contexts: phrase-initial, intervocalic, post-nasal, and phrase-final. Five acoustic properties commonly associated with voicing distinctions were measured: total oral stop duration, rate of lenition, phonated and silent closure duration, voice onset time (VOT), and preceding vowel duration.
Overall, the findings from this dissertation serve to bridge the gap between phonetic science and phonological approaches to laryngeal properties. Results add to the discussions which relate to universal defaults, underspecification, and markedness principles in phonological systems. The results from this study suggest that while there are general phonetic processes which pose constraints on laryngeal properties in NVD languages, each of the three languages differed with regard to the implementation of these constraints. These results challenge universalist and markedness proposals which predict more uniformity when there is a lack of a contrast. Alternative approaches to explaining laryngeal properties which can account for more language-specific variation are better suited to explaining the results found in this study.ÂÂ
Each of the three languages studied in this project are endangered, under threat, and under-documented. Thus, a secondary aim of this dissertation is to highlight the contribution that endangered and under-documented languages can make to linguistic theory by expanding our understanding of the full range of human language structures
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