Thesis (Ph. D.)--Ohio State University, 2004. / Title from first page of PDF file. Document formatted into pages; contains xx, 229 p. : ill. Advisor: Shari Speer, Dept. of Linguistics. Includes bibliographical references (p. 226-229).

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Texas at Dallas, 2007. / Includes vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 116-124)

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Thesis (MA)--University of Stellenbosch, 2000. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This study focuses on the prosodic features of imperatives and the role of prosodies in the development of a text-to-speech (TIS) system for Xhosa, an African tone language. The perception of prosody is manifested in suprasegmental features such as fundamental frequency (pitch), intensity (loudness) and duration (length). Very little experimental research has been done on the prosodic features of any grammatical structures (moods and tenses) in Xhosa, therefore it has not yet been determined how and to what degree the different prosodic features are combined and utilized in the production and perception of Xhosa speech. One such grammatical structure, for which no explicit descriptive phonetic information exists, is the imperative mood expressing commands. In this study it was shown how the relationship between duration, pitch and loudness, as manifested in the production and perception of Xhosa imperatives could be determined through acoustic analyses and perceptual experiments. An experimental phonetic approach proved to be essential for the acquisition of substantial and reliable prosodic information. An extensive acoustic analysis was conducted to acquire prosodic information on the production of imperatives by Xhosa mother tongue speakers. Subsequently, various statistical parameters were calculated on the raw acoustic data (i) to establish patterns of significance and (ii) to represent the large amount of numeric data generated, in a compact manner. A perceptual experiment was conducted to investigate the perception of imperatives. The prosodic parameters that were extracted from the acoustic analysis were applied to synthesize imperatives in different contexts. A novel approach to Xhosa speech synthesis was adopted. Monotonous verbs were recorded by one speaker and the pitch and duration of these words were then manipulated with the TD-PSOLA technique. Combining the results of the acoustic analysis and the perceptual experiment made it possible to present a prosodic model for the generation of perceptually acceptable imperati ves in a practical Xhosa TIS system. Prosody generation in a natural language processing (NLP) module and its place within the larger framework of text-to-speech synthesis was discussed. It was shown that existing architectures for TTS synthesis would not be appropriate for Xhosa without some adaptation. Hence, a unique architecture was suggested and its possible application subsequently illustrated. Of particular importance was the development of an alternative algorithm for grapheme-to-phoneme conversion. Keywords: prosody, speech synthesis, speech perception, acoustic analysis, Xhosa / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Hierdie studie fokus op die prodiese eienskappe van imperatiewe en die rol van prosodie in die ontwikkeling van 'n teks-na-spraak-sisteem vir Xhosa, 'n Afrika-toontaal. Die persepsie van prosodie word gemanifesteer in suprasegmentele eienskappe soos fundamentele frekwensie (toonhoogte), intensiteit (luidheid) en duur (lengte). Weinig eksperimentele navorsing bestaan ten opsigte van die prosodiese eienskappe van enige grammatikale strukture (modus en tyd) in Xhosa. Hoe en tot watter mate die verskillende prosodiese kenmerke gekombineer en gebruik word in die produksie en persepsie van Xhosa-spraak is nog nie duidelik nie. 'n Grammatikale struktuur waarvoor geen eksplisiete deskriptiewe fonetiese inligting bestaan nie, is die van die imperatiewe modus wat bevele uitdruk. Hierdie studie wys hoe die verhouding tussen duur, toonhoogte en luidheid, soos gemanifesteer in die produksie en persepsie van Xhosa-imperatiewe bepaal kon word deur akoestiese analises en persepsueIe eksperimente. Dit het geblyk dat 'n eksperimenteelfonetiese benadering noodsaaklik is vir die verkryging van sinvolle en betroubare prosodiese inligting. 'n Uitgebreide akoestiese analise is uitgevoer om prosodiese data omtrent die produksie van imperatiewe deur Xhosa-moedertaalsprekers te bekom. Vervolgens is verskeie statistiese analises op die rou akoestiese data uitgevoer om (i) patrone van beduidenheid te bepaal en om (ii) die groot hoeveelheid numeriese data wat gegenereer is meer kompak voor te stel. 'n PersepsueIe eksperiment is uitgevoer met die doelom die persepsie van imperatiewe te ondersoek. Die prosodiese parameters soos uit die akoestiese analise bekom, is toegepas in die sintese van bevele in verskillende kontekste. 'n Nuwe benadering tot Xhosaspraaksintese is gevolg. Monotone werkwoorde is vir een spreker opgeneem en die toonhoogte en duur van hierdie woorde is met TD-PSOLA tegniek gemanipuleer. 'n Kombinasie van akoestiese en persepsueie resultate is aangewend om 'n prosodiese model te ontwikkel vir die sintese van persepsueel aanvaarbare imperatiewe in 'n praktiese Xhosa teks- na- spraaksinteti seerder . Prosodie-generering in 'n natuurlike taalprosesering-module en die plek daarvan binne die raamwerk van teks-na-spraaksintese is bespreek. Daar is gewys dat bestaande argitekture vir teks-na-spraaksisteme nie sonder sommige aanpassings toepaslik vir Xhosa sal wees nie. Derhalwe is 'n unieke argitektuur gesuggereer en die moontlike toepassing daarvan geïllustreer. Die ontwikkeling van 'n alternatiewe algoritme vir letter-na-klankomsetting was van besondere belang. Sleutelwoorde: spraaksintese, spraakpersepsie, akoestiese analise, Xhosa

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The PAM-based prosodic LID system is compared with other prosodic LID systems with a task of pairwise language identification. The advantages of comprehensive modeling of prosodic features is clearly demonstrated. Analysis reveals the confusion patterns among target languages, as well as the feature-language relationship. The PAM-based prosodic LID system is combined with a state-of-the-art phonotactic system by score-level fusion. Complementary effects are demonstrated between the two different features in the LID problem. An additional operation on score calibration, which further improves the LID system performance, is also introduced. / There are no conventional ways to model prosody. We use a large prosodic feature set which covers fundamental frequency (FO), duration and intensity. It also considers various extraction and normalization methods of each type of features. In terms of modeling, the vector space modeling approach is adopted. We introduce a framework called prosodic attribute model (PAM) to model the acoustic correlates of prosodic events in a flexible manner. Feature selection and preliminary LID tests are carried out to derive a preferred term-document matrix construction for modeling. / This thesis focuses on the use of prosodic features for automatic spoken language identification (LID). LID is the problem of automatically determining the language of spoken utterances. After three decades of research, the state-of-the-art LID systems seem to give a saturating performance. To meet the tight requirements on accuracy, prosody is proposed as alternative features to provide complementary information to LID. / Ng, Wai Man. / Adviser: Tan Lee. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 73-04, Section: B, page: . / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2011. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 112-125). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. [Ann Arbor, MI] : ProQuest Information and Learning, [201-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, MI : ProQuest Information and Learning Company, [200-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Abstract also in Chinese.

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Cross-linguistically, the notion 'minimal word' has proved fruitful grounds for explanatory accounts of requirements imposed on morphological and phonological constituents. Word minimality requires that a lexical word includes the main-stressed foot of the language. As a result, subminimal words are augmented to a bimoraic foot through diverse strategies like vowel lengthening, syllable addition, etc. Even languages with numerous monomoraic lexical words may impose a minimality requirement on derived words that would otherwise be smaller than a well-formed foot. In addition, the minimal word has been argued to play a central role in characterizing a prosodic base within some morpho-prosodic constituent for the application of processes such as reduplication and infixation. / The goal of this thesis is to offer an explanation as to why and in which contexts grammars may prefer a prosodic constituent which may not be reducible to a bimoraic foot. I provide explanatory accounts for a number of cases where the prosodic structure of morphological or phonological constituents cannot be defined as coextensive with the main stressed foot of the language. To this end, I propose to add to the theory of Prosodic Structure (Chen 1987; Selkirk 1984, 1986, 1989, 1995; Selkirk and Shen 1990) within an optimality-theoretic framework by providing evidence for a new level within the Prosodic Hierarchy, that of the Prosodic Stem (PrStem). / An important aspect of the model of prosodic structure proposed here is a notion of headship which follows directly from the Prosodic Hierarchy itself and from the metrical grouping of prosodic constituents. A theory of prosodic heads is developed which assumes that structural constraints can impose well-formedness requirements on the prosodic shape and the distribution of heads within morphological and phonological constituents.

Building on earlier work, notably Kager (1993, 1995) and framed in Optimality Theory (Prince & Smolensky 1993), this thesis presents a theory of foot structure in which the asymmetric maximal expansions of iambic and trochaic feet (cf. the Iambic/Trochaic Law: 1TL, e.g. Hayes 1995) are accounted for by a single constraint, HEAD GOVERNMENT (Mellander 2001c, 2002b). The present analysis devotes special attention to a class of quantitative processes in trochaic systems which generate uneven (HL) trochaic feet. In contrast to previous analyses (e.g. Hayes 1995), such processes are shown to be of phonological rather than phonetic nature in certain languages, and the ramifications of this conclusion are explored with regard to a variety of issues in prosodic theory. / The evidence for the phonological status of (HL)-creating processes comes from published data on Mohawk, Selayarese, Gidabal, and Oromo, as well as original field data from Central Slovak. Following Piggott (1998, 2001) and Mellander (2001a, c, 2002b), these processes are seen to follow from H EAD PROMINENCE, a constraint which requires greater relative intrinsic prominence in the head of a prosodic constituent. Since HEAD PROMINENCE is sensitive to intrinsic prominence, its effects are shown to hold irrespective of derived prominence resulting from the application of stress rules. H EAD PROMINENCE is also shown to play a central role in accounting for diphthongal quantity-prominence relations, where cross-linguistic patterns of long vowel diphthongization in bimoraic syllables mirror those of (HL)-creating processes in disyllabic feet. / In contrast to previous work on HEAD GOVERNMENT (Mellander 2001c, 2002b), the absence of languages which require violations of this constraint implies that it is universally undominated, contra the standard Optimality Theoretic assumption of universal constraint violability. This view is also supported by the analysis of ternary stress systems, where the absence of unattested quaternary and quinternary systems relies crucially on the inviolability of HEAD G OVERNMENT. / A final aspect of this thesis is the development of a preliminary model to explain asymmetries in structure and markedness between iambic and trochaic systems, including distributional asymmetries, Iambic Lengthening, and the ITL. Based on work by Van de Vijver (1998) this approach abandons traditional symmetric notions of iambicity and trochaicity in favour of an asymmetric pair of constraints---PEAK-FIRST and *E DGEMOST. Iambic/trochaic asymmetries consequently emerge as artefacts of constraint interaction and require no additional theoretical machinery.

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