scholarly journals Experimental approach of the prosodic component in the linguistic input of gardenpath sentences in Brazilian Portuguese

2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 65-83
Author(s):  
A. A. Fonseca
Keyword(s):  
Experimental Approach ◽  
American English ◽  
Brazilian Portuguese ◽  
Syntactic Processing ◽  
Linguistic Processing ◽  
Prosodic Cues ◽  
Early Activation ◽  
Linguistic Input ◽  
Intonational Phrases ◽  
Linguistic Process

This study investigates what part the prosodic component plays in linguistic processing. Can prosodic cues be computed early in the linguistic process and influence the syntactic processing? Some studies in American English (Kjelgaard&Speer, 1999; DeDe 2010) and German (Steinhaueret al 1999) have shown that yes, furthermore, prosodic elements like intonational phrases can modify the syntactic chain during processing. Our work is based on the premises that, during the perceptive processing, an early activation of the prosodic component in the linguistic input can lead the sentence’s syntactic structure.There have been studies in Brazilian Portuguese that show how prosody influences parsing (Lourenço-Gomes 2008; Magalhães& Maia 2006), however, none that tested the effects of prosodic constituents’ organization in online tasks.

Prosody in the interpretation of ambiguity

2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 03-13
Author(s):  
René Alain Santana de Almeida ◽  
Miguel Oliveira Junior ◽  
Reinier Cozijn
Keyword(s):  
Likert Scale ◽  
Brazilian Portuguese ◽  
Experimental Paradigm ◽  
Linguistic Processing ◽  
Nominal Phrase ◽  
Line Method ◽  
Prosodic Cues ◽  
Non Local ◽  
As Stress

The present paper aims to analyze the role of prosody in the resolution of global ambiguity in sentences of the type NP1 - Verb - NP2 - Adverb of place - Adverb of intensity (very) - Attribute, e.g., “The guitarist received the drummer at the room very drugged” (O guitarrista recebeu o baterista no quarto bastante drogado), in Brazilian Portuguese (BP). We consider the hypothesis that prosodic cues, such as stress and pause, assist in the process of disambiguation, both in isolation and in conjunction. The experimental paradigm of the present study used an off-line method of linguistic processing through a questionnaire with Likert scale questions. The results revealed a predominance of non-local apposition judgments in all analyzed conditions. However, the choice of assigning the adjective to the first nominal phrase increased, in a statistically significant way, in the conditions in which there was prosodic manipulation for that purpose, confirmation our hypothesis.

The role of cross-linguistic stress pattern frequency and word similarity on the acquisition of English stress pattern by native speakers of Brazilian Portuguese

2012 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amanda Post Silveira
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Mother Tongue ◽  
American English ◽  
Brazilian Portuguese ◽  
Stress Pattern ◽  
Target Language ◽  
English As Second Language ◽  
Word Similarity ◽  
L1 Transfer

This is a preliminary study in which we investigate the acquisition of English as second language (L2[1]) word stress by native speakers of Brazilian Portuguese (BP, L1[2]). In this paper, we show results of a multiple choice forced choice perception test in which native speakers of American English and native speakers of Dutch judged the production of English words bearing pre-final stress that were both cognates and non-cognates with BP words. The tokens were produced by native speakers of American English and by Brazilians that speak English as a second language. The results have shown that American and Dutch listeners were consistent in their judgments on native and non-native stress productions and both speakers' groups produced variation in stress in relation to the canonical pattern. However, the variability found in American English points to the prosodic patterns of English and the variability found in Brazilian English points to the stress patterns of Portuguese. It occurs especially in words whose forms activate neighboring similar words in the L1. Transfer from the L1 appears both at segmental and prosodic levels in BP English. [1] L2 stands for second language, foreign language, target language. [2] L1 stands for first language, mother tongue, source language.

scholarly journals English and Portuguese consonant clusters: contrasts and challenges

2020 ◽  
Vol 36 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sandra Madureira
Keyword(s):  
American English ◽  
Learning Model ◽  
Brazilian Portuguese ◽  
Consonant Clusters ◽  
Front Vowel ◽  
Vowel Epenthesis ◽  
Speech Learning Model ◽  
Speech Learning

ABSTRACT Consonant clusters occur both in Portuguese and English. However, clusters are more productive in English than in Portuguese and there are sequences which are only found in English.This study focuses on the contrasts between American English and Brazilian Portuguese consonant clusters and on three strategies Brazilian learners tend to apply when producing them: adding the high front vowel (epenthesis) between the consonants in the clusters, discarding consonants, or introducing phonetic changes. The relevance of introducing English clusters to Brazilian learners of English is pointed out and discussed under the framework of the Speech Learning Model (SLM).

scholarly journals CREATIVITY AND TRANSLATOR TRAINING: INVESTIGATING WORDPLAYS IN AMERICAN SITCOM 2 BROKE GIRLS SUBTITLED INTO BRAZILIAN PORTUGUESE

2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Adauri Brezolin ◽  
Tatiane de Paula Bóvis Spinetti
Keyword(s):  
American English ◽  
Free Association ◽  
Brazilian Portuguese ◽  
Target Language ◽  
Linguistic Awareness ◽  
Translator Training ◽  
Pragmatic Aspects

Translating wordplays has been considered a challenging task and an appropriate exercise for building (meta)linguistic awareness in translation students. By comparing wordplays from American sitcom 2 Broke Girls translated from American English into Brazilian Portuguese, we discuss, in this article, the main mechanisms used to generate and translate wordplays. For solutions considered ineffective in the target language, suggestions are offered emphasizing the creative and pragmatic aspects surrounding this linguistic event. Our results show that it is possible to encourage creativity among translation students if suitable techniques, such as free association, are adopted in the classroom. Our discussion can be a useful didactic tool for reflecting on theoretical and practical aspects related to wordplays, (meta)linguistic awareness and creativity. <p> </p><p><strong> Article visualizations:</strong></p><p><img src="/-counters-/edu_01/0847/a.php" alt="Hit counter" /></p>

scholarly journals The Role of the Auditory and Visual Modalities in the Perceptual Identification of Brazilian Portuguese Statements and Echo Questions

2020 ◽  
pp. 002383091989888
Author(s):  
Luma Miranda ◽  
Marc Swerts ◽  
João Moraes ◽  
Albert Rilliard
Keyword(s):  
Visual Information ◽  
Brazilian Portuguese ◽  
Perceptual Identification ◽  
Auditory Information ◽  
Visual Channel ◽  
Prosodic Cues ◽  
The Face ◽  
Set Up ◽  
Echo Questions

This paper presents the results of three perceptual experiments investigating the role of auditory and visual channels for the identification of statements and echo questions in Brazilian Portuguese. Ten Brazilian speakers (five male) were video-recorded (frontal view of the face) while they produced a sentence (“ Como você sabe”), either as a statement (meaning “ As you know.”) or as an echo question (meaning “ As you know?”). Experiments were set up including the two different intonation contours. Stimuli were presented in conditions with clear and degraded audio as well as congruent and incongruent information from both channels. Results show that Brazilian listeners were able to distinguish statements and questions prosodically and visually, with auditory cues being dominant over visual ones. In noisy conditions, the visual channel improved the interpretation of prosodic cues robustly, while it degraded them in conditions where the visual information was incongruent with the auditory information. This study shows that auditory and visual information are integrated during speech perception, also when applied to prosodic patterns.

scholarly journals Retrieving L2 word stress from orthography: Evidence from word naming and cross-modal priming

2020 ◽  
Vol 73 (1) ◽  
pp. 409-442
Author(s):  
Amanda Post da Silveira
Keyword(s):  
American English ◽  
Reading Aloud ◽  
Mixed List ◽  
Brazilian Portuguese ◽  
Word Naming ◽  
Lexical Stress ◽  
Word Stress ◽  
Moderate Frequency ◽  
Lexical Perception ◽  
Target Words

In this paper we investigated how L1 word stress affects L2 word naming for cognates and non-cognates in two lexical stress languages, Brazilian Portuguese (BP, L1) and American English (AE, L2). In Experiment 1,  BP-AE bilinguals named a mixed list of disyllabic moderate frequency words in L1 (Portuguese) and L2 (English). In Experiment 2, Portuguese-English bilinguals named English (L2) disyllabic target words presented simultaneously with auditory Portuguese (L1) disyllabic primes. It is concluded that word stress has a task-dependent role to play in bilingual word naming and must be incorporated in bilingual models of lexical production and lexical perception and reading aloud models.

“Since when does the Midwest have an accent?”

2018 ◽  
Vol 39 (2) ◽  
pp. 127-156 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katie Carmichael
Keyword(s):  
Regional Variation ◽  
American English ◽  
Social Judgments ◽  
Linguistic Input ◽  
The Moment ◽  
Listening Task ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The U.S

Abstract Folk ideologies about regional variation often depend on the consideration of certain varieties in contrast with the idea of a linguistically unmarked, standard way of speaking (Preston 1996; Lippi-Green 2012). This study analyzes the relationship between those abstract ideologies and in-the-moment reactions to linguistic input. Examining this question with respect to American English, a listening task manipulated where speakers were said to be from and whether the speakers used regional speech varieties linked to those places. Listeners were asked to make social judgments about speakers with varying degrees of local accentedness said to be from Southern, Northeastern, and Midwestern locales in the U.S.; these locations were selected to target highly enregistered nonstandard dialect areas versus more linguistically “unmarked” regions. Results indicate that while pre-existing sociolinguistic stereotypes about these three locations in some cases trumped the actual linguistic input that listeners encountered, effects of accentedness also varied in place-specific ways related to expectations for each locale.

Prosodic differences between declaratives and interrogatives in infant-directed speech

2016 ◽  
Vol 44 (4) ◽  
pp. 968-994 ◽  
Author(s):  
SUSAN GEFFEN ◽  
TOBEN H. MINTZ
Keyword(s):  
Word Order ◽  
American English ◽  
Standard American English ◽  
Prosodic Cues ◽  
Syntax Acquisition ◽  
Syntactic Information ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Syntactic Properties ◽  
Maternal Speech

AbstractIn many languages, declaratives and interrogatives differ in word order properties, and in syntactic organization more broadly. Thus, in order to learn the distinct syntactic properties of the two sentence types, learners must first be able to distinguish them using non-syntactic information. Prosodic information is often assumed to be a useful basis for this type of discrimination, although no systematic studies of the prosodic cues available to infants have been reported. Analysis of maternal speech in three Standard American English-speaking mother–infant dyads found that polar interrogatives differed from declaratives on the patterning of pitch and duration on the final two syllables, butwh-questions did not. Thus, while prosody is unlikely to aid discrimination of declaratives fromwh-questions, infant-directed speech provides prosodic information that infants could use to distinguish declaratives and polar interrogatives. We discuss how learners could leverage this information to identify all question forms, in the context of syntax acquisition.

scholarly journals Prosodic independence of affixes in Brazilian Portuguese: an experimental approach

2020 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
Author(s):  
Camila Ulrich ◽  
Luiz Carlos Schwindt
Keyword(s):  
Lexical Decision ◽  
Eye Tracking ◽  
Empirical Evidence ◽  
Lexical Decision Task ◽  
Experimental Approach ◽  
Acoustic Analysis ◽  
Brazilian Portuguese ◽  
Decision Task ◽  
Stressed Position

We argue that Brazilian Portuguese (BP) affixes can be divided in (at least) two groups according to their prosodic behavior: true affixes are prosodically integrated to the base, while compositional affixes are considered independent prosodic words. Aiming to find empirical evidence to sustain this distintion, we investigate two questions: (i) Can we find acoustic patterns in derived words to differentiate true and compositional affixes? (ii) Are there psycholinguistic evidence to sustain that these two groups are accessed differently in our lexicon?. In order to answer these questions, we developed two experimental paradigms. The first one is an acoustic analysis which compares duration in syllables and V-V units of derived words. In this experiment, syllables showed increase in duration towards the stressed position for all conditions, while V-V units seem to differentiate the two types of morphological formations. The second one is an eye tracking experiment with lexical decision task to describe fixations, saccades and level of accuracy in derived words and nonce words. Our main results show that compositional words presented longer total time of fixation in the eye tracking analysis and longer and less accurate answers in the lexical decision task, what sustains the hypothesis that the two categories behave differently. 

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