Analyzing Navajo Discourse: Investigating Form and Function of Intonational Units in Referential Discourse

Extensive research has been conducted on the Navajo verb complex (prefix morphology) and specific constructions (i.e. relative clause structure, subject-object-inversion), but to date the proposed establishment of a method to analyze actual discourse from a functional or usage based approach has not occurred. The goal of this study is twofold. The first is to establish a method to analyze spoken Navajo using the Intonation Units (IU) as a measure as it occurs in natural, uninterrupted speech, according to the parameters outlined by Chafe (1994), and show the influence of the morphological complexity of Navajo on the size of the IU. Secondly, analyzing the function of the IU within discourse from the intonation-as-information-flow\u27 approach (Couper-Kuhlen 2005) including deliberate manipulation by speakers in a sequential manner and the framing in which story threads are woven together expressing various points of view within a single text. IUs (Chafe 1994, DuBois et al. 1993) are portions of speech occurring under a single prosodic contour that reveal how speakers naturally segment their speech. Prosodic structure, including the suprasegmental phonetic cues of intonation, pitch, rhythm, duration and pauses, has been studied in many languages, but to date, there has not been an analysis of Navajo that has attempted to define an IU and its function in discourse. The hope is the research presented will leave the reader with a better understanding of communicative process, how syntactic structural features are interrelated to cognitive constraints and interlocutor motivation which ultimately may influence and impact actual performance which are revealed via various voices (Dinwoodie 1999) represented within a text. By proposing a unit larger than the morphologically complex verb for analysis, a specific type of clause (i.e., relative or subordinate), or even a culturally relevant structure (i.e., subject-object inversion), the desire is the results presented will both foster and aid subsequent Navajo discourse analysis studies and ultimately positively impact Navajo language education efforts

Effect of Vocal Prosody on Elementary Teachers’ Perceptions of Black and White Students

There is an academic achievement gap between White and Black male students as evidenced by the significant difference between standardized test scores beginning in the third grade and continuing throughout secondary education. It has been postulated that this gap is influenced by differences in how teachers interact with students of color. This difference in treatment may stem from implicit racial stereotypes held by teaching staff. Many characteristics such as skin color or accent can serve as triggers for such stereotypes. One factor that has not been studied is vocal prosody, the melodic contour of one’s speaking voice, and its ability to activate racial stereotypes. This study examined the degree to which vocal prosody might trigger stereotypes and thereby affect teacher’s expectations of academic performance. A group of volunteer teachers (n=104) were tasked with listening to a recording of either a Black or White student reading a passage aloud. Half the teachers were simultaneously shown a photo of a Black or White student corresponding to the race of the recorded student voice, while half only listened to their assigned recording with no visual image. They were then asked to select an academic profile (ranging from Advanced to Unsatisfactory) that would best fit their expectations of the student’s academic achievement. Using this methodology, the goal of this study was to determine whether differences in voice (i.e., White child or Black child) or voice and picture affected teacher’s expectations of academic success. The statistical analysis of group response patterns indicated that there were no statistically significant differences. That is, recordings of the Black student reading (with or without accompanying photograph) did not yield significantly different ratings of expected performance than those of the White student reading. Therefore, there is no indication that voice influences teacher expectation. Further study into the effects voice has on triggering racial bias, in or out of the classroom setting, is needed. Examination into how the age of a student influences racial cuing by the voice is also of importance to this field of study. Despite the lack of significant findings, this study highlights the need for awareness concerning how racial bias can be perceived as impacting the classroom environment

A perceptual and experimental phonetic approach to dialect stereotypes : the tonada cordobesa of Argentina

textThis study investigates the perception of vowel lengthening in the tonada cordobesa, a feature of the Spanish spoken in Córdoba, Argentina. Unlike other dialects of Argentine Spanish, lengthening occurs in the pre-tonic syllable (Fontanella de Weinberg 1971; Yorio 1973; Lang 2010) and is believed to be accompanied by a pitch peak (Fontanella de Weinberg 1971). The goals of this dissertation are to determine if duration alone (i.e., without intonational changes) is significant in identifying a speaker’s Cordoba provenance, and to discover what listener features affect perception. A matched-guise methodology presents speech tokens with natural and manipulated pre-tonic vowel durations to Argentine listeners in a dialect identification task. Results show a main effect of speaker region and token type (natural versus manipulated). Shorter durations made Córdoba speakers difficult to identify, reducing accuracy from 59% for natural tokens to 28% for manipulated tokens with shortened pre-tonic syllables. Buenos Aires speakers received the highest identification accuracy for natural tokens (80%) and Tucumán speakers the lowest (43%). Longer pre-tonic vowel durations are associated with a Córdoba identity, regardless of speaker origin and other linguistic cues. Control tokens produced by speakers from Buenos Aires and Tucumán confirmed this effect: these tokens, when manipulated to have a longer pre-tonic vowel, induced the perception of a Córdoba identity. Listener experience is also shown to improve accuracy of dialect identification: listeners of more geographically distant provinces, relative to the speaker’s province of origin, present significantly reduced identification rates. Acoustical analyses of the Cordoba samples confirm pre-tonic lengthening as well as an early peak rise within the stressed syllable, and valley alignment before the onset of this syllable. Pre-tonic, tonic and post-tonic syllable durations are lengthened, resulting in a segmentally unbalanced intonational phrase for which prominence is disproportionately concentrated in these final segments. The durational, intonational, and rhythmic properties make the Cordoba dialect unique among regional lects within Argentina and across the Spanish-speaking world. This research contributes experimental evidence for the prosodic features marking this dialect and supports its saliency and social significance within Argentina.Spanish and Portugues

Communicative functions integrate segments in prosodies and prosodies in segments

This paper takes a new look at the traditionally established divide between sounds and prosodies, viewing it as a useful heuristics in language descriptions that focus on the segmental make- up of words. It pleads for a new approach that bridges this reified compartmentalization of speech in a more global communicative perspective. Data are presented from a German perception experiment in the framework of the Semantic Differential that shows interdependence of f0 contours and the spectral characteristics of a following fricative segment, for the expression of semantic functions along the scales questioning - asserting, excited - calm, forceful - not forceful, contrary - agreeable. The results lead to the conclusion that segments shape prosodies and are shaped by them in varying ways in the coding of semantic functions. This implies that the analysis of sentence prosodies needs to integrate the manifestation of segments, just as the analysis of segments needs to consider their prosodic embedding. In communicative interaction, speakers set broad prosodic time windows of varying sizes, and listeners respond to them. So, future phonetic research needs to concentrate on speech analysis in such windows

The time course of authenticity and valence perception in nonverbal emotional vocalizations

There is evidence that the recognition of sadness and happiness in nonverbal vocalizations reaches an adult standard before the recognition of anger and fear, and that men and women are equally good at recognizing emotions, regardless of whether male or female speakers produce them. Still, there is no evidence regarding how much time we need to identify the authenticity of vocal emotional expressions, as well as the type of vocalization itself. How much acoustic information do we need to perceive if a vocal expression, such as a laughter, is authentic or voluntary? How long does it take to perceive if its laughter or crying? The present study addresses these questions. The main objective is to determine the time course of authenticity and type of vocalization recognition in laughter and crying sounds. For this purpose, the procedure was done using a gating paradigm and a sample of 395 participants. Results showed that the recognition accuracy of nonverbal vocalizations improves with the increase of the gate duration, and that the identification of the type of vocalization (laughter vs. crying) happens at earlier stages than the identification of their authenticity (authentic vs. voluntary).Há evidências de que o reconhecimento de tristeza e felicidade em vocalizações não verbais atinge um padrão adulto antes do reconhecimento de raiva e medo, e que homens e mulheres são igualmente bons a reconhecer emoções, independentemente de estas emoções serem produzidas por falantes do sexo masculino ou do sexo feminino. Ainda assim, não há evidências de quanto tempo precisamos para identificar a autenticidade das expressões emocionais vocais, bem como o tipo de vocalização em si. De quanta informação acústica precisamos para perceber se uma expressão vocal, tal como um riso ou choro, é autêntica ou voluntária? Quanto tempo se demora a perceber se é riso ou choro? O presente estudo aborda estas questões. O objetivo principal é determinar o tempo de reconhecimento da autenticidade e tipo de vocalização em estímulos de riso e choro. Para tal, foi utilizado um paradigma de gating e uma amostra de 395 participantes. Os resultados mostraram que a precisão do reconhecimento de vocalizações não verbais melhora com o aumento da duração do gate e que a identificação do tipo de vocalização (riso vs. choro) ocorre em fases mais precoces do que a identificação da sua autenticidade (autêntica vs. voluntária)

Biasing the perception of ambiguous vocal affect: a TMS study on frontal asymmetry

Several sources of evidence point toward a link between asymmetry of prefrontal brain activity and approach–withdrawal tendencies. Here, we tested the causal nature of this link and examined if the categorization of an ambiguous approach- or withdrawal-related vocal signal can be biased by manipulating left and right frontal neural activity. We used voice morphing of affective non-verbal vocalizations to create individually tailored affectively ambiguous stimuli on an Anger–Fear continuum—two emotions that represent extremes on the approach–withdrawal dimension. We tested perception of these stimuli after 10 min of low-frequency repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation over left or right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex or over the vertex (control), a technique that has transient inhibitory effects on the targeted brain region. As expected, ambiguous stimuli were more likely perceived as expressing Anger (approach) than Fear (withdrawal) after right prefrontal compared with left prefrontal or control stimulation. These results provide the first evidence that the manipulation of asymmetrical activity in prefrontal cortex can change the explicit categorization of ambiguous emotional signals

Evidentials, politeness and prosody in Spanish: A corpus analysis

This paper analyzes three Spanish particles, namely al parecer, por lo visto and según parece, whose status as pure evidentials (i.e., elements that only convey"source of information") has been put into question. The aim of this study is twofold: firstly, to observe the incidence of prosody in triggering the contextual meanings usually expressed by evidentials, i.e., politeness, impoliteness and self-image activities; secondly, to find out whether their prosodic behaviour provides any hint of their core meaning being"source of information". In order to carry out this analysis, a corpus of circa three million words of Peninsular Spanish has been compiled, which aims to reflect a variety of registers (formal and informal) and genres (both confrontational and nonconfrontational). The study reveals different prosodic behaviours exhibited by pure evidentials on the one hand, and contextual meanings on the other. Theoretically speaking, the concept of"relational work" embraces all the contextual meanings, and therefore explains the prosodic difference more effectively than other concepts. On the other hand, data show a high number of cases in Spanish where evidentials are used with their pure meaning, thus supporting the existence of elements exclusively conveying"source of information", without any further contextual nuance

A Study of Accomodation of Prosodic and Temporal Features in Spoken Dialogues in View of Speech Technology Applications

Inter-speaker accommodation is a well-known property of human speech and human interaction in general. Broadly it refers to the behavioural patterns of two (or more) interactants and the effect of the (verbal and non-verbal) behaviour of each to that of the other(s). Implementation of thisbehavior in spoken dialogue systems is desirable as an improvement on the naturalness of humanmachine interaction. However, traditional qualitative descriptions of accommodation phenomena do not provide sufficient information for such an implementation. Therefore, a quantitativedescription of inter-speaker accommodation is required. This thesis proposes a methodology of monitoring accommodation during a human or humancomputer dialogue, which utilizes a moving average filter over sequential frames for each speaker. These frames are time-aligned across the speakers, hence the name Time Aligned Moving Average (TAMA). Analysis of spontaneous human dialogue recordings by means of the TAMA methodology reveals ubiquitous accommodation of prosodic features (pitch, intensity and speech rate) across interlocutors, and allows for statistical (time series) modeling of the behaviour, in a way which is meaningful for implementation in spoken dialogue system (SDS) environments.In addition, a novel dialogue representation is proposed that provides an additional point of view to that of TAMA in monitoring accommodation of temporal features (inter-speaker pause length and overlap frequency). This representation is a percentage turn distribution of individual speakercontributions in a dialogue frame which circumvents strict attribution of speaker-turns, by considering both interlocutors as synchronously active. Both TAMA and turn distribution metrics indicate that correlation of average pause length and overlap frequency between speakers can be attributed to accommodation (a debated issue), and point to possible improvements in SDS “turntaking” behaviour. Although the findings of the prosodic and temporal analyses can directly inform SDS implementations, further work is required in order to describe inter-speaker accommodation sufficiently, as well as to develop an adequate testing platform for evaluating the magnitude ofperceived improvement in human-machine interaction. Therefore, this thesis constitutes a first step towards a convincingly useful implementation of accommodation in spoken dialogue systems

Multimodal Annotations and Categorization for Political Debates

International audienceThe paper introduces an annotation scheme for a political debate dataset which is mainly in the form of video, and audio annotations. The annotation contains various infor- mation ranging from general linguistic to domain specific information. Some are annotated with automatic tools, and some are manually annotated. One of the goals is to use the information to predict the categories of the answers by the speaker to the disruptions. A typology of such answers is proposed and an automatic categorization system based on a multimodal parametrization is successfully performed

Methods in prosody

This book presents a collection of pioneering papers reflecting current methods in prosody research with a focus on Romance languages. The rapid expansion of the field of prosody research in the last decades has given rise to a proliferation of methods that has left little room for the critical assessment of these methods. The aim of this volume is to bridge this gap by embracing original contributions, in which experts in the field assess, reflect, and discuss different methods of data gathering and analysis. The book might thus be of interest to scholars and established researchers as well as to students and young academics who wish to explore the topic of prosody, an expanding and promising area of study