scholarly journals usage and distribution of "so" in spontaneous Berlin Kiezdeutsch

2010 ◽  
Vol 52 ◽  
pp. 43-61
Author(s):  
Stefanie Jannedy
Keyword(s):  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
Grammatical Category ◽  
Specific Circumstance ◽  
Gender And Age ◽  
Youth Language

In this paper I investigate the usage of the adverb and particle 'so' in spontaneous speech (interviews) collected from 21 speakers of the urban multi-ethnolectal youth language Kiezdeutsch. Speakers from the neighborhoods Kreuzberg and Wedding in Berlin are ranging in age from 14 to 18. The 1454 tokens of so available in the corpus (about 5 hours of speech) were classified into 10 different categories; some were structurally defined while others were defined along dimensions of meaning. Our current results indicate that there are differential usages patterns depending on the speaker's gender and age for some of these categories. Further, it appears that some patterns that have been attributed grammatical meaning may not appear frequently enough to establish a separate meaningful grammatical category. Rather, most instances of this kind of use of so appear to have a hedging function, indicating speakers' non-commitance to a specific circumstance.  

Grammatical Gender in the German Multiethnolect

2021 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 5-29
Author(s):  
Peter Auer ◽  
Vanessa Siegel
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
First Language ◽  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
Grammatical Gender ◽  
Grammatical Category ◽  
Immigrant Background ◽  
Frequent Use ◽  
Bare Nouns ◽  
Gender System ◽  
Germanic Languages

While major restructurings and simplifications have been reported for gender systems of other Germanic languages in multiethnolectal speech, this article demonstrates that the three-way gender distinction of German is relatively stable among young speakers from an immigrant background. We investigate gender in a German multiethnolect based on a corpus of approximately 17 hours of spontaneous speech produced by 28 young speakers in Stuttgart (mainly from Turkish and Balkan background). German is not their second language, but (one of) their first language(s), which they have fully acquired from childhood. We show that the gender system does not show signs of reduction in the direction of a two-gender system, nor of wholesale loss. We also argue that the position of gender in the grammar is weakened by independent innovations, such as the frequent use of bare nouns in grammatical contexts where German requires a determiner. Another phenomenon that weakens the position of gender is the simplification of adjective-noun agreement and the emergence of a generalized gender-neutral suffix for prenominal adjectives (that is, schwa). The disappearance of gender and case marking in the adjective means that the grammatical category of gender is lost in Adj + N phrases (without a determiner).

Prosodiac strategies of reading and oral narrative

2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 316-330
Author(s):  
Tatiana Evgenyevna Yanko
Keyword(s):  
Young Women ◽  
Preliminary Analysis ◽  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
Scientific Paper ◽  
Oral Narrative ◽  
Social Categories ◽  
Young Females ◽  
Gender And Age

This paper is aimed at the analysis of discourse incompleteness in sound speech. The main means of indicating that the current statement is not final is prosody. The preliminary analysis shows that various genres and styles of spoken speech – spontaneous speech, prepared speech, artistic reading, and radio newscasters’ reading – as well as various social categories of speakers use the prosody of incompleteness to different extent. The rate of demonstrating incompleteness in a text can serve as a parameter of genre, style, or a speaker him/herself. Young women even in prepared speech (for instance, in a scientific paper at a conference) are very eager in showing that the continuation of the speech is in its process, whereas professional readers of both genders practically do not employ the indices of incompleteness. In this paper, a notion of incompleteness factor has been put forward. It mirrors the frequency of incompleteness instances in a text, or in a working corpus of texts. Incompleteness factor as an instrument of sound speech analysis is tested on five fragments taken from a working corpus specifically set up for this investigation. The fragments exemplify the following parameters of texts and speakers: style, genre, gender, and age of a speaker. The analysis shows that sound speech of young females has a higher incompleteness factor than the one of males, or older females. At the same time, the radio newscasters reading has a higher incompleteness factor than the artistic reading.

Nouns and verbs in the speech signal: Are there phonetic correlates of grammatical category?

Linguistics ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 58 (6) ◽  
pp. 1877-1911
Author(s):  
Arne Lohmann
Keyword(s):  
Speech Signal ◽  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
Grammatical Category ◽  
Relevant Research ◽  
Complex Interplay ◽  
The Past ◽  
Per Se ◽  
Acoustic Analyses ◽  
Phonetic Realization ◽  
End Results

AbstractOver the past decades a considerable number of works have observed differences in the phonetic realization of nouns and verbs. The guiding question in most relevant research is whether such differences are caused by grammatical category per se, or are triggered by more general processes of phonetic implementation that impact nouns and verbs differently. Most studies argue for the latter and focus on one particular process or variable, which is advocated to be responsible for the acoustic differences observed. Among the processes mentioned are pre-boundary lengthening, accentuation, and frequency-induced reduction. Due to the focus on monofactorial explanations, an overview and contextualization of the different processes interacting with the noun-verb distinction is yet missing. The present paper aims to fill this gap. This goal is pursed by providing an in-depth discussion of how grammatical category interacts with a number of different processes that affect acoustic realization. To that end results from the literature on the topic are synthesized with new acoustic analyses of noun-verb homophones from spontaneous speech. The analysis shows that differences in acoustic realization between nouns and verbs are caused by the complex interplay of a number of different processes, defying simple, monofactorial explanations.

Effects of Gender, Parental Role, and Time on Infant- and Adult-Directed Read and Spontaneous Speech

2019 ◽  
Vol 62 (11) ◽  
pp. 4001-4014
Author(s):  
Melanie Weirich ◽  
Adrian Simpson
Keyword(s):  
Parental Involvement ◽  
Gender Identity ◽  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
First Year ◽  
Space Size ◽  
Vowel Space ◽  
Potential Impact ◽  
Phonetic Features ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Description Task

Purpose The study sets out to investigate inter- and intraspeaker variation in German infant-directed speech (IDS) and considers the potential impact that the factors gender, parental involvement, and speech material (read vs. spontaneous speech) may have. In addition, we analyze data from 3 time points prior to and after the birth of the child to examine potential changes in the features of IDS and, particularly also, of adult-directed speech (ADS). Here, the gender identity of a speaker is considered as an additional factor. Method IDS and ADS data from 34 participants (15 mothers, 19 fathers) is gathered by means of a reading and a picture description task. For IDS, 2 recordings were made when the baby was approximately 6 and 9 months old, respectively. For ADS, an additional recording was made before the baby was born. Phonetic analyses comprise mean fundamental frequency (f0), variation in f0, the 1st 2 formants measured in /i: ɛ a u:/, and the vowel space size. Moreover, social and behavioral data were gathered regarding parental involvement and gender identity. Results German IDS is characterized by an increase in mean f0, a larger variation in f0, vowel- and formant-specific differences, and a larger acoustic vowel space. No effect of gender or parental involvement was found. Also, the phonetic features of IDS were found in both spontaneous and read speech. Regarding ADS, changes in vowel space size in some of the fathers and in mean f0 in mothers were found. Conclusion Phonetic features of German IDS are robust with respect to the factors gender, parental involvement, speech material (read vs. spontaneous speech), and time. Some phonetic features of ADS changed within the child's first year depending on gender and parental involvement/gender identity. Thus, further research on IDS needs to address also potential changes in ADS.

Perceptual Evaluation of Speech Naturalness in Speakers of Varying Gender Identities

2020 ◽  
Vol 63 (7) ◽  
pp. 2054-2069
Author(s):  
Brandon Merritt ◽  
Tessa Bent
Keyword(s):  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
Identification Accuracy ◽  
Rating Task ◽  
Gender Identification ◽  
Identification Task ◽  
Male And Female ◽  
Perceptual Evaluation ◽  
Speech Training ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Speech Naturalness

Purpose The purpose of this study was to investigate how speech naturalness relates to masculinity–femininity and gender identification (accuracy and reaction time) for cisgender male and female speakers as well as transmasculine and transfeminine speakers. Method Stimuli included spontaneous speech samples from 20 speakers who are transgender (10 transmasculine and 10 transfeminine) and 20 speakers who are cisgender (10 male and 10 female). Fifty-two listeners completed three tasks: a two-alternative forced-choice gender identification task, a speech naturalness rating task, and a masculinity/femininity rating task. Results Transfeminine and transmasculine speakers were rated as significantly less natural sounding than cisgender speakers. Speakers rated as less natural took longer to identify and were identified less accurately in the gender identification task; furthermore, they were rated as less prototypically masculine/feminine. Conclusions Perceptual speech naturalness for both transfeminine and transmasculine speakers is strongly associated with gender cues in spontaneous speech. Training to align a speaker's voice with their gender identity may concurrently improve perceptual speech naturalness. Supplemental Material https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.12543158

Letter to the Editor Concerning Skuk et al., “Parameter-Specific Morphing Reveals Contributions of Timbre and Fundamental Frequency Cues to the Perception of Voice Gender and Age in Cochlear Implant Users”

2020 ◽  
Vol 63 (12) ◽  
pp. 4325-4326 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hartmut Meister ◽  
Katrin Fuersen ◽  
Barbara Streicher ◽  
Ruth Lang-Roth ◽  
Martin Walger
Keyword(s):  
Cochlear Implant ◽  
Fundamental Frequency ◽  
Stimulus Type ◽  
Voice Perception ◽  
Letter To The Editor ◽  
Gender And Age ◽  
General Influence

Purpose The purpose of this letter is to compare results by Skuk et al. (2020) with Meister et al. (2016) and to point to a potential general influence of stimulus type. Conclusion Our conclusion is that presenting sentences may give cochlear implant recipients the opportunity to use timbre cues for voice perception. This might not be the case when presenting brief and sparse stimuli such as consonant–vowel–consonant or single words, which were applied in the majority of studies.

Functional Spontaneous Speech Phenomena

2007 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 17-20
Author(s):  
Jean E. Fox Tree
Keyword(s):  
Spontaneous Speech

Differential Performance of Professional Dancers to the Music Apperception Test and the Thematic Apperception Test

2018 ◽  
Vol 39 (1) ◽  
pp. 20-49
Author(s):  
Leland van den Daele ◽  
Ashley Yates ◽  
Sharon Rae Jenkins
Keyword(s):  
Visual Processing ◽  
Assessment Tool ◽  
Thematic Apperception Test ◽  
Performance Tests ◽  
Basic Emotions ◽  
Gender And Age ◽  
Thematic Apperception ◽  
Professional Dancers ◽  
Visually Based ◽  
Modality Preference

Abstract. This project compared the relative performance of professional dancers and nondancers on the Music Apperception Test (MAT; van den Daele, 2014 ), then compared dancers’ performance on the MAT with that on the Thematic Apperception Test (TAT; Murray, 1943 ). The MAT asks respondents to “tell a story to the music” in compositions written to represent basic emotions. Dancers had significantly shorter response latency and were more fluent in storytelling than a comparison group matched for gender and age. Criterion-based evaluation of dancers’ narratives found narrative emotion consistent with music written to portray the emotion, with the majority integrating movement, sensation, and imagery. Approximately half the dancers were significantly more fluent on the MAT than the TAT, while the other half were significantly more fluent on the TAT than the MAT. Dancers who were more fluent on the MAT had a higher proportion of narratives that integrated movement and imagery compared with those more fluent on the TAT. The results were interpreted as consistent with differences observed in neurological studies of auditory and visual processing, educational studies of modality preference, and the cognitive style literature. The MAT provides an assessment tool to complement visually based performance tests in personality appraisal.

Measurement Invariance of Divergent Thinking Across Gender, Age, and School Forms

2009 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-7 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jörg-Tobias Kuhn ◽  
Heinz Holling
Keyword(s):  
Measurement Invariance ◽  
Divergent Thinking ◽  
Factor Model ◽  
Age Groups ◽  
Thinking Skills ◽  
Specific Model ◽  
Confirmatory Factor Analyses ◽  
Domain Specific ◽  
Gender And Age ◽  
Confirmatory Factor

The present study explores the factorial structure and the degree of measurement invariance of 12 divergent thinking tests. In a large sample of German students (N = 1328), a three-factor model representing verbal, figural, and numerical divergent thinking was supported. Multigroup confirmatory factor analyses revealed that partial strong measurement invariance was tenable across gender and age groups as well as school forms. Latent mean comparisons resulted in significantly higher divergent thinking skills for females and students in schools with higher mean IQ. Older students exhibited higher latent means on the verbal and figural factor, but not on the numerical factor. These results suggest that a domain-specific model of divergent thinking may be assumed, although further research is needed to elucidate the sources that negatively affect measurement invariance.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document