In the field of second language acquisition, a great deal of work has been done on first (L1) to second language (L2) transfer of linguistic patterns from various levels of language, ranging from syntactic (i.e., Clahsen & Felser, 2006; Dussias, 2003; Nicol et al., 2001) and lexical (i.e. Jiang, 2004; Kroll & Tokowicz, 2001) to sound patterns at the segmental level (i.e. Flege, 1987; Flege & McKay, 2004; see work of Flege and colleagues). However, an area that has previously received less attention is that of L2 intonation, especially that of native speakers of a non-intonation language (some exceptions: Chen, 2007; McGory, 1997; Nguyen et al., 2008). The present study seeks to fill that gap, considering the L2 English intonation patterns of native speakers of Mandarin, a tone language. This work was approached from an experimental phonetic perspective, though it draws from theoretical work on intonation of both phonological and phonetic nature (intonational phonology of Ladd, 2008; see work of Ladd and colleagues, and PENTA of Xu & Xu, 2005; see work of Xu and colleagues). A series of production experiments was undertaken with native English speakers as a control group, and Mandarin speakers of higher proficiency (university students in America). Experiments treated stress patterns at the lexical level through production of target items in narrow focus, as well as treating the changes seen in such target items at different intonational points in sentences, elicited in a broad focus production experiment. In addition, the intonational patterns of questions vs. statements and contrastive focus were investigated. Because Mandarin is a lexical tone language, its speakers may tend to produce lexical items similarly regardless of their intonational situation, implementing a sort of lexical tonal transfer strategy. Even lexical tone languages have complementary intonation patterns, however, and these may also be transferred to English (Chen, 2007; Gussenhoven, 2004; Liu, 2009; McGory, 1997; Xu & Xu, 2005). In fact, results do indicate evidence of transfer at the tonal level, where it appears that a rising tone 2 is mapped onto English stressed syllables, and a falling tone 4 is mapped onto post-stressed syllables. Results also indicate intonational transfer, with a lack of sentence-final lowering in broad focus statements, as well as pitch patterns that can lead to an overall higher register in yes/no questions and post-focal lowering in contrastive focus questions.

In recent years, a great deal of research on second language (L2) acquisition has been concerned with non-target production of L2 learners, addressing issues such as native language (L1) transfer into L2 and the nature and source of developmental errors. Previous studies have mostly focused on the analysis of discrete L2 segments (Flege 1987, 1999; Major & Kim 1996), rather than on L2 phonological patterns. This study, however, examines the production of sequences of sounds in Russian L1 and L2 from both the phonetic and phonological perspectives.This dissertation investigates native and non-native production of real and nonsense words containing obstruent clusters in which a phonological phenomenon known as regressive voicing assimilation is required. In Russian, forms like lodka `boat' are rendered orthographically with a voiced obstruent which is pronounced as a voiceless one when followed by a voiceless obstruent. The results of the experiments reveal several production patterns in L1 and L2 speech as well as gradiency in devoicing which are further analyzed within the stochastic Optimality Theory framework. Categorical production is accounted for by the re-ranking of L1 and L2 constraints; whereas, gradiency in production is viewed as a result of the re-ranking of constraints within phonetically detailed constraint families.

No description available.

This dissertation explores the nature and ontogeny of infants' ability to match phonetic information in comparison to non-speech information in the face and voice. Previous research shows that infants' ability to match phonetic information in face and voice is robust at 4.5 months of age (e.g., Kuhl & Meltzoff, 1982; 1984; 1988; Patterson & Werker, 1999). These findings support claims that young infants can perceive structural correspondences between audio and visual aspects of phonetic input and that speech is represented amodally. It remains unclear, however, specifically what factors allow speech to be perceived amodally and whether the intermodal perception of other aspects of face and voice is like that of speech. Gender is another biologically significant cue that is available in both the face and voice. In this dissertation, nine experiments examine infants' ability to match phonetic and gender information with dynamic faces and voices. Infants were seated in front of two side-by-side video monitors which displayed filmed images of a female or male face, each articulating a vowel sound ( / a / or / i / ) in synchrony. The sound was played through a central speaker and corresponded with one of the displays but was synchronous with both. In Experiment 1,4.5-month-old infants did not look preferentially at the face that matched the gender of the heard voice when presented with the same stimuli that produced a robust phonetic matching effect. In Experiments 2 through 4, vowel and gender information were placed in conflict to determine the relative contribution of each in infants' ability to match bimodal information in the face and voice. The age at which infants do match gender information with my stimuli was determined in Experiments 5 and 6. In order to explore whether matching phonetic information in face and voice is based on featural or configural information, two experiments examined infants' ability to match phonetic information using inverted faces (Experiment 7) and upright faces with inverted mouths (Experiment 8). Finally, Experiment 9 extended the phonetic matching effect to 2-month-old infants. The experiments in this dissertation provide evidence that, at 4.5 months of age, infants are more likely to attend to phonetic information in the face and voice than to gender information. Phonetic information may have a special salience and/or unity that is not apparent in similar but non-phonetic events. The findings are discussed in relation to key theories of perceptual development.

It is commonly agreed that phonological elements must be prosodically licensed in order to be interpreted phonetically (cf. Ito, 1986). The licensing of segments is generally assumed to follow from the Universal Association Conventions. The licensing of phonological units smaller than the segment, however, has not been fully addressed. There is no agreement on the exact licensing mechanisms at play and on what constitutes a proper anchor for the initial association of floating subsegmentals. This thesis proposes a principled account of subsegmental licensing within the theory of segmental structure known as feature geometry, as modified by Piggott (to appear). It is shown that the manifestation of nasality in Maukaka, Koyaga, Jula, and Terena result from the way licensing operates. It is argued that, universally, floating subsegmental units are licensed through mapping, which associates a unit to an available position. It is also proposed that whenever there is no proper position for the mapping of a subsegmental element, this element may be licensed by Chomsky-adjunction. This type of adjunction has played a role in syllabification but not in the organization of feature.

This thesis presents an acoustic vowel space analysis of F1 and F2 frequencies from 10 speakers of Pijal Media Lengua (PML) and 10 speakers of Imbabura Quichua (IQ). This thesis also provides a brief grammatical discription of PML with insights into contrasts and similarities between Spanish, Quichua and other documented varieties of Media Lengua (ML). ML is typically described as a mixed language with a Quichua morphosyntactic structure where almost all content words are replaced by their Spanish-derived counterparts through the process of relexification. I use mixed effects models to test for statistical significance between PML Spanish-derived vowels and Quichua-derived vowels. The results provide suggestive data for (1) co-existing vowel systems in moderate contact situations and (2) moderate evidence for co-exsiting vowel systems in extreme contact situations. Results also show that PML may be manipulating as many as eight vowels and IQ as many as six.

No description available.

Foreign accent can be everything from hardly detectable to rendering the second language speech unintelligible. It is assumed that certain aspects of a specific target language contribute more to making the foreign accented speech intelligible and listener friendly, than others. The present thesis examines a teaching strategy for Swedish pronunciation in second language education. The teaching strategy “Basic prosody” or BP, gives priority to temporal aspects of Swedish prosody, which means the temporal phonological contrasts word stress and quantity, as well as the durational realizations of these contrasts. BP does not prescribe any specific tonal realizations. This standpoint is based on the great regional variety in realization and distribution of Swedish word accents. The teaching strategy consists virtually of three directives: · Stress the proper word in the sentence. · Stress proper syllables in stressed words and make them longer. · Lengthen the proper segment – vowel or subsequent consonant – in the stressed syllable. These directives reflect the view that all phonological length is stress-induced, and that vowel length and consonant length are equally important as learning goals. BP is examined in the light of existing findings in the field of second language pronunciation and with respect to the phonetic correlates of Swedish stress and quantity. Five studies examine the relation between segment durations and the categorization made by native Swedish listeners. The results indicate that the postvocalic consonant duration contributes to quantity categorization as well as giving the proper duration to stressed syllables. Furthermore, native Swedish speakers are shown to apply the complementary /V: C/ - /VC:/ pattern also when speaking English and German, by lengthening postvocalic consonants. The correctness of the priority is not directly addressed but important aspects of BP are supported by earlier findings as well as the results from the present studies. / <p>För att köpa boken skicka en beställning till exp@ling.su.se/ To order the book send an e-mail to exp@ling.su.se</p>

This thesis presents an acoustic vowel space analysis of F1 and F2 frequencies from 10 speakers of Pijal Media Lengua (PML) and 10 speakers of Imbabura Quichua (IQ). This thesis also provides a brief grammatical discription of PML with insights into contrasts and similarities between Spanish, Quichua and other documented varieties of Media Lengua (ML). ML is typically described as a mixed language with a Quichua morphosyntactic structure where almost all content words are replaced by their Spanish-derived counterparts through the process of relexification. I use mixed effects models to test for statistical significance between PML Spanish-derived vowels and Quichua-derived vowels. The results provide suggestive data for (1) co-existing vowel systems in moderate contact situations and (2) moderate evidence for co-exsiting vowel systems in extreme contact situations. Results also show that PML may be manipulating as many as eight vowels and IQ as many as six.

This thesis documents the creation of a three-dimensional model of the larynx. The focus is on synthesizing the movement and appearance of laryngeal and pharyngeal sounds, with the intention of elucidating the physiological performance required of the larynx to produce these articulations. The model serves three primary purposes: the analysis of laryngeal articulation, an interactive tool for learning about linguistically relevant anatomy, and a foundation for future modeling developments such as acoustic synthesis. There are two methodological topics of discussion concerning the techniques used to generate the three-dimensional model of the larynx. The first concerns the morphological aspect of the laryngeal architecture. Laryngeal structures were segmented from a series of histological images using a process known as vertex tracing to generate wire-frame computer representations, or meshes, of the laryngeal structures featured in the model. The meshes were then carefully placed within the three-dimensional space used to generate a scene of the larynx that could be rendered and presented to the user of the program. Frame hierarchies, an organization scheme for vertices, were imposed on flexible tissue meshes to attach and manipulate various moving structures found in the larynx. Finally, basic mechanical features of laryngeal movement derived from research into the biomechanics of laryngeal physiology were implemented. The second methodological topic pertains to the analysis of laryngoscopic videos to obtain data that describes the movement patterns used to generate the laryngeal and pharyngeal articulations of interest. There are three image analysis techniques applied to the laryngoscopy. The first uses normal speed laryngoscopy to assess end-state articulations, by comparing various geometrical aspects of laryngeal landmarks as they differ between the maximally open setting (used for deep inspiration), and the articulatory target setting. With this technique, various phonation types and segmental articulations are assessed using videos of a phonetician carefully performing the articulations. Some comparison of these articulations to their analogues in the speech of native speakers from various languages is made for the sake of illustration and verification. The second image analysis technique used is applied to high-speed laryngoscopic video of aryepiglottic trilling, which is an important function of the laryngeal constrictor mechanism. The left and right aryepiglottic apertures during trilling are analyzed using binary-conversion and area measurement. The third technique takes the same high-speed laryngoscopic video of aryepiglottic trilling and extracts motion vectors between frame pairs to characterize the directionality and magnitude of motion occurring for each of the folds. Using the image analysis data, model movements are constrained and synchronized to recreate the articulations observed in the laryngoscopic videos. One of the major innovations of this model is a biomechanical simulation of aryepiglottic fold trilling, based primarily upon the data collected from the high-speed laryngoscopic videos. Overall the model represents one of the first attempts to visually recreate laryngeal articulatory function in a way that is dynamic and interactive. Future work will involve dynamic acoustic synthesis for laryngeal states represented by the model.