Intrusive vowels preceding /R/ in Quebec French

It has been observed (e.g. [2]) that an intrusive vowel (Vi) is frequently produced in obstruent+/R/ clusters, which is interpreted as a cluster simplification process. Here we look at Vi next to /R/ in a broader variety of contexts, in a corpus of 12,981 words read by 103 speakers of Quebec French [3, 4]. LMM shows that Vi is more likely to appear word- initially than in clusters, which questions the interpretation of Vi in terms of simplification. Vi is also more likely to appear with apical than dorsal /R/ (both attested in Quebec French) and, in clusters, after voiced obstruents. Vi is significantly more frequent in monosyllabic than in polysyllabic words. Regarding the quality of Vi, t-tests between Vi and the following vowel’s mean F1 and F2 (Hz) and duration show that there is little to no difference between the quality of the two vowels, though Vi is significantly shorter

Hypoarticulation as a tool for assessing social distance: an acoustic study of speech addressed to different types of interlocutors

Work within Hyper-Hypoarticulation Theory (H&H) and Communication Accommodation Theory (CAT) is increasingly focused on the adaptation of speech to the identity of the interlocutor (Koppen et al. 2017, Pardo et al. 2012, among others). These studies show a correlation between changes in the rate and spectral characteristics of speech (especially vowels) and the relationship between the speakers. Using the Diapix task (Baker & Hazan 2011), 10 Québec-French-speaking couples were invited to interact together and with two strangers, one French and one Québécois. This produced a corpus of 25h of speech and 121000 vowels. Spectral variations (especially hyper- / hypo- articulation), and changes in speech rate depending on the interlocutor, were studied using ((G)LMM) analysis. Our results reveal a correlation between the degree of social distance and speech reduction: the closer the interlocutors are (partners), the more speech is reduced

Application des lois nationales à l'internet : étude de l'encadrement juridique de la publicité

Mémoire numérisé par la Direction des bibliothèques de l'Université de Montréal

Ciblage exosomal et effet de HLA-DM sur la présentation antigénique par le complexe majeur d'histocompatibilité de classe II

Les molécules du complexe majeur d'histocompatibilité de classe II (CMH II) sont exprimées exclusivement à la surface des cellules présentatrices d'antigènes et servent à stimuler les cellules CD4+ initiant une réponse immunitaire. Le chargement peptidique sur HLA-DR se produit dans les endosomes tardifs et les lysosomes sous l'action de HLA-DM. Cette molécule de classe II non-classique enlève les fragments peptidiques de la chaîne invariante (Ii) restés associés aux molécules de classe II (CLIP) et édite leur répertoire d'antigènes présentés. En utilisant une forme mutante de HLA-DM (HLA-DMy) qui s'accumule à la surface plasmique, nous avons observé que HLA-DMy augmente les chargements de peptides exogènes et aussi la réponse des cellules T en comparaison avec HLA-DM sauvage. Il a été démontré que des molécules chimiques, comme le n-propanol, pouvait avoir le même effet que HLA-DM en remplaçant les peptides associés aux molécules de classe II de la surface cellulaire. De plus, HLA-DMy et le n-propanol ont présenté un effet additif sur la présentation de peptides exogènes. Certaines protéines de la voie endocytique, comme HLA-DR, HLA-DM, HLA-DO et Ii sont ciblés aux compartiments multivésiculaires (MVB) et peuvent être ciblées aux exosomes. Suite à une fusion entre les MVB et la membrane plasmique, les exosomes sont relâchés dans le milieu extracellulaire. Nous avons déterminé que le motif tyrosine de HLA-DMβ et son interaction avec HLA-DR n'affectaient pas le ciblage aux exosomes, sauf la molécule HLA-DO. Cette étude nous a permis de démontrer que HLA-DMy augmente la quantité de peptides exogènes chargés sur les CPA et que HLA-DM et HLA-DMy sont incorporés dans les exosomes.Major histocompatibility class II (MHC II) molecules are expressed exclusively on the surface of antigen presenting cells and serve to stimulate CD4+ cells to initiate an immune response. Peptide loading on MHC II molecules occurs in late endosomal and lysosomal compartments by the catalytic action of HLA-DM. This non-classical class II molecule removes class-II-associated invariant-chain peptide (CLIP) from class II molecules and edits their repertoire of antigenic peptides loaded. Using a mutant form of HLA-DM (HLA-DMy) that is targeted to the plasma membrane, we observed in the case of HLA-DMy, there is an increase of the loading of exogenous peptides and also significantly increased T cell response in comparison with HLA-DM wild-type. It was found that some chemical molecules, like n-propanol, could mimic the effect of HLA-DM by removing peptides from cell surface class II molecules. Interestingly, HLA-DMy and n-propanol seem to have an additive effect on the exogenous peptide loading. Some proteins of the endosomal pathway, like HLA-DR, HLA-DM, HLA-DO and Ii are targeted to microvesicules-containing compartments called MVB and they can be introduced into exosomes. Following the fusion between MVB and plasma membrane, exosomes are released in extracellular environment. We have determined that tyrosine motif of HLA-DMβ and interaction with HLA-DR does not affect HLA-DM targeting to exosomes, except for the HLA-DO molecule. In conclusion, we showed that HLA-DMy increases the quantity and the quality of exogenous peptides loading on APC and HLA-DM and HLA-DMy are incorporated to exosomes

De français canadien à québécois à laurentien: la résolution de trois siècles de débats terminologiques

Un Français: – Pardon, vous êtes canadien? Vous avez l’accent.Bob Gratton: – Moé, je suis un Canadien québécois! Un Français, canadien français. Un Américain du nord français. Un francophone, euh québécois canadien. Euh, un Québécois d’expression canadienne française française! On est des Canadiens… américains, francophones d’Amérique du nord. Des Franco-québécois…Linda Gratton: – On est, on est des Franco-canadiens du Québec. Des Québécois canadiens. Bob Gratton: – Les deux. Linda Gratton: –..

Developing Resources for Automated Speech Processing of Quebec French

International audienceThe analysis of the structure of speech nearly always rests on the alignment of the speech recording with a phonetic transcription. Nowadays several tools can perform this speech segmentation automatically. However, none of them carries out the automatic segmentation of Quebec French (QF hereafter) in a proper way. Contrary to what could be assumed, the acoustics and phonotactics of QF differs widely from that of France French (FF hereafter). To adequately segment QF, features like diphthongization of long vowels and affrication of coronal stops have to be taken into account. Thus acoustic models for automatic segmentation must be trained on speech samples exhibiting those phenomena. Dictionaries and lexicons must also be adapted and integrate differences in lexical units (such as very frequent words in QF that are not used in FF) and in the phonology of QF (such as the existence of tense and lax high vowels in QF but not in FF). This paper presents the development of linguistic resources to be included into the SPPAS software tool in order to get Text normalization, Phonetization, Alignment and Syllabification. We adapted the existing French lexicon and developed a QF-specific pronunciation dictionary. We then created an acoustic model from the existing ones and adapted it with 5 minutes of manually time-aligned data. These new resources are all freely distributed with SPPAS version 2.7; they perform the full process of speech segmentation in Quebec French