Some patterns of unscripted speech in Hindi

2001 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 115-126
Author(s):  
Manjari Ohala
Keyword(s):  
Acoustic Analysis ◽  
Native Speaker ◽  
Female Adult ◽  
Perceptual Test ◽  
Sound Changes

This paper presents data from a small corpus of unscripted speech gathered from one male and one female adult native speaker of Hindi. An acoustic analysis of the data demonstrated changes such as lenition and assimilation. The cases of assimilation included stop plus stop sequences yielding geminates. The results of a perceptual test showed that such ‘pseudogeminates’ are generally perceived as true geminates. Parallels between these phenomena and historical sound changes in Indo-Aryan are also discussed.

Rendaku or Sequential Voicing in Japanese Phonology

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Timothy J. Vance
Keyword(s):  
Native Speakers ◽  
Native Speaker ◽  
Semantic Relationship ◽  
Active Process ◽  
Obligatory Contour Principle ◽  
Initial Element ◽  
Sound Changes ◽  
Old Japanese

The term rendaku, sometimes translated as sequential voicing, denotes a morphophonemic phenomenon in Japanese. In a prototypical case, an alternating morpheme appears with an initial voiceless obstruent as a word on its own or as the initial element (E1) in a compound but with an initial voiced obstruent as the second element (E2) in a two-element compound. For example, the simplex word /take/ ‘bamboo’ and the compound /take+yabu/ ‘bamboo grove’ (cf. /yabu/ ‘grove’) begin with voiceless /t/, but this morpheme meaning ‘bamboo’ begins with voiced /d/ in /sao+dake/ ‘bamboo (made into a) pole’ (cf. /sao/ ‘pole’). Rendaku was already firmly established in 8th-century Old Japanese (OJ), the earliest variety for which extensive written records exist, and subsequent sound changes have made the alternations phonetically heterogeneous. Many OJ compounds with eligible E2s did not undergo rendaku, and the phenomenon remains pervasively irregular in modern Japanese. There are, however, many factors that promote or inhibit rendaku, and some of these appear to influence native-speaker behavior on experimental tasks. The best known phonological factor is Lyman’s Law, according to which rendaku does not apply to E2s that contain a non-initial voiced obstruent. Many theoretical phonologists endorse the idea that Lyman’s Law is a sub-case of the Obligatory Contour Principle, which rules out identical or similar units if they would be adjacent in some domain. Other well-known factors involve vocabulary stratum (e.g., the resistance to rendaku of recently borrowed E2s) or the morphological/semantic relationship between E2 and E1 (e.g., the resistance to rendaku of coordinate compounds). Some morphemes are idiosyncratically immune to rendaku. Other morphemes alternate but undergo rendaku in some compounds while failing to undergo it in others, even though no known factor is relevant. In addition, many individual compounds vary between a form with rendaku and a form without, and this variability is often not reflected in dictionary entries. Despite its irregularity, rendaku is productive in the sense that it often applies to newly created compounds. Many compounds, of course, are stored (with or without rendaku) in a speaker’s lexicon, but fact that native speakers can apply rendaku not just to existing E2s in novel compounds but even to made-up E2s shows that rendaku as an active process is somehow incorporated into the grammar.

scholarly journals Words without vowels: phonetic and phonological evidence from Tashlhiyt Berber

2002 ◽  
Vol 28 ◽  
pp. 93-110
Author(s):  
Rachid Ridouane
Keyword(s):  
Acoustic Analysis ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Native Speaker ◽  
Phonological Rule

This article deals with the Tashlhiyt dialect of Berber (henceforth TB) spoken in the southern part of Morocco. In TB, words may consist entirely of consonants without vowels and sometimes of only voiceless obstruents, e.g. tft#tstt "you rolled it (fem)". In this study we have carried out acoustic, video-endoscopic and phonological analyses to answer the following question: is schwa, which may function as syllabic, a segment at the level of phonetic representations in TB? Video-endoscopic films were made of one male native speaker of TB, producing a list of forms consisting entirely of voiceless obstruents. The same list was produced by 7 male native speakers of TB for the acoustic analysis. The phonological analysis is based on the behaviour of vowels with respect to the phonological rule of assibilation. This study shows the absence of schwa vowels in forms consisting of voiceless obstruents.  

scholarly journals Duration as a Phonetic Cue in Native and Non‑Native American English

2019 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 15-28
Author(s):  
Biljana Čubrović
Keyword(s):  
Native American ◽  
Acoustic Analysis ◽  
Native Speaker ◽  
Mother Tongue ◽  
American English ◽  
Spectral Characteristics ◽  
Vowel Duration ◽  
The Us ◽  
Long Time ◽  
Phonetic Duration

This vowel study looks at the intricate relationship between spectral  characteristics and vowel duration in the context of American English vowels, both from a native speaker (NS) and non-native speaker (NNS) perspective. The non-native speaker cohort is  homogeneous in the sense that all speakers have Serbian as their mother tongue, but have been long-time residents of the US. The phonetic context investigated in this study is /bVt/, where V is one of the American English monophthongs /i ɪ u ʊ ε æ ʌ ɔ ɑ/. The results of the acoustic analysis show that the NNS vowels are generally longer than the NS vowels. Furthermore, NNSs neutralise the vowel quality of two tense and lax pairs of vowels, /i ɪ/ and /u ʊ/, and rely more heavily on the phonetic duration when prononuncing them.

scholarly journals Between Sound and Voice: Teaching Chinese Tones To Non-Tonal Language Speakers

2021 ◽  
Vol 69 (9) ◽  
pp. 141-158
Author(s):  
Ewa Zajdler
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Language ◽  
Mandarin Chinese ◽  
Acoustic Analysis ◽  
Native Speaker ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Language Instruction ◽  
Voice Teaching ◽  
Two Stages ◽  
Teaching Chinese ◽  
Successful Production

The production of highly intelligible syllables in Mandarin Chinese entails a successful production of tones, which poses a challenge for learners of Chinese as a foreign language. The aim of the current paper is to address this issue by identifying the key tonal features contributing to tone intelligibility in the lexemes produced by Polish learners of Mandarin Chinese as a foreign language. Samples of Polish female students’ tonal pronunciations at two stages of learning were selected and compared with productions made by a female native speaker of Mandarin Chinese from Taiwan. Four syllables produced by the students were selected from a corpus of read-out passages which had already been assessed for the intelligibility of monosyllabic lexemes by native judges. The students’ pronunciation samples (whose pronunciation improved from the A1 minus language level to A2) were analysed using pitch, fundamental frequency contour, and register span criteria, and then compared to the female native speaker’s pronunciations of the same syllables. Importantly, before the results of this analysis are presented, the simplified model of tones widely used in language instruction is compared and contrasted with the acoustic analysis of tonal productions made by the native speaker. This is done to show to what extent the simplified, widely used model reflects real-life tonal productions.

Bulgarian Consonant Acquisition in Preschoolers with Typical versus Protracted Phonological Development

2019 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Barbara May Bernhardt ◽  
D. Ignatova ◽  
W. Amoako ◽  
N. Aspinall ◽  
S. Marinova-Todd ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Acoustic Analysis ◽  
Native Speaker ◽  
Word List ◽  
Primary Objective ◽  
Phonological Development ◽  
Single Word ◽  
Match Accuracy

Previous research on Bulgarian consonant acquisition reports earlier acquisition of stops, nasals and glides than fricatives, affricates and liquids. The current study expands the investigation of Bulgarian consonant acquisition. The primary objective was to identify characteristics of protracted versus typical phonological development (PPD versus TD) relative to consonant match (accuracy) levels and mismatch patterns. A native speaker audio-recorded and transcribed single-word productions (110-word list) of sixty 3- to 5-year-olds (30 TD, 30 PPD). Another two transcribers confirmed transcriptions using acoustic analysis for disambiguation. Data generally confirmed previous findings regarding the order of consonant acquisition. Factors characteristic of PPD in comparison with TD were: lower match levels, especially at age 3 for onsets in unstressed syllables: later mastery of laterals; and a greater proportion and range of mismatch patterns, including deletion and more than one feature mismatch per segment (e.g., Manner & Place). The paper concludes with clinical and research implications.

scholarly journals A PHONOLOGICAL ANALYSIS ON MADURESE ENGLISH TEACHER’S PRONUNCIATION IN READING AN ENGLISH TEXT

2016 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 294-309
Author(s):  
Tiyas Saputri
Keyword(s):  
Data Collection ◽  
Native Speaker ◽  
English Teachers ◽  
English Text ◽  
English Teacher ◽  
Sound Changes ◽  
Language Characteristics ◽  
English Native Speaker ◽  
Program Version ◽  
Descriptive Qualitative

This study concerns on a phonological analysis on Madurese English teacher‟s pronunciation in reading an English text. The writer identified kinds of oscillographic pronunciation made by Madurese English teachers in reading an English text, the differences of oscillographic pronunciation between Madurese English teachers and that of the English native speaker in reading an English text and how Madurese language characteristics influences Madurese English teachers‟ pronunciation. In the process of data collection, she used descriptive qualitative. She observed and recorded the Madurese English teachers‟pronunciation by using MP4 then analysed it by using Praat program version 4027. Then, she found that in reading the English text entitled „insomnia‟, the oscillographic pronunciation of Subject 2 and Subject 3 when it is compared to subject 1 is different and makes different meaning, but for some words, it is slightly different but it does not make different meaning. Furthermore, it is found that Madurese language characteristics influence Subject 2 and Subject 3 in reading the English text. Therefore, in reading it, they made some sound changes: vowel, consonant and diphthong. The sound changes are: 1). the vowel changes: ;, ;, , ;;, ;;, , 2). the consonant changes: , , , , 3). the diphthong changes: ;, ;;, , , ;. In reading it, it is found that subject 2 and subject 3 also made deletion and addition. It is, thus, concluded that the pronunciation of subject 2 and subject 3 are unintelligible because they often mispronounce which can make their students do not understand their saying.

Jaw setting and the California Vowel Shift in parodic performance

2017 ◽  
Vol 46 (3) ◽  
pp. 283-312 ◽  
Author(s):  
Teresa Pratt ◽  
Annette D'Onofrio
Keyword(s):  
Acoustic Analysis ◽  
The Other ◽  
Sound Changes ◽  
Semiotic Resources ◽  
Vowel Shift

AbstractThis article explores the intertwining semiotics of language and embodiment in performances of Californian personae. We analyze two actors’ performances of Californian characters in parodic skits, comparing them to the same actors’ performances of non-Californian characters. In portraying their Californian characters, the actors use particularized jaw settings, which we link toembodied stereotypesfrom earlier portrayals of the Valley Girl and Surfer Dude personae. Acoustic analysis demonstrates that both actors also produce features of the California Vowel Shift in their Californian performances, aligning their linguistic productions with sound changes documented in California. We argue that these embodied stereotypes and phonetic realizations not only co-occur in parodic styles, but are in fact semiotically and corporeally intertwined, one occasioning the other. Moreover, the performances participate in the broader process ofenregisterment, packaging these semiotic resources with other linguistic and extralinguistic features to recontextualize Californian personae in the present day. (Parody, performance, California, California Vowel Shift, embodiment, embodied stereotype, enregisterment)*

scholarly journals The influence of Standard German on the vowels and diphthongs of West Central Bavarian

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-33
Author(s):  
Katrin Wolfswinkler ◽  
Jonathan Harrington
Keyword(s):  
Primary School ◽  
Acoustic Analysis ◽  
Adult Child ◽  
Phonetic Variation ◽  
Longitudinal Changes ◽  
West Central ◽  
Sound Changes ◽  
Opening And Closing

The spoken accent of children is strongly influenced by those of their peers but how rapidly do they adapt to sound changes in progress? We addressed this issue in an acoustic analysis of child and adult vowels of West Central Bavarian (WCB) that may be subject to an increasing influence by the Standard German (SG) variety. The study was a combination of longitudinal and apparent-time analyses: re-recordings from 20 WCB children in their first, second and third years of primary school at two schools in rural Bavaria were compared with those of 21 WCB adult speakers from the same area. The question was whether the children’s pronunciation diverged from the adults’ pronunciation and increasingly so in their second and third years. Participants produced stressed vowels in isolated mostly trochaic words in which WCB vs. SG differences were expected. Both adult/child and longitudinal changes in the direction of the standard were found in the children’s tendency towards a merger of two open vowels and a collapse of a long/short consonant contrast, neither of which exists in SG. There was some evidence that, unlike the adults, the children were beginning to develop tensity (= tenseness) and rounding contrasts, which occur in SG but not WCB. There were no observed changes to the pattern of opening and closing diphthongs, which differ markedly between the two varieties. The general conclusion is that WCB change is most likely to occur as a consequence of exaggerating phonetic variation that already happens to be in the direction of the standard.

scholarly journals A PHONOLOGICAL ANALYSIS ON MADURESE ENGLISH STUDENTS’ PRONUNCIATION IN READING AN ENGLISH TEXT

2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Tiyas Saputri
Keyword(s):  
Native Speaker ◽  
English Text ◽  
Sound Changes ◽  
Language Characteristics ◽  
English Students ◽  
English Native Speaker ◽  
Program Version

The study focuses on the analysis of phonology on Madurese English students‟ pronunciation in reading an English text. The writer identified kinds of English oscillographic pronunciation made by Madurese students in reading an English text, the differences of English oscillographic pronunciation between Madurese students and that of the English native speaker in reading an English text and how Madurese language characteristics influences Madurese English students‟ pronunciation. To collect the data, she observed and recorded the Madurese English students‟ pronunciation by using MP4 then analysed it descriptively by using Praat program version 4027. Then, she found that the oscillographic pronunciation of Subject 2 and Subject 3 when it is compared to subject 1 is different and makes different meaning, but sometimes not. Furthermore, it is found that Madurese language characteristics influence them in reading the English text. Therefore, they made some sound changes: vowel, consonant and diphthong. Moreover, they also made deletion and addition. She concludes that their pronunciation is unintelligible because they often make mispronunciation.

scholarly journals THE PHONOLOGICAL PROCESS OF SEMIVOWEL INSERTION IN BAHASA INDONESIA

2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 560-567
Author(s):  
Kartika Eva Rahmawati ◽  
Agus Subiyanto
Keyword(s):  
Data Collection ◽  
Native Speaker ◽  
Note Taking ◽  
Phonological Process ◽  
Structural Process ◽  
Sound Changes ◽  
Observation Method ◽  
Bahasa Indonesia

The phonological process shows the changing of sounds and the rules that govern the work. These sound changes can occur in vowels, consonants, and even semivowels. This study focuses on the sound changes that occur in semivowels [y] and [w], especially in Indonesian vocabularies. This study aimed to investigate the quantity of diphthong diversity in Bahasa Indonesia, as the basis for examining the role and patterns of [y] and [w] insertion, as well as when [y] and [w] cannot be inserted into some words in Bahasa Indonesia. This study also emphasizes the location where [y] and [w] are inserted by using a spectrogram. The data collection used the observation method. The list of data was taken from Kamus Besar Bahasa Indonesia (KBBI) and pronounced by an Indonesian native speaker. The spoken data are transcribed into the phonetic form using the note-taking technique. The analysis was done through the syllabic structural process based on Schane. The results present that [y] is inserted between the diphthongs ia, iu, ie, io, ea, and eo. Then, [w] is inserted between the diphthongs ua, ui, ue, uo, and oa, and the insertion of [y] and [w] does not appear when they meet with the diphthongs ai, au, ae, ao, ei, eu, oi, ou oe. The spectrograms in this study are used to see and present the insertion of [y] and [w].

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