Acoustic evidence for high vowel devoicing in Lezgi

International audienceThis study uses acoustic analysis to determine whether unstressed pretonic high vowels in Lezgi are deleted or devoiced. We argue that the vowel gesture is not deleted, but it is overlapped and consequently devoiced by the preceding [s] gesture. We use spectral analysis to test the increased gestural overlap hypothesis. Three results support this hypothesis and consequently the devoicing interpretation: lower average energy in [s] before [u], higher energy in [s] before [i] in contrast to [a], and higher energy in [s] before unstressed [i] in contrast to stressed [a]

A minimal dynamical model of intonation:Tone contrast, alignment, and scaling of American English pitch accents as emergent properties

The pitch accent system of Mainstream American English (MAE) is one of the most well-studied phenomena within the Autosegmental-Metrical (AM) approach to intonation. In this work we present an explicit model grounded in dynamical theory that predicts both qualitative phonological and quantitative phonetic generalizations about the MAE system. While the traditional AM account separates a phonological model of the structure of the accents from the F0 algorithm that interprets the phonological specification, we propose a unified dynamical model that encompasses both. The proposed model is introduced incrementally, one dynamical term at a time, to arrive at the minimal model needed to account for observed empirical generalizations, avoiding unnecessary complexity. The quantitative and qualitative properties of the MAE system that inform the dynamical model are based on an analysis of a large database of productions of the four most well-studied pitch accents of American English: three rising accents (H*, L+H*, L*+H) and a low-falling accent (L*). The dynamic model highlights the importance of velocity-based measures of F0, not typically invoked in intonational research, as key to understanding F0 differences among pitch accent categories. Although the focus of this work is on the MAE pitch accent system, suggestions are made for how the unified phonetic-phonological dynamical framework presented can be further developed to account for other pitch-based phenomena in a variety of languages

Dynamic Acoustic -Articulatory Relations

151 p.Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2001.This dissertation investigates the relationship between tongue movement and dynamic formant patterns. Based on an analysis of tongue edge deformation from Lateral X-Ray Cineflurographic films, I argue that there are only two basic dynamic patterns: the pivot and the arch. These dynamic structures emerge when the analysis focuses on the contribution of tongue movement to area function dynamics, rather than on the movement of individual points of the tongue. Tongue movement is constrained to influence area function change only at locations in the vocal tract where a linguistic task is specified. The patterns are a dynamic expression of this constraint. Simulation of acoustic tube models will then show how the acoustic consequences of area function change at the linguistically specified locations are fused into complex dynamic formant patterns.U of I OnlyRestricted to the U of I community idenfinitely during batch ingest of legacy ETD

Quantifying lingual coarticulation in German using mutual information: An ultrasound study

International audienc

Pharyngeal articulation in the production of voiced and voiceless fricatives1

A structural magnetic resonance imaging study has revealed that pharyngeal articulation varies considerably with voicing during the production of English fricatives. In a study of four speakers of American English, pharyngeal volume was generally found to be greater during the production of sustained voiced fricatives, compared to voiceless equivalents. Though pharyngeal expansion is expected for voiced stops, it is more surprising for voiced fricatives. For three speakers, all four voiced oral fricatives were produced with a larger pharynx than that used during the production of the voiceless fricative at the same place of articulation. For one speaker, pharyngeal volume during the production of voiceless labial fricatives was found to be greater, and sibilant pharyngeal volume varied with vocalic context as well as voicing. Pharyngeal expansion was primarily achieved through forward displacement of the anterior and lateral walls of the upper pharynx, but some displacement of the rear pharyngeal wall was also observed. These results suggest that the production of voiced fricatives involves the complex interaction of articulatory constraints from three separate goals: the formation of the appropriate oral constriction, the control of airflow through the constriction so as to achieve frication, and the maintenance of glottal oscillation by attending to transglottal pressure