This study investigates sociophonetic stress variation in the Onondaga County area of Upstate New York. I argue that five variations of stress correlate to factors of age, education level, place of residence, frequency, and analogical change. Dinkin and Evanini (2010) have examined and discovered similar outcomes of stress variation in his work with dialectal features across the state of New York. Rather than analyze the state and its borders in their entirety, I focus on morpheme-specific analogical change of stress in specific social categories within the Syracuse, New York region. In terms of lexical items, I analyze stress placement within four-, five-, and six-syllable words containing the -mentary affix and explore how stress shifts in these words depending on those social and linguistic factors. Data were collected through formal and informal sociolinguistic interviews in which each instance of the target words were analyzed as belonging to one of five types of stress. Results indicate that Syracuse is one of the locations in the state that see all five stress patterns. To further investigate, I take the provided evidence of stress variation and filter for sociological relevance for factors of age, gender, and residence.

The role of literacy skills in learning and the ability to have the cognitive learning skills necessary to receive, process and make meaning of information is core to academic achievement at school. Many learners whose underdeveloped literacy skills prove to be a considerable barrier to learning struggle to make any significant progress at school, particularly at secondary school if these learners have come into their grade eight year from a remedial primary school where only a limited curriculum is taught. Often these learners drop out of the educational system altogether with no real alternatives available to them. Inclusive education policy states that schools must do everything they can to make the curriculum accessible to all learners regardless of their barrier to learning. This research project examined the critical success factors of implementing a one-on-one mediated literacy programme to eight selected grade eight learners as part of their school programme. The learners selected to be participants on the programme were identified from an analysis of background history, educational testing, and parent and teacher recommendations as learners whose specific barrier to learning was associated with inadequate literacy skill ability. The programme was called the Integrated Approach to Literacy Instruction(IATLI), and it combined the mediation of literacy skills simultaneously with metacognitive learning strategies. The research project was participatory in nature, as the researcher was the mediator of the programme to the eight learners. The project was based on participatory action research theory, and was a case-study design implemented at an independent secondary school in Johannesburg. The methodology used to evaluate the research project was a mixed research design incorporating structured surveys of the teaching staff, pre- and post-testing of the eight learners using standardized educational tests that evaluated literacy ability, semi-structured interviews with the teachers who taught the eight learners, and commentary from the learners themselves recorded in the researcher’s journal. Quantitative and qualitative analysis of the data indicated that the programme was a worthwhile initiative, and that certain critical success factors of the IATLI programme’s implementation emerged. Of these critical success factors, highlighted in the research sub-questions, success was often more evident in some learners than others. The data also highlighted a number of challenges that the programme’s implementation exposed, notably sustainability of the programme in the long term, as the programme was driven by the learning support specialist and the factor of burnout with regard to the intensive nature of the programme and its demands on the learner participants and the school’s internal structures. Other challenges that emerged were the practical aspects of integrating an inclusive education initiative into the demanding high school curriculum, and addressing the paradigm shift necessary to get all educators collaborating with learning support programme outcomes and then supporting initiatives in their own teaching.

<div>This thesis research was motivated by the need for increasing speech transmission rates through a phonemic-based tactile speech communication device named TAPS (TActile Phonemic Sleeve). The device consists of a 4-by-6 tactor array worn on</div><div>the forearm that delivers vibrotactile patterns corresponding to English phonemes. Three studies that proceeded this thesis evaluated a coding strategy that mapped 39 English phonemes into vibrotactile patterns. This thesis corresponds to a continuation of the project with improvements summarized in two parts. First, a design and implementation of a training framework based on theories of second language acquisition and game-based learning is developed. A role playing game named Haptos was designed to implement this framework. A pilot study using the first version of the game showed that two participants were able to master a list of 52 words within 45 minutes of game play. Second, an improved set of haptic codes was designed. The design was based on the statistics of spoken English and included an additional set of codes that abbreviate the most frequently co-occurring phonemes in duration. The new set included 39 English phonemes and 10 additional abbreviated symbols. The new codes represent a 24 to 46% increase in word presentation rates. A second version of the Haptos game was implemented to test the new 49 codes in a learning curriculum distributed over multiple days. Eight participants learned the new codes within 6 hours of training and obtained an average score of 84.44% in symbol identification tests with error rates per haptic symbol below 18%. The results demonstrate the feasibility of employing the new codes for future work where the ability to receive longer sequences of phonemes corresponding to phrases and sentences will be trained and tested.</div>

Cette étude montre que le développement phonético-phonologique en fulfulde et bambara est à la fois comparable au développement langagier dans d'autres langues du monde et influencé par les caractéristiques phonétiques et phonologiques de ces deux langues notamment au niveau de la phonotaxe. Ainsi, tandis que les résultats obtenus dans les données du babillage montrent que pour les vocants, il n'existe aucun indice de spécialisation précoce, pour les closants, des aspects universels coexistent avec des indices de spécialisation précoce. Toujours au stade du babillage, l'analyse des cooccurrences entre lieu d'articulation des closants et lieu des vocants dans les protosyllabes confirme la surreprésentation du pure frame labial+central dans les productions des enfants tandis que quelques cas de coronal+antérieur ont été relevés chez certains enfants qui participent à cette étude. Au stade des premiers mots, l'acquisition du contrôle de la vibration des cordes vocales, du velum et de la quantité est toujours en cours jusqu'à l'âge de 3 ans chez les enfants exposés au fulfulde et au bambara. Par ailleurs, l'étude du développement de la phonologie en fulfulde et bambara montre que des aspects universels (liés notamment à des contraintes biomécaniques et aérodynamiques) et des indices de spécialisation coexistent, même au stade des premiers mots. L'étude supporte l'existence d'une continuité entre babillage et premiers mots chez l'enfant et décrit le multilinguisme dans la ville de Douentza (Mali) où grandissent les enfants multilingues qui participent à cette étude. / This dissertation shows that Fulfulde and Bambara language development is both comparable to language development in other world languages and is influenced by the phonetic and phonological characteristics of the languages of the environment, including phonotax. In fact, while findings on babbling data indicate that for vowel-like sounds there is no evidence of early specialization, for consonant-like sounds, universal aspects coexist with evidence of early specialization. Still at the babbling stage, analysis of consonant-vowel co-occurrence patterns in protosyllables shows an overrepresentation of labial + central combinations and cases of coronal + anterior in monolingual as well as in multilingual children's productions. At the first words stage, the acquisition of control of vocal cords' vibration, the velum and quantity is still ongoing until the age of 3 in children exposed to Fulfulde and Bambara. Moreover, the study of phonological development in Fulfulde and Bambara shows that universal aspects (related especially to biomechanical and aerodynamic constraints) and specialization's indices coexist, even at the first words stage. The study supports the existence of continuity between babbling and first words in children and describes multilingualism in the city of Douentza (Mali), where multilingual children participating in this study are growing up.

Le langage et la musique sont deux éléments majeurs structurants une société. ils permettent aux membres de cette dernière d'entretenir et d'échanger avec autrui. ces objectifs sont communs à ceux de l'enseignant de langue-culture : créer des actes de langage. la production orale fait appel aux différentes connaissances de l'apprenant qu'elles soient syntaxiques, lexicales, phonétiques. les activités, telles que le théâtre ou le chant favorisent les acquisitions nécessaires à l'enseignement des langues et, plus particulièrement dans ce cas-ci, du français langue étrangère. ces deux supports sont un moyen didactique d'apprentissage qui, par le travail de création, puis de mémorisation, se détache des problèmes purement linguistiques pour se focaliser sur les compétences verbales, phonétiques et prosodiques de chaque apprenant.nous nous interrogerons sur l'évolution de l'enseignement de la phonétique en langues vivantes et plus particulièrement en fle puis des enseignements proposés par le théâtre et le chant d'un point de vue théorique. cette théorisation nous permettra par la suite d'observer si elle peut mener à une pratique plus performante. nous observerons les particularités des disciplines artistiques au niveau corporel, vocal, mais aussi d'un point de vue relationnel que ce soit au niveau vertical ou au niveau horizontal. ce dernier élément nous permettra ainsi d'observer le rôle de l'enseignant, la préparation que cela implique, les difficultés (choix du texte, gestion du temps, notation de ce type d'enseignement, l'implication ou non des apprenants, l'utilisation du métalangage propre au domaine de la phonétique, pallier les connaissances préalables et les transferts des apprenants…) auxquelles il peut être confronté ainsi que les apports que cela procure d'un point de vue pédagogique. nous tenterons de décrire et d'analyser ainsi une approche transdisciplinaire d'un enseignement-apprentissage possible de la phonétique et ainsi de répondre à la problématique de ce domaine : comment reconnaître et reproduire les phonèmes d'une langue étrangère. / The following study discusses the influence of drama and singing in the teaching and learning of French pronunciation as a foreign language. The theoretical part of this reflexion relies on interactionism, socio-constructivism and emergentist approaches. We will review the different methods of teaching pronunciation as well as the concepts of “norm” “correction”, “body langage” and “voice setting” in such context. Therefore, we conducted two experiments. The first study took place at the University Paris 3 Sorbonne-Nouvelle. We managed a singing project with students who learn French pronunciation at the A2 level. The second one dealt with drama and pronunciation with a group of A2 level students at the Catholic University of Paris. Through the observation and collection of pre- and post-tests we will present the results of the analysis of /y/ and /u/ of female voices through such protocols. This study aims to contribute to the field of pronunciation with artistic approaches.

Linguistic research suggests that speakers represent syllable structure by a CV-frame. CVC syllables are more frequent than VCC ones. Further, the presence of VCC syllables in a language asymmetrically implies the presence of CVC syllables. These typological facts may reflect grammatical constraints. Alternatively, people's preferences may be due solely to their sensitivity to the statistical properties of sound combinations in their language. I demonstrate that participants in an auditory lexical decision task reject VCC nonwords faster than CVC nonwords, suggesting that the marked VCC syllables are dispreferred relative to CVC syllables. In a second experiment, I show that people are also sensitive to the distribution of these frames in the experiment. Findings indicate that syllable structure is represented at the phonological level, that individuals have preferences for certain syllables, and that these preferences can not be accounted for by the statistical properties of the stimuli. / by Kayla Causey. / Thesis (M.A.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2008. / Includes bibliography. / Electronic reproduction. Boca Raton, Fla., 2008. Mode of access: World Wide Web.

Este trabalho trata da descrição e da análise do contorno entoacional total de sentenças interrogativas globais e parciais, neutras e não-neutras, da variedade paulista do português brasileiro (PB). Investigamos a relação entre a associação de eventos tonais ao contorno entoacional dessas sentenças e a formação de domínios prosódicos. Nosso objetivo é identificar padrões entoacionais que codifiquem prosodicamente o significado pragmático dos diferentes tipos de sentenças interrogativas do PB. Partimos da hipótese de que o contorno entoacional total tem papel fundamental na codificação de significados pragmáticos, além do contorno nuclear. Em nosso trabalho, utilizamo-nos de corpora de fala controlada obtida em tarefa de leitura de sentenças interrogativas antecedidas por contextos propícios à produção de diferentes tipos frásicos interrogativos e de fala semicontrolada obtida em tarefa de leitura de mapa em dupla. A descrição e a análise prosódica das sentenças interrogativas de nossos corpora foram feitas à luz da visão integrada entre a abordagem Autossegmental e Métrica da Fonologia Entoacional (Pierrehumbert 1980; Pierrehumbert & Beckman 1988; Ladd 1996, 2008; Jun 2005/2014; entre outros) e a Fonologia Prosódica (Selkirk 1984, 1986, 2000; Nespor & Vogel 1986, 2007). Levamos em conta, para o desenvolvimento das análises desta investigação, os trabalhos desenvolvidos nesse mesmo quadro teórico e aplicados ao português (Frota & Vigário 2000; Tenani 2002; Fernandes 2007a, 2007b, Serra 2009, Toneli 2014; e, mais especificamente para sentenças interrogativas, Moraes 2008, Truckenbrodt, Sandalo & Abaurre 2009, Castelo 2011, 2016 e Frota et. al. 2015a). Os resultados obtidos a partir de nossa investigação revelam que (i) de maneira geral, o contorno nuclear das sentenças interrogativas da variedade paulista do PB tem um padrão ascendente-descendente; (ii) o contorno entoacional total tem papel importante na codificação do significado pragmático da interrogação; (iii) há características prosódicas especiais associadas ao contorno entoacional total que correspondem a significados pragmáticos específicos, como, por exemplo: (a) a marcação prosódica de foco e ênfase que varia a depender do significado pragmático associado à marcação de foco e ênfase nos diferentes tipos frásicos; (b) a associação de downstep ao contorno nuclear de sentenças interrogativas neutras; (c) a associação de upstep marcando o elemento enfático em sentenças interrogativas antiexpectativa; (d) o rebaixamento da gama de variação tonal no trecho do contorno entoacional correspondente à primeira palavra prosódica e o contorno nuclear em sentenças interrogativas retóricas; (e) as diferenças quanto à densidade tonal em sentenças interrogativas neutras e não-neutras; entre outras características prosódicas especiais associadas a significados pragmáticos específicos. Tais resultados revelam o cumprimento dos objetivos da pesquisa e confirmam nossa hipótese inicial de trabalho. / This study aims to describe the intonational contour of global and partial, neutral and non-neutral interrogative sentences of the Paulista variety of Brazilian Portuguese (BP). We investigate the relation between tonal events assignment and the formation of prosodic domains. Our goal is to find intonational patterns that codigy pragmatic meaning of different clause types of BP interrogative sentences. Our hypothesis is that the total contour has a fundamental role in codifying pragmatic meaning, besides the nuclear contour. In our work, the corpora analyzed includes controlled speech data obtained in a reading task that exposed interrogative sentences along with context to elicit the production of interrogatives with different pragmatic meanings and semicontrolled speech data recorded in a map task. The description and the prosodic analysis of the intonational phrasing of the interrogative sentences of our corpora were developed according to an integrated view of the Autossegmental Metrical approach within the framework of Intonational Phonology (Pierrehumbert 1980; Pierrehumbert & Beckman 1988; Ladd 1996, 2008; Jun 2005/2014; entre outros) and the Prosodic Phonology framework (Selkirk 1984, 1986, 2000; Nespor & Vogel 1986, 2007). Our analysis take into account previous works developed in this same framework and applied to Portuguese (Frota & Vigário 2000; Tenani 2002; Fernandes 2007a, 2007b, Serra 2009, Toneli 2014; and, more specifically regarding interrogative sentences, Moraes 2008, Truckenbrodt, Sandalo & Abaurre 2009, Castelo 2011, 2016 e Frota et. al. 2015a). The results achieved through this investigation reveal that (i) in general, the nuclear contour of interrogative sentences of the Paulista variety of BP show a rising-falling pattern; (ii) the total contour plays an important role in conveying pragmatic meaning of questions; (iii) there are special prosodic characteristics assigned to the total contour that correspond to specific pragmatic meaning, such as: (a) focus and emphasis marking that varies depending on the pragmatic meaning associated with different phrase types; (b) downstep association to the nuclear contour in neutral interrogative sentences; (c) upstep association to the emphatic element in counter expectation sentences; (d) lower tessiture of the range of variation in the portion of the intonational contour corresponding to the first prosodic word and the nuclear contour in rhetoric questions; (e) differences in tonal density between neutral and non-neutral sentences; among other prosodic characteristics associated with specific pragmatic meaning. These results confirm lead us to achieve our objectives and confirm our main hypothesis.

O objeto deste trabalho é investigar a realização dos ditongos orais no português vernacular de São Tomé e Príncipe (pvs). Esta variedade de português está em contato com outras línguas faladas no país e difere do sistema linguístico da variedade considerada padrão, o português europeu (pe) (FIGUEIREDO, 2010; GONÇALVES, 2010; CHRISTOFOLETTI, 2011; SANTOS & CHRISTOFOLETTI, 2011). A hipótese para as peculiaridades do comportamento do sistema fonético-fonológico do pvs é o aprendizado do português como L2 (por gerações passadas recentes) (HAGEMEIJER, 2009; GONÇALVES, 2010), e a influência do contato com as línguas crioulas faladas no país, como o santome (FERRAZ, 1979), o principense (MAURER, 2009), o angolar (MAURER, 1995) e o kabuverdianu, visto que as comunidades são, em geral, bilíngues ou convivem em espaços multilíngues. As mudanças linguísticas intergeracionais e o contato também justificariam o comportamento na realização dos ditongos que possuem variações em sua realização no pvs. O corpus deste trabalho é formado por gravações de fala espontânea de 18 informantes, coletados na capital de stp por meio da sociolinguística variacionista (LABOV, 1991 [1972]). A justificativa para o estudo das realizações dos ditongos, constatada a singularidade de suas realizações, é observar o comportamento de uma variante de português em um ambiente multilíngue; aumentar o nosso conhecimento sobre essa variante; confrontar um sistema em diglossia; possibilitar outros estudos sobre o pvs e comparações com outras variantes de português nos Países Africanos de Língua Oficial Portuguesa. Em relação às variáveis sociais, há uma relação da aplicação do processo de monotongação com a quantidade de anos de escolaridade, sendo que as pessoas mais escolarizadas tendem evitar mais a monotongação do que as pessoas menos escolarizadas. Ademais, foi constatada a singularidade do sistema fonético-fonológico dessa variedade africana de português, pois, diferente da norma europeia (MATEUS & DANDRADE, 2000; MATEUS, 2002), considerada de prestígio no país, o pvs realiza a monotongação dos ditongos [eI ], como em dinheiro [di\"ñeKU], primeiro [pri\"meKU] e feijoada [feZu\"ad5], sugerindo uma aproximação ao comportamento do português brasileiro (pb) (cf. BISOL 1991, 1994; ARAÚJO 1999; LOPES 2002 e outros), todavia, a monotongação ocorre ainda em contextos nos quais tanto nas variantes do pb, como nas do pe, ela é bloqueada. Assim, ocorre a monotongação mesmo quando a consoante seguinte é uma oclusiva alveolar surda [t], como em feitiço [fe\"tisU], leitão [le\"tãU ] e direito [di\"KetU], fato não documentado no pb ou no pe. Com relação ao ditongo [oU ] no pvs, a monotongação é categórica, assim como nos estudos apresentados sobre variação nos ditongos de outras variedades de português. No que diz respeito ao ditongo [oI ], observamos que a variação na aplicação da monotongação ocorre apenas quando seguido pela consoante [S], responsável pelo espraiamento do nó vocálico criando o glide [I ] via processo fonético. O ditongo [aI ], por sua vez, sofreu variação no processo de monotongação fundamentalmente diante de consoante palatal, nos demais contextos sua ocorrência foi pouco produtiva. Do mesmo modo, o ditongo [eU ] teve baixo índice de ocorrência de monotongação, sendo mantido em quase todos os contextos. Os demais ditongos, [EI ], [EU ], [uI ] e [iU ], tiveram raras ocorrências, e foi impossível observar variações em suas realizações. / The purpose of this work is to investigate the realization of oral diphthongs in vernacular portuguese of Sao Tome and Principe (pvs). This variety of portuguese is in contact with other languages spoken in the country and differs from the linguistic system of the considered standard variety, the european portuguese (pe) (FIGUEIREDO, 2010; GONÇALVES, 2010; CHRISTOFOLETTI, 2011; SANTOS & CHRISTOFOLETTI, 2011). The hypothesis for the behavior of the phonetic-phonological system of pvs is the learning of portuguese as L2 (from recent past generations) (HAGEMEIJER, 2009; GONÇALVES, 2010), and the influence of contact with the creole languages spoken in the country, as the santome (FERRAZ, 1979), the principense (MAURER, 2009), angolar (MAURER, 1995) and kabuverdianu, since the communities are usually bilingual or living in multilingual environment. The intergenerational linguistic changes and the linguistic contact also justify the behavior in the realization of diphthongs that have variations in their realization in pvs. The corpus of this study consists of recordings of spontaneous speech of 18 informants, collected in the capital of stp through the assumptions of sociolinguistic theory and method (LABOV, 1991 [1972]). The reason to study the achievements of diphthongs, noted the uniqueness of its accomplishments, is to observe the behavior of a variant from portuguese in a multilingual environment; increase our knowledge of this variant; confront a system in diglossia; enable further studies on the pvs and compare it with other variants in the African countries witch have portuguese as official language. Regarding social variables, there is a link to the application of the process of monophthongization with the number of years of schooling, once that people with more time of school education tend to avoid monophthongization than people with less time of school education. Moreover, it was found the uniqueness of the phonetic-phonological system of pvs, because, unlike the pe (MATEUS & DANDRADE, 2000; MATEUS, 2002), considered prestigious in the country, pvs performs the monophthongization of diphthongs [eI ], as seeing in dinheiro [di\"ñeKU], primeiro [pri\"meKU] and feijoada [feZu\"ad5], it suggests an approach to behavior of Brazilian portuguese (pb) (cf. BISOL 1991, 1994; ARAÚJO 1999; LOPES 2002 e outros), however, monophthongization still occurs in contexts in both the variants whrer it is blocked as pb, as in the pe. So monophthongization occurs even when the following consonant is an voiceless alveolar occlusive [t], as in feitiço [fe\"tisU], leitão [le\"tãU ] e direito [di\"KetU], nons-documented fact in pb or pe. Regarding the diphthong [oU ] in pvs the monophthongization is categorical, as shown in studies on diphthongs variation in other varieties of portuguese. With respect to the diphthong [oI ] we observed that the variation in the application of monophthongization occurs only when it followed by the consonant [S], responsible for spreading the vocalic feature creating the glide [I ] through phonetic process. The diphthong [aI ] suffered variation in the monophthongization process, mainly before palatal consonant, in other contexts its occurrence was not very productive. Similarly, the diphthong [eU ] had a low rate of occurrence of monophthongization, and was kept in almost all contexts. The other diphthongs, [EI ], [EU ], [uI ] and [iU ], had rare occurrences, and it was impossible to observe variations in their realizations.

O objetivo deste trabalho é desenvolver nossa hipótese em torno dos alvos tonais, que seriam unidades fonético-fonológicas responsáveis pela mediação entre o nível representacional da entoação e o nível físico da implementação de F0. Os alvos tonais foram divididos em duas grandes categorias, topológicos e pontuais. Os primeiros ocorrem em um espaço limitado, denominado por Ferreira-Netto (2008) de tom médio. Os limites desse espaço são definidos pelos limiares de diferenciação tonal (LDT) e estão a +3 e -4 semitons do tom médio. Além e aquém destes limiares encontram-se as faixas de frequência do Foco/Ênfase. Nestas faixas os tons passam a ser eventos relevantes para os ouvintes que podem atribuir significados a eles. Aos tons que ocorrem nessa região demos o nome de pontual, uma vez que são eventos específicos. Para testar essa hipótese aplicamos o teste 1, no qual era solicitado aos participantes que repetissem uma sentença pré-gravada dotada de uma divisão entoacional marcante: na primeira parte tratava-se de uma voz masculina entoando uma frase declarativa, na segunda parte uma voz feminina entoando uma frase interrogativa. De um total de 15 participantes obtivemos 24 amostras, contando repetições intra-sujeitos. A análise foi conduzida em duas etapas, na primeira avaliamos a capacidade do falante detectar o alvo tonal topológico subjacente à primeira parte do estímulo e reproduzi-lo. Na segunda etapa, avaliamos a capacidade do falante em detectar o alvo pontual caracterizado pela interrogativa e implementá-lo em sua fala. A análise da primeira condição foi feita por meio do que denominamos índice de relação (ir), que media o grau de correlação entre o estímulo e a repetição do falante. A análise revelou que os participantes demonstraram uma grande acuidade na execução da tarefa, o que sugere que os falantes são capazes de monitorar a implementação da frequência fundamental, a partir da detecção dos alvos topológicos. Já a segunda análise demonstra que a implementação dos alvos pontuais pode ser aleatória em certa medida, uma vez que ela não precisa respeitar um limite específico, apenas um limiar. Na segunda parte do trabalho aplicamos um método semelhante, voltado à análise da fala emotiva atuada em três condições: raiva, tristeza e neutra. A frase consistia de um trecho de um livro de ciências lido nessas três emoções por atrizes profissionais, a análise por meio de testes de hipótese (n=196, p<0,005) revelou que os alvos topológicos entre as condições eram distintos, o que sugere que o espaço entoacional e a variação de frequência em seu interior podem ser uma pista significativa para a distinção da fala emotiva. / The main purpose of this work is develop our hypothesis about the tonal targets, which would be phonological-phonetic units responsible for the mediation between the representational level of the intonation and the physical level of the implementation of F0. The tonal targets were divided into two major categories, topological and punctual. The first occur in a limited space, and is called by Ferreira-Netto (2008) as midtone. The boundaries of this space are defined by the tonal differentiation thresholds (TDT) and are specified at +3 and -4 semitones from the midtone. Beyond these thresholds are the Focus/Emphasis frequency bands. In these bands the tones become relevant events to the listeners who are able to attribute meanings to them. the tones that occur in this region we gave the name of punctual, since they are specific events. To test this hypothesis, we applied test 1, in which participants were asked to repeat a pre-recorded sentence with a striking intonational division: in the first part it was a male voice spealing a declarative phrase, in the second part a female voice speaking an interrogative phrase. From 15 participants we obtained 24 samples, counting intra-subject repetitions. The analysis was conducted in two stages, in the first one we evaluated the ability of the speaker to detect the topological tonal target underlying the first part of the stimulus and to reproduce it. In the second step, we evaluated the ability of the speaker to detect the punctual target characterized by the interrogative and implement it in his speech. The analysis of the first condition was done by means of what we call the relationship index (ir), which measures the degree of correlation between the stimulus and the repetition of the speaker. The analysis revealed that the participants demonstrated a great acuity in the execution of the task, which suggests that the speakers are able to monitor the fundamental frequency implementation, from the detection of the topological targets. The second analysis, on the other hand, shows that the implementation of specific targets can be random to some extent, since it does not need to respect a specific limit, only a threshold. In the second part of the work we apply a similar method, focused on the analysis of emotional speech, in three conditions: anger, sadness and neutrality. The phrase consisted of an excerpt from a science book, read in these three emotions by professional actresses. The analysis, using hypothesis tests (n = 196, p <0.005), revealed that the topological targets between the conditions were distinct, suggesting the intonational space and the variation of frequency in its interior can be a significant clue to the distinction of the emotive speech.

Orientador: Luiz Carlos Cagliari / Banca: Daniel Soares da Costa / Banca: Luciana Mercês Ribeiro Santos / Resumo: Várias vezes ouvimos falar que o português do Brasil é uma língua homogênea. Mas, um território de 8,5 milhões de quilômetros quadrados, com aproximadamente 200 milhões de pessoas, com grandes índices de analfabetismo e com uma pluralidade cultural - não poderia de modo algum apresentar uma língua homogênea. O presente estudo verifica como determinados falantes pronunciam os ditongos nasais -ões, -ães e -ãos, analisando os segmentos [ɐ̃], [õ], [ɪ̃] e [ʊ̃], que compõem estes ditongos nasais. O foco da pesquisa é através de uma investigação acústica. Verificadas as qualidades acústicas investigadas, a pesquisa faz uma análise comparativa entre as qualidades acústicas e articulatórias. A pesquisa utiliza o programa de análise acústica Praat. Com o auxílio do Praat e seguindo a Teoria Acústica de Produção de Fala de Fant (1960), foram feitas as segmentações apropriadas dos enunciados registrados e, para os segmentos relevantes, foi investigada a estrutura acústica dos formantes com as facilidades fornecidas pelo Praat. O objetivo da pesquisa está voltado para a forma como os falantes pronunciam os ditongos nasais. No estudo, foi levada em consideração a percepção do fator, já que surgiram variações inesperadas. Fonologicamente, a forma de plural dos ditongos nasais em estudo pode ser interpretada como /-awNS/. / Abstract: Brazilians usually hear that his language is quite homogeneous. However, a large territory of 8,5 millions square kilometers, and with 200 million inhabitants, with a large contingent of his population not alphabetized, plus a cultural plurality, could not by all means be linguistically homogeneous. The present study verifies how some speakers pronounce the nasal diphthongs -ões, -ães e -ãos, with a particular articulatory and acoustic analysis of the diphthongal segments [ɐ̃], [õ], [ɪ̃] e [ʊ̃]. The focus of the research is the acoustic investigation. Once detected the acoustic patterns the work makes a comparative analysis between the acoustic and the articulatory patterns. The Praat Program is use for the acoustic analysis. With the help of Praat and following Fant speech acoustic theory (1960), there has been made the appropriate segmentations of the recorded utterances and for the relevant segments it has been investigated the formant structure with the facilities provided by Praat. The aim of the research is orientated towards how the speakers pronounce the nasal diphthongs. In the study it has been taken into consideration the factor perception, since there emerged unexpected variations. Phonologically the plural form of Portuguese nasal diphthongs may be interpreted as /-awNS/ / Mestre