scholarly journals An instrumental analysis of oral monophthongs in Aceh Barat dialect of Acehnese

2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 383
Author(s):  
Tanzir Masykar ◽  
Roni Agusmaniza ◽  
Nurul Taflihati Masykar ◽  
Febri Nurrahmi

As among the ten most spoken languages, Acehnese inevitably has many varieties. Many previous studies on Acehnese have been heavily conducted on the northern varieties of Acehnese, leaving other Acehnese varieties unexplored. Pase dialect of Acehnese has been described to have oral and nasal monophthongs and diphthongs, but no studies on Aceh Barat dialect phonetic features of Acehnese have been made. Aceh Barat dialect has also been stigmatized as being rough and vulgar in the previous study. Thus, the current study aims to explore the instrumental analysis of Acehnese oral monophthongs by Aceh Barat speakers. Three male speakers (aged 35-50 years old) speaking only Acehnese as the local language participated in the current study. The ten Acehnese words used to target the ten phonemes were adapted from study. A total of 90 tokens of Acehnese oral vowels production were analyzed using PRAAT version 6.1.29. The oral monophthongs of the Aceh Barat dialect are generally similar to the previous study on the Pase dialect. Exception emerges for the vowel /?/ and /?/, which seems to be produced differently across the speakers. Both vowels appear to stretch further down the vowel space closer to the back vowels /u/ and / ?/, respectively.

2019 ◽  
Vol 62 (11) ◽  
pp. 4001-4014
Author(s):  
Melanie Weirich ◽  
Adrian Simpson

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.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jason Geller ◽  
Bob McMurray ◽  
Inyong Choi ◽  
Ann Holmes

Speech perception, especially in background noise, is a critical problem for hearing impaired listeners, and an important issue for cognitive hearing science. Despite a plethora of standardized measures, there are few single-word, closed-set tasks that uniformly sample the phonetic space and which use response choices that balance all phonetic features. The Iowa Test of Consonant Perception (ITCP) was developed to solve this. It is a phonemically balanced word recognition task designed to assess perception of the initial consonant of monosyllabic consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) words. The ITCP consists of 120 phonetically balanced CVC words. Words were recorded from four different talkers (two female), and uniformly sample from all four corners of the vowel space to control for coarticulation. Response choices on each trial are balanced to equate difficulty and sample a single phonetic feature. This study evaluated the psychometric properties of ITCP by examining reliability (test-retest) and validity in a sample of online normal hearing participants. Ninety-eight participants completed two sessions of the ITCP along with standardized tests of words and sentence in noise (CNC words and AzBio sentences). The ITCP showed good test-retest reliability and convergent validity with two popular speech-in-noise tasks. ITCP materials are freely available here: https://osf.io/hycdu/.


2019 ◽  
Vol 43 ◽  
pp. 41-58
Author(s):  
Danguolė Mikulėnienė ◽  
Aušra Pacevičiūtė

Language shift: The case of the Žeimiai area in the Kaunas-Jonava regionAs a result of application of the principles of multidimensional dialectology in Lithuania in the early twenty-first century, the research discourse of Lithuanian dialectologists now covers not only the traditional dialects, but also several local language variations that continuously interact and compete with one another in the same geographical area. The processes of convergence and divergence of language variations are addressed in a more comprehensive manner, not only analysing the linguistic characteristics of a local variation, but also looking into the language environment (or language landscape) and the attitude of the local populace (especially the young generation) towards their linguistic homeland.The linguistic study presented in this article was conducted in the Žeimiai area in the Kaunas-Jonava region in 2015–2017. It involved interviews with 21 members of three generations of one family (15 females and 6 males aged 19 to 95), over 20 hours of audio material in total; the informants also answered a sociolinguistic survey. The description and analysis of collected material involved: (1) analysis of the degree of viability of language variations used in the area on the basis of a model of sociocultural networks of Žeimiai town; (2) description of the linguistic landscape of the region; (3) description of the linguistic behaviour and attitudes towards local variations on the basis of informants’ replies in the sociolinguistic survey; (4) analysis of salient phonetic features of the informants’ speech that best describe the local language variation in use. The collected and processed material allowed the researchers to investigate the competitiveness of local language variations in this area, identifying ones that have greater demand with representatives of different generations compared to others (cf. Inoue, 1997, p. 41).In the opinion of the authors of this article, a local Lithuanian variation has developed in the Kaunas-Jonava region on the basis of the local Polish variation actively used for decades; this variation cannot be seen as a natural continuation of the Western Higher Lithuanian subdialects of the Kaunas or Šiauliai regions. What makes it different from the traditional Lithuanian subdialects is the mixing of ė and ie, o and uo in stressed position, and the processes of neutralisation of intonation in stressed compound and mixed diphthongs.These phonetic features, which, as the analysis shows, have been preserved in the language of all three generations to a greater or lesser extent, were absorbed by the Lithuanian dialectal language from the local Polish subdialect. Consequently, the local Lithuanian variation currently spoken in the Kaunas-Jonava region cannot be considered a direct continuation of the old traditional dialect. Przesunięcie językowe: Okolice Żejm w regionie kowieńsko-janowskim (studium przypadku)Kiedy na początku XXI wieku na Litwie zaczęto stosować metodologię opartą na zasadach dialektologii wielofunkcyjnej (ang. multidimensional dialectology), badania naukowe litewskich dialektologów ukierunkowano nie tylko na opis tradycyjnych gwar, ale też na inne języki współwystępujące na tym samym terenie, oddziałujące na siebie nawzajem i konkurujące ze sobą. Zachodzące procesy konwergencji i dywergencji różnych odmian języka są badane kompleksowo: przy opisie właściwości językowych miejscowej odmiany języka bada się otoczenie językowe (krajobraz lingwistyczny) oraz nastawienie mieszkańców (zwłaszcza najmłodszego pokolenia) do ukształtowanej sytuacji językowej.Badania językoznawcze przedstawione w niniejszym artykule przeprowadzono w okolicach Żejm w regionie kowieńsko-janowskim w latach 2015–2017. Przeprowadzono wywiady z 21 mieszkańcami w wieku od 19 do 95 lat, reprezentującymi trzy pokolenia jednej rodziny; nagrano 20 godzin rozmów i pozyskano dane za pomocą kwestionariusza socjolingwistycznego. Zgromadzony materiał został opracowany w następujący sposób: 1) wykorzystując sporządzony model sieci społeczno-kulturowych miasteczka Żejmy, ustalono stopień witalności używanych na tym terenie odmian języka; 2) zanalizowano krajobraz lingwistyczny regionu; 3) na podstawie odpowiedzi informatorów na pytania kwestionariusza socjolingwistycznego przedstawiono zachowania językowe osób badanych i ich nastawienie do lokalnych odmian języka; 4) dokonano analizy podstawowych cech fonetycznych języka respondentów, które najlepiej oddają właściwości miejscowych odmian języka. Zgromadzony i usystematyzowany materiał pozwolił na bardziej dogłębne zbadanie konkurencyjności odmian języka używanych w tym rejonie, to znaczy na ustalenie, która z odmian cieszy się wyższym prestiżem wśród reprezentantów różnych pokoleń mieszkańców tych okolic.Zdaniem autorek artykułu, w regionie kowieńsko-janowskim, pod wpływem miejscowej odmiany języka polskiego, intensywnie używanej przez wiele dziesięcioleci, ukształtował się lokalny wariant języka litewskiego, którego nie można uznać za typową gwarę dialektu zachodnioauksztockiego, kowieńskiego lub szawelskiego. Różni się on od tradycyjnych dialektów litewskich sposobem realizacji ė oraz ie, o oraz uo w pozycji akcentowanej, jak również zjawiskiem neutralizacji zestrojów akcentowych w dyftongach złożonych i mieszanych, występujących w pozycji akcentowanej.Te cechy fonetyczne, które, jak wynika z przeprowadzonej analizy, w różnym stopniu występują w języku wszystkich trzech pokoleń mieszkańców, zostały przejęte do języka litewskiego z miejscowej gwary polskiej. Dlatego nie można uznać lokalnej odmiany języka litewskiego używanej obecnie w regionie kowieńsko-janowskim za bezpośrednią kontynuację dawnego tradycyjnego dialektu litewskiego.


Author(s):  
Rima Bakšienė

The article analyses the linguistic basis of the Tarmynas, the database Lithuanian local language variants. The development of the database model was based on the linguistic variability of the Kaunas district as an important zone for the development of Standard Lithuanian. Until now, the territory of the Kaunas district has not been systematically studied by dialectologists; therefore, the study is relevant in assessing the interaction between Standard language and local variants; the conclusions drawn are significant for prog-nostic models of the Lithuanian language. The analysis performed by the methods of geolinguistics research showed a significant horizontal and vertical variability of the Kaunas district. Based on the characteristics of the traditional dialects and their spread in the new dialectal structures, four linguistic areas of the Kaunas district were distinguished. Their main distinguishing features are the shortening of long vowels in unaccented inflexions and the hardening of the compounds le and lė. The influence of the local Polish dialects on the current linguistic variants was also identified. The possibilities of the explication of the dialectal phonetic features in the database are also briefly presented: transcriptions of acoustic recordings and a questionnaire about the frequency of usage of the dialectal features.


Author(s):  
Inna Tsaralunga ◽  

As a result of the analysis of liturgical texts of the 14th–15th centuries created in the territory of Ukraine, expressive signs of interaction between the Old Bulgarian graphic and spelling system and the Ukrainian folk speech are recorded. Manifestations of the phonetic and graphic South Slavic-Ukrainian variability are associated with the following linguistic phenomena in the vocalism and consonantism of religious monuments: continuity of the former*ę,*’а and *Q; change of the initial *jе into о; transition of e into o after hushings and ц; reduction of и > ь before iotated vowels; confusion of unstressed и and е; development of sound combinations *tоrt, *tоlt, *tеrt, *tеlt; reflexes of sound combinations ър, ъл, ьр, ьл; hardening of р'; hardness/softness of hushing consonants; dissimilation and simplification of consonants; change of sound combinations *dj, *zdj and *tj, *kt . In the phonetic system of the studied monuments, the interaction of the traditional writing of that time and the local vernacular is observed, in particular, the phonetic features of the North Ukrainian and the South-West Ukrainian dialects are revealed. The study of the language of religious monuments taking into account the results of other research in the field of philology, paleography, theology has undeniable prospects for linguistic interpretation of church books with the definition of local language traditions of the time, their localization as elements of the Slavic written culture, resolving debatable issues regarding the formation, chronology and systematization of the church-written corpus.


2019 ◽  
Vol 28 (4) ◽  
pp. 1411-1431 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lauren Bislick ◽  
William D. Hula

Purpose This retrospective analysis examined group differences in error rate across 4 contextual variables (clusters vs. singletons, syllable position, number of syllables, and articulatory phonetic features) in adults with apraxia of speech (AOS) and adults with aphasia only. Group differences in the distribution of error type across contextual variables were also examined. Method Ten individuals with acquired AOS and aphasia and 11 individuals with aphasia participated in this study. In the context of a 2-group experimental design, the influence of 4 contextual variables on error rate and error type distribution was examined via repetition of 29 multisyllabic words. Error rates were analyzed using Bayesian methods, whereas distribution of error type was examined via descriptive statistics. Results There were 4 findings of robust differences between the 2 groups. These differences were found for syllable position, number of syllables, manner of articulation, and voicing. Group differences were less robust for clusters versus singletons and place of articulation. Results of error type distribution show a high proportion of distortion and substitution errors in speakers with AOS and a high proportion of substitution and omission errors in speakers with aphasia. Conclusion Findings add to the continued effort to improve the understanding and assessment of AOS and aphasia. Several contextual variables more consistently influenced breakdown in participants with AOS compared to participants with aphasia and should be considered during the diagnostic process. Supplemental Material https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.9701690


2019 ◽  
Vol 62 (12) ◽  
pp. 4534-4543
Author(s):  
Wei Hu ◽  
Sha Tao ◽  
Mingshuang Li ◽  
Chang Liu

Purpose The purpose of this study was to investigate how the distinctive establishment of 2nd language (L2) vowel categories (e.g., how distinctively an L2 vowel is established from nearby L2 vowels and from the native language counterpart in the 1st formant [F1] × 2nd formant [F2] vowel space) affected L2 vowel perception. Method Identification of 12 natural English monophthongs, and categorization and rating of synthetic English vowels /i/ and /ɪ/ in the F1 × F2 space were measured for Chinese-native (CN) and English-native (EN) listeners. CN listeners were also examined with categorization and rating of Chinese vowels in the F1 × F2 space. Results As expected, EN listeners significantly outperformed CN listeners in English vowel identification. Whereas EN listeners showed distinctive establishment of 2 English vowels, CN listeners had multiple patterns of L2 vowel establishment: both, 1, or neither established. Moreover, CN listeners' English vowel perception was significantly related to the perceptual distance between the English vowel and its Chinese counterpart, and the perceptual distance between the adjacent English vowels. Conclusions L2 vowel perception relied on listeners' capacity to distinctively establish L2 vowel categories that were distant from the nearby L2 vowels.


1974 ◽  
Vol 17 (3) ◽  
pp. 417-425
Author(s):  
Stuart I. Ritterman ◽  
Nancy C. Freeman

Thirty-two college students were required to learn the relevant dimension in each of two randomized lists of auditorily presented stimuli. The stimuli consisted of seven pairs of CV nonsense syllables differing by two relevant dimension units and from zero to seven irrelevant dimension units. Stimulus dimensions were determined according to Saporta’s units of difference. No significant differences in performance as a function of number of the irrelevant dimensions nor characteristics of the relevant dimension were observed.


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