Automatically generated, phonemic Arabic-IPA pronunciation tiers for the boundary annotated Qur'an dataset for machine learning (version 2.0)

In this paper, we augment the Boundary Annotated Qur?an dataset published at LREC 2012 (Brierley et al 2012; Sawalha et al 2012a) with automatically generated phonemic transcriptions of Arabic words. We have developed and evaluated a comprehensive grapheme-phoneme mapping from Standard Arabic \ensuremath> IPA (Brierley et al under review), and implemented the mapping in Arabic transcription technology which achieves 100% accuracy as measured against two gold standards: one for Qur?anic or Classical Arabic, and one for Modern Standard Arabic (Sawalha et al [1]). Our mapping algorithm has also been used to generate a pronunciation guide for a subset of Qur?anic words with heightened prosody (Brierley et al 2014). This is funded research under the EPSRC " Working Together" theme

Robust Estimation of Tone Break Indices from Speech Signal using Multi-Scale Analysis and their Applications

The aim of this study is to develop robust algorithm to automatically detect the Tone and Break Indices(ToBI) from the speech signal and explore their applications. iLAST was introduced to analyze the acoustic and prosodic features to detect the ToBI indices. Both expert and data driven rules were used to improve the robustness. The integration of multi-scale signal analysis with rule-based classification has helped in robustly identifying tones that can be used in applications, such as identifying Vowel triangle, emotions from speech etc. Empirical analyses using labeled dataset were performed to illustrate the utility of the proposed approach. Further analyses were conducted to identify the inefficiencies with the proposed approach and address those issues through co-analyses of prosodic features in identifying the major contributors to robust detection of ToBI. It was demonstrated that the proposed approach performs robustly and can be used for developing a wide variety of applications

Creaky voice and utterance fluency measures in predicting fluency and oral proficiency of spontaneous L2 Finnish

While utterance fluency measures are often studied in relation to perceived L2 fluency and proficiency, the effect of creaky voice remains ignored. However, creaky voice is frequent in a number of languages, including Finnish, where it serves as a cue for phrase-boundaries and turn-taking. In this study we investigate the roles of creaky voice and utterance fluency measures in predicting fluency and proficiency ratings of spontaneous L2 Finnish (F2) speech. In so doing, 16 expert raters participated in assessing narrative spontaneous speech samples from 160 learners of Finnish. The effect of creaky voice and utterance fluency measures on proficiency and fluency ratings was studied using linear regression models. The results indicate that creaky voice can contribute to both oral proficiency and fluency alongside utterance fluency measures. Furthermore, average duration of composite breaks – a measure combining breakdown and repair phenomena – proved to be the most significant predictor of fluency. Based on these findings we recommend further investigation of the effect of creaky voice to the assessment of L2 speech as well as reconsideration of the utterance fluency measures used in predicting L2 fluency or proficiencyPeer reviewe

Generating Tailored, Comparative Descriptions with Contextually Appropriate Intonation

Generating responses that take user preferences into account requires adaptation at all levels of the generation process. This article describes a multi-level approach to presenting user-tailored information in spoken dialogues which brings together for the first time multi-attribute decision models, strategic content planning, surface realization that incorporates prosody prediction, and unit selection synthesis that takes the resulting prosodic structure into account. The system selects the most important options to mention and the attributes that are most relevant to choosing between them, based on the user model. Multiple options are selected when each offers a compelling trade-off. To convey these trade-offs, the system employs a novel presentation strategy which straightforwardly lends itself to the determination of information structure, as well as the contents of referring expressions. During surface realization, the prosodic structure is derived from the information structure using Combinatory Categorial Grammar in a way that allows phrase boundaries to be determined in a flexible, data-driven fashion. This approach to choosing pitch accents and edge tones is shown to yield prosodic structures with significantly higher acceptability than baseline prosody prediction models in an expert evaluation. These prosodic structures are then shown to enable perceptibly more natural synthesis using a unit selection voice that aims to produce the target tunes, in comparison to two baseline synthetic voices. An expert evaluation and f0 analysis confirm the superiority of the generator-driven intonation and its contribution to listeners' ratings

The Phonetics and Phonology of Lenition: A Campidanese Sardinian Case Study

This paper gives a detailed description of the consonant system of Campidanese Sardinian and makes methodological and theoretical contributions to the study of lenition. The data are drawn from a corpus of field recordings, including roughly 400 utterances produced by 15 speakers from the Trexenta and Western Campidanese areas. Campidanese has a complex lenition system that interacts with length, voicing, and manner contrasts. We show that the semi-automated lenition analysis presented in this journal by Ennever, Meakins, and Round can be fruitfully extended to our corpus, despite its much more heterogeneous set of materials in a genetically distant language. Intensity measurements from this method do not differ qualitatively from more traditional ones in their ability to detect lenition-fortition patterns, but do differ in interactions with stress. Lenition-fortition patterns reveal at least three levels of prosodic constituent in Campidanese, each of which is associated with medial lenition and initial fortition. Lenition affects all consonants and V-V transitions. It reduces duration, increases intensity, and probabilistically affects qualitative manner and voicing features in obstruents. Mediation analysis using regression modeling suggests that some intensity and most qualitative reflexes of lenition are explained by changes in duration, but not vice versa

ProPOSEL: a human-oriented prosody and PoS English lexicon for machine learning and NLP

ProPOSEL is a prosody and PoS English lexicon, purpose-built to integrate and leverage domain knowledge from several well-established lexical resources for machine learning and NLP applications. The lexicon of 104049 separate entries is in accessible text file format, is human and machine- readable, and is intended for open source distribution with the Natural Language ToolKit. It is therefore supported by Python software tools which transform ProPOSEL into a Python dictionary or associative array of linguistic concepts mapped to compound lookup keys. Users can also conduct searches on a subset of the lexicon and access entries by word class, phonetic transcription, syllable count and lexical stress pattern. ProPOSEL caters for a range of different cognitive aspects of the lexicon

Prosodic detail in Neapolitan Italian

Recent findings on phonetic detail have been taken as supporting exemplar-based approaches to prosody. Through four experiments on both production and perception of both melodic and temporal detail in Neapolitan Italian, we show that prosodic detail is not incompatible with abstractionist approaches either. Specifically, we suggest that the exploration of prosodic detail leads to a refined understanding of the relationships between the richly specified and continuous varying phonetic information on one side, and coarse phonologically structured contrasts on the other, thus offering insights on how pragmatic information is conveyed by prosody

Prosodic detail in Neapolitan Italian

Recent findings on phonetic detail have been taken as supporting exemplar-based approaches to prosody. Through four experiments on both production and perception of both melodic and temporal detail in Neapolitan Italian, we show that prosodic detail is not incompatible with abstractionist approaches either. Specifically, we suggest that the exploration of prosodic detail leads to a refined understanding of the relationships between the richly specified and continuous varying phonetic information on one side, and coarse phonologically structured contrasts on the other, thus offering insights on how pragmatic information is conveyed by prosody

Prosodic detail in Neapolitan Italian

Recent findings on phonetic detail have been taken as supporting exemplar-based approaches to prosody. Through four experiments on both production and perception of both melodic and temporal detail in Neapolitan Italian, we show that prosodic detail is not incompatible with abstractionist approaches either. Specifically, we suggest that the exploration of prosodic detail leads to a refined understanding of the relationships between the richly specified and continuous varying phonetic information on one side, and coarse phonologically structured contrasts on the other, thus offering insights on how pragmatic information is conveyed by prosody