39 research outputs found
The descriptive content of names as predicate modifiers
In this paper I argue that descriptive content associated with a proper name can serve as a truth-conditionally relevant adjunct and be an additional contribution of the name to the truth-conditions. Definite descriptions the so-and-so associated by speakers with a proper name can be used as qualifying prepositional phrases as so-and-so, so sentences containing a proper name NN is doing something could be understood as NN is doing something as NN (which means as so-and-so). Used as an adjunct, the descriptive content of a proper name expresses the additional circumstances of an action (a manner, reason, goal, time or purpose) and constitute a part of a predicate. I argue that qualifying prepositional phrases should be analyzed as predicate modifiers and propose a formal representation of modified predicates. The additional truth-conditional relevance of the descriptive content of a proper name helps to explain the phenomenon of the substitution failure of coreferential names in simple sentences
Spontaneous Voice Gender Imitation Abilities in Adult Speakers
Background
The frequency components of the human voice play a major role in signalling the gender of the speaker. A voice imitation study was conducted to investigate individuals' ability to make behavioural adjustments to fundamental frequency (F0), and formants (Fi) in order to manipulate their expression of voice gender.
Methodology/Principal Findings
Thirty-two native British-English adult speakers were asked to read out loud different types of text (words, sentence, passage) using their normal voice and then while sounding as âmasculineâ and âfeminineâ as possible. Overall, the results show that both men and women raised their F0 and Fi when feminising their voice, and lowered their F0 and Fi when masculinising their voice.
Conclusions/Significance
These observations suggest that adult speakers are capable of spontaneous glottal and vocal tract length adjustments to express masculinity and femininity in their voice. These results point to a âgender codeâ, where speakers make a conventionalized use of the existing sex dimorphism to vary the expression of their gender and gender-related attributes