The effects of imitation and synchronization on the pronunciation of selected phonemes in L2 English and German: a pilot study

ISBN 978-0-646-80069-1International audienceThis study focuses on investigating possible effects of synchronous speech, an experimental version of joint speech [3], on L2 pronunciation at the segmental level. While repetition and imitation are traditionally used in pronunciation teaching and learning of L2 phonetic and phonological acquisition, synchronous speech has been seldom studied in an L2 learning environment. What are the L2 linguistic aspects that synchronous speech would influence? Is there any effect of L2 phonetic convergence found when learners are speaking and listening at the same time? We studied the effects of synchronization and imitation on the acquisition of eight phonemes in L2 English and German that are known to be problematic for French learners. A series of acoustic analysis revealed that while some acoustic parameters such as formant frequencies and vocalic duration improved in both speech practices, changes brought on by synchronous speech of consonantal acoustic parameters were more subtle to determine

Speaker-specific kinematic properties of alveolar reductions in English and German

International audienceA simultaneous EPG/EMA study of tongue gestures of five speakers was conducted to investigate the kinematic events accompanying alveolar stop reductions in the context of a velar plosive /k/ and in the context of a laryngeal fricative /h/ in two languages, English and German. No systematic language differences could be detected. Alveolar productions before a following /h/ showed only a marginal weakening of the formation of complete occlusion, while alveolar productions before a following /k/ showed a wide range of reductions, including instances of a complete deletion of the alveolar gesture. The extension of movement reduction varied between and within subjects. Importantly, while speakers were consistent with themselves, they employed different articulatory patterns with respect to the timing relationship between movement initiation, overall movement duration, peak velocity as well as closure duration. An attempt is made to relate the observed movement patterns to the dynamic factors of the speech mechanism

A pilot study on the F0 curve of syllable-initial sonorants, comparing nasals, lenis stops and fortis stops

International audienceSeveral publications raise the issue whether the F0 curve of syllable-initial sonorants can play a prosodic role. The experimental evidence adduced in the present pilot study consists of 15 C1VC2 words, where C1 = /p/, /t/, /k/, /b/, /d/, /g/, /m/ or /n/, V = /ɑː/, /iː/, /uː/, and C2 = /t/; these words were said twice inside a carrier sentence by four Cambridge undergraduates (speakers of Southern Standard British English). Comparison of the F0 curves of the /m/-initial syllables with those of the obstruent-initial syllables suggests that only the part of the F0 curve which corresponds to the syllable rime is to be taken into account at the stage of the interpretation of the word's intonation pattern

Le rôle du feedback visuel articulatoire dans l'apprentissage des langues étrangères

International audienceLe but de cet atelier est de présenter l’ultrason, un outil de feedback visuel articulatoire permettant de voir la position de la langue en temps réel dans un contexte de classe de langues. Après une brève présentation de son principe de fonctionnement, de ses implications scientifiques et pédagogiques, de ses avantages et de ses limites, un temps de pratique est proposé : manipulation du logiciel SeeMore, utilisation sur des oppositions suggérées par des participants, discussion sur des protocoles pédagogiques

Patterns of lingual variability in German vowel production

This study aimed to assess the relative importance of biomechanical and linguistic constraints on articulatory precision by analyzing contextual and token-to-token variability in tongue postioning for vowels. Contextual variability proved greater for lax vowels. Back vowels showed substantially increasing variability towards more front tongue locations. Regarding token-totoken variability, lax vowels were more variable for front vowels, but less so for back ones. Again, back vowel variability increased towards the front. The main distinction in variability was thus between palatal vowels (whole tongue constrained) and non-palatal vowels (anterior tongue unconstrained)

Le rôle du feedback visuel articulatoire dans l'apprentissage des langues étrangères

International audienceLe but de cet atelier est de présenter l’ultrason, un outil de feedback visuel articulatoire permettant de voir la position de la langue en temps réel dans un contexte de classe de langues. Après une brève présentation de son principe de fonctionnement, de ses implications scientifiques et pédagogiques, de ses avantages et de ses limites, un temps de pratique est proposé : manipulation du logiciel SeeMore, utilisation sur des oppositions suggérées par des participants, discussion sur des protocoles pédagogiques

Qualité vocale et dispositions articulatoires dans le bilinguisme et la production de langues étrangères: recherches et perspectives

Pillot-Loiseau, C., Kühnert, B. (2013). Qualité vocale et dispositions articulatoires dans le bilinguisme et la production de langues étrangères: recherches et perspectives, présentation invitée à l'université de Mons, 7 février 2013.International audienceAprès une brève revue de littérature sur les dispositions phonatoire, la qualité vocale et les dispositions supralaryngées, les résultats au sujet du ressenti vocal d'apprenants du FLE et de sujets bilingues avec mesures acoustiques préliminaires d'une part, et une étude pilote sur les corrélais articulatoires associés aux composantes supralaryngées de la qualité vocale d'autre part sont exposées

Apprendre les langues étrangères par échographie

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Prosodic modifications in Tandem Interactions

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