El objetivo de este trabajo es estudiar el proceso de asimilación de sonoridad a diferentes velocidades de habla en catalán e inglés y, más concretamente observar y analizar la asimilación de sonoridad cuando dos consonantes que tienen una especificación fonológica de sonoridad distinta coocurren a través de palabras. Además, el estudio se propone evaluar modelos descriptivos actuales con el fin de determinar cómo explican los datos obtenidos en el experimento. Se realizó un experimento usando datos acústicos, electropalatográficos y electoglotográficos simultáneos. Las secuencias estudiadas son de 4 tipos:1) Secuencias de obstruyentes donde C1 es fonológicamente sorda y C2 es fonológicamente sonora.2) Secuencias de obstruyentes donde C1 es fonológicamente sonora y C2 es fonológicamente sorda.3) Secuencies de sonorante seguida de obstruyente.4) Secuencias de obstruyente seguida de sonorante.Se observó que en las secuencias de obstruyentes en catalán los hablantes tienden a anticipar el gesto de sonoridad de C2 a C1, tanto en las secuencias de oclusivas como en las secuencias de fricativa seguida de oclusiva. Así, el proceso es regresivo y categórico, lo cual es congruente con la existencia de una regla de asimilación de sonoridad en catalán. También se observó que los hablantes catalanes pueden mostrar anticipación parcial del gesto de sonoridad de C2, lo cual muestra que la asimilación de sonoridad puede ser un proceso gradual en catalán. Así pues, parece que la regla de asimilación de sonoridad es opcional. Los datos del catalán reflejan dos procesos distintos: por un lado, la asimilación completa y regresiva de sonoridad en las secuencias de obstruyentes es el resultado de una regla que implica la reorganización a alto nivel de las instrucciones motoras. Por otro lado, los casos de asimilación parcial podrían ser debidos a factores de implementación fonética.En inglés se observó que no existe una regla fonológica de asimilación de sonoridad en las secuencias de obstruyentes. La coordinación de los gestos orales y glotales durante la constricción máxima es un proceso gradual. En las secuencias que combinan sonorantes y obstruyentes, el gesto de sonoridad coincide con la transición de C1 a C2 en ambas lenguas. Además, se observa que puede haber asimilación completa de sonoridad en las secuencias obstruyente - sonorante en catalán. Esto sugiere que la regla de asimilación regresiva de sonoridad podría extenderse a este tipo de secuencias, por lo menos en algunos hablantes catalanes.Finalmente, se sugiere que los modelos conocidos como Articulatory Phonology y Windows Theory pueden dar cuenta de la coordinación de los gestos orales y glotales en catalán e inglés. / The present study intends to analyze the process of voicing assimilation across different speaking rates in Catalan and English. More specifically, it aims at observing and characterizing voicing assimilation when two consonants that have a different phonological specification for voicing co-occur across word boundaries. Furthermore, this study intends to evaluate current descriptive frameworks, in order to see how they account for the data obtained in the experiment. An experiment was carried out using simultaneous acoustic, electroglottographic and electropalatographic data. The sequences were of 4 types:1) Obstruent sequences where C1 was phonologically voiceless and C2 was phonologically voiced, e.g., 'fat gap', 'this doll'.2) Obstruent sequences where C1 was phonologically voiced and C2 was phonologically voiceless, e.g., 'sad gap', 'his toll'.3) Sequences of sonorant plus voiceless obstruent, e.g., 'full cap', 'long sip'.4) Sequences of voiceless obstruent plus sonorant, e.g., 'thick lap', 'this nut'.It was found that in Catalan obstruent sequences that differ in their phonological specification for voicing, speakers tend to anticipate the voicing gesture of C2 to C1, both in stop sequences and in fricative - stop sequences. Thus, the process is regressive and categorical, which is congruent with a rule of voicing assimilation in Catalan. Evidence was also found that speakers can display partial anticipation of the voicing gesture of C2, which shows that voicing assimilation may also be a gradient process in this language. Thus, the voicing assimilation rule seems to be optional. The Catalan data thus seem to reflect two different processes. On one hand, complete regressive voicing assimilation in obstruent sequences seems to be the result of a rule involving higher-level reorganization of motor commands. On the other hand, cases of partial assimilation may result from phonetic implementation factors.In English, it was found that there is no phonological rule of voicing assimilation in obstruent sequences. Rather, the coordination of oral and glottal gestures during the maximal constriction is a gradient process that may result from anticipatory overlap - sensitive to time constraints - and inertial effects . In sequences of consonants where nasals and laterals combine with obstruents, the voicing gesture seems to be switched at the transition from C1 to C2 in both languages. In addition, evidence was found for complete assimilation of voicing in Catalan obstruent - sonorant sequences, suggesting the extension of the regressive voicing assimilation rule for obstruents to these sequences, at least for some speakers.Finally, it is suggested that Articulatory Phonology and Keating's Windows Theory account for the coordination of oral and glottal gestures in Catalan and English.

This study sought to investigate the relationship between safety voicing and employee turnover. A model of the safety exit interview process was developed, along with reasons why conducting a safety exit interview may help improve workplace safety. A generic safety exit survey template was developed and administered to a sample of workers previously employed in high safety risk occupations. 126 participants completed the study measures. The type of information which the safety exit survey elicited is described. Results found clear evidence that safety concerns had influenced participants to leave their previous job. It was also found participants wished to voice these safety concerns at exit, but for some reason they could not or chose not to do so. Results also support the predictions that management and co-worker trust and support for safety, would be negatively associated with voicing within the safety exit survey context. Support was also found for the prediction that management trust and support for safety, would be positively associated with the actual voicing of safety issues on the job. Overall, this study seeks to improve workplace safety through encouraging the use of a safety exit interview.

The current study tests the use of vowel duration as a cue for the voicing of the following stop by Saudi ESL learners. It is mainly constructed on the Language Transfer Theory (LTT) established by Gass and Selinker (1994), the Ontogeny Phylogeny Model (OPM) formulated by Major (2001), the Perceptual Assimilation Model (PAM) developed by Best (1994, 1995), and the Speech Learning Model (SLM) developed by Flege (1995). The instrument contained 30 English monosyllabic minimal pairs of the type CVC. The participants, who were living in the US, consisted of two groups: 5 advanced Saudi ESL learners with linguistic knowledge and 10 advanced Saudi ESL learners without linguistic knowledge. Results showed that both groups of participants (those with linguistics background and those without linguistics background) were fairly accurate at predicting final voiceless Coronal and Dorsal stops after a shorter vowel. On the other hand, they both had equal difficulties predicting voiced stops in this environment. This would explain why participants in both groups overall seemed to be listening for the voicing status of the final stop and disregarding differences in vowel length as a predictor of that voicing. Individual participants, overall, were quite uniform in their responses regardless of any background in linguistics. This finding suggests that participants in both groups relied much more on the actual voicing of the final stops than they did on the length of the preceding vowel.

Un effort phonatoire intense ou prolongé peut causer des lésions des plis vocaux et une dysphonie. L’effort correspond à la perception, par un individu, de la force qu’il déploie pour réaliser une activité, ici la phonation visant à faire vibrer périodiquement les plis vocaux pour produire la voix dans la parole. L’évaluation de cet effort doit donc reposer, au moins, sur deux mesures, l’une perceptive et l’autre physique. Pour développer de telles mesures, il est nécessaire de dissocier l’effort phonatoire de la dysphonie, d’une part, et de l’effort articulatoire, d’autre part. Nous avons réalisé des expériences chez un grand nombre de sujets sains, en faisant varier l’effort phonatoire. Nous avons comparé les consonnes voisées et non voisées, ainsi que la parole vocale modale usuelle et non usuelle, c’est-à-dire différant par l’intensité, la hauteur et la qualité de la voix. Nous avons testé une mesure d’auto-perception de l’effort dans des comparaisons de syllabes par paires : le taux de difficulté ressenti pendant la production des consonnes voisées, par rapport aux non voisées. Le score moyen s’élevait à 22 sur 36, soit 61 pourcents. Nous avons aussi adapté une mesure acoustique de l’effort phonatoire : la fréquence fondamentale relative (RFFa). Les valeurs de RFFa, notamment à l’initiation de la voyelle post-consonantique, étaient plus basses, indiquant un effort plus important, pour les consonnes voisées que pour les non voisées et pour la voix forte-aigüe-pressée que pour la voix usuelle. Ces valeurs étaient cohérentes avec les mesures aérodynamiques réalisées. Nous avons également appliqué les deux mesures développées à des patients, dont nous présentons les cas. / An intense or prolonged phonatory effort can induce vocal fold lesions and dysphonia. The effort corresponds to the perception, by an individual, of the exertion to perform an activity, here the phonation aiming to create a periodic vibration the vocal folds in order to produce the voice during speech. Therefore, the evaluation of phonatory effort must rely, at least, on two measures, one perceptive and another physical. To develop such measures, it is necessary to dissociate phonatory effort from dysphonia, on the one hand, and from articulatory effort, on the other hand. We have conducted experiments in a large number of healthy subjects, by varying the phonatory effort. We compared voiced and voiceless consonants, as well as usual and unusual modal vocal speech, the last one differing in intensity, pitch, and voice quality. We tested a self-perception measurement in pair comparisons of syllables: the rate of difficulty felt during the production of the voiced consonants, compared to voiceless ones. The average score was 22 out of 36, or 61 percents. We also adapted an acoustic measure of phonatory effort: the relative fundamental frequency (RFFa). The values of RFFa, especially at the initiation of post-consonantal vowels, were lower, indicating a greater effort, for the voiced consonants than for the voiceless ones, and for the loud-high-pressed voice than for the usual voice. These values were consistent with the aerodynamic measurements we made. We also applied the two developed measures to patients and we presented their cases.

The main objective of this thesis is to investigate acoustic cues for the voicing contrast in stops in Russian for effects of speaking rate and phonetic environment. Although the laryngeal contrast in Russian is assumed to be a [voice] contrast, very few experimental studies have looked at the acoustic properties of Russian voiced and voiceless stops. Most claims about acoustic properties of stops and phonological processes that affect them (voice assimilation and final devoicing) have been made based on impressionistic transcriptions. The present study provides evidence that (1) voicing in voiced stops is affected by speaking rate manipulation, (2) stops in Russian retain underlying voicing contrast in presonorant position and voice assimilation occurs only in obstruent clusters, and (3) phonological processes of voice assimilation and final devoicing do not result in complete neutralization. The target of the investigation is voiced and voiceless intervocalic stops, stops in clusters, and final stops in different prosodic positions within a word and at the phrase level. The acoustic cues to voicing (duration of voicing, stop closure duration, vowel duration, f0, and F1) were measured from the production data of 14 monolingual speakers of Russian recorded in Russia. Speakers produced words and phrases with target stops in three speaking rate conditions: list reading, slow rate and fast rate. The data were analyzed in 5 blocks focusing on (1) word-internal stops, (2) voice assimilation in stops in prepositions, (3) cases of so-called "sonorant transparency", (4) voice assimilation in stops before /v/, and (5) voicing processes across a word boundary. The results of the study present a challenge to the widely-held assumption that phonological processes precede phonetic processes at the phonology-phonetics interface. It is shown that the underlying contrast leaves traces on assimilated and devoiced stops. To account for the findings, a phonology-phonetics interface that allows interaction between the modules is required. In addition, the results show that temporal cues are affected by speaking rate manipulation, but the effect of rate on voicing is found only in voiced stops. Duration of voicing and VOT in voiceless stops are not affected by speaking rate. The results also show that no effect of C2 is obtained on voicing in C1 stops in in obstruent-sonorant-obstruent clusters, thus no "phonological sonorant transparency to voice assimilation" is found in Russian. Rather, the study provides evidence that there is variation in production of voicing in stops in prepositions, and that voice assimilation in stops before /v/ followed by a voiced obstruent is optional for some speakers.

Most electrolarynges do not allow hands-free use or pitch modulation. This study presents the potential of pattern recognition to support electrolarynx use by predicting fundamental frequency (F0) and voicing state (VS) from neck surface EMG and respiratory trace. Respiratory trace and neck surface EMG were collected from 10 normal, adult males (18-60 years old) during different vocal tasks. Time-domain features were extracted from both signals, and a Support Vector Machine (SVM) classifier was employed to model F0 and VS. An average mean-squared-error (MSE) of 8.21 ± 3.5 semitones2 was achieved for the estimation of vocal frequency. An average classification accuracy of 78.05 ± 6.3 % was achieved for the prediction of voicing state from EMG and 65.24 ± 7.8 % from respiratory trace. Our results show that pattern classification of neck-muscle EMG and respiratory trace has merit in the prediction of F0 and VS during vocalization.

Most electrolarynges do not allow hands-free use or pitch modulation. This study presents the potential of pattern recognition to support electrolarynx use by predicting fundamental frequency (F0) and voicing state (VS) from neck surface EMG and respiratory trace. Respiratory trace and neck surface EMG were collected from 10 normal, adult males (18-60 years old) during different vocal tasks. Time-domain features were extracted from both signals, and a Support Vector Machine (SVM) classifier was employed to model F0 and VS. An average mean-squared-error (MSE) of 8.21 ± 3.5 semitones2 was achieved for the estimation of vocal frequency. An average classification accuracy of 78.05 ± 6.3 % was achieved for the prediction of voicing state from EMG and 65.24 ± 7.8 % from respiratory trace. Our results show that pattern classification of neck-muscle EMG and respiratory trace has merit in the prediction of F0 and VS during vocalization.

La présente recherche vise à explorer des formes multiples de silence représentées dans un film et à étudier la façon dont le silence a été perçu et conçu par des cinéastes femmes selon la perspective de l’analyse critique de discours (ACD). Dans ce contexte, nous avons choisi quatre longs métrages produits durant le XXIe siècle par quatre femmes cinéastes originaires de deux milieux culturels différents — à savoir les États-Unis et la Tunisie, à travers lesquels nous avons abordé notre problématique. Nous avons adopté l’approche développée par Fairclough (1989) qui consiste en trois étapes analytiques : description, interprétation et explication, combinant pragmatisme et analyse sémiotique. Cette recherche introduit également le concept de ‘voicing’ en référence aux signes sémiotiques et aux techniques cinématographiques qui sous-tendent la signification du silence et sa dimension pragmatique. Les résultats de l'étude démontrent que l'utilisation de ‘voicing’ s’avère un moyen efficace pour créer une méthode systématique d'analyse du silence au cinéma. Ils montrent également qu’en dépit des différences, des thèmes abordés et du contexte socio-culturel des cinéastes, il existe un dénominateur commun entre les quatre films, à savoir leur positionnement féministe ou pro-féministe.En outre, il ressort de notre analyse que les films en question constituent des barrières de résistance à l'hégémonie patriarcale du cinéma grand public qui sont fortement influencées par les perceptions individuelles des cinéastes, leurs expériences personnelles et le contexte culturel auquel elles appartiennent. / The current research aims to explore several of the manifold states of silence represented in film and to investigate how silence and silencing have been perceived and conceived by female filmmakers from a Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) perspective.This is achieved by examining the case studies of four feature films produced in the twenty-first century by four female filmmakers from two different cultural backgrounds–namely the USA and Tunisia. Research questions are qualitatively applied to a corpus of four films, following Fairclough’s (1989) three analytic stages: description, interpretation and explanation, using pragmatics combined with semiotic analysis. The thesis also introduces the concept of ‘voicing’ with reference to the semiotic signs and film techniques that underpin the meaning of silence and its pragmatic dimension.The findings of the study show that using ‘voicing’ has proved to be effective in creating a systematic method of analyzing silence in films. They also show that even though the cinematographic practices, the themes dealt with and the socio-cultural background of the filmmakers may be different, there is a common denominator between the four films: their feminist or pro-feminist agenda.Further, it argues that the films under discussion may be considered as barriers of resistance to the hegemonic patriarchal mainstream cinema and that these barriers are strongly influenced by the filmmakers’ own individual perceptions, personal experiences and cultural background.

The thesis is concerned with the German speakers' pronunciation of the Czech language, specifically with the issue of the voicing of obstruents. The phonological voicing is realized differently in Czech and German and the assimilation of voicing follows diverse principles. The pronunciation is often underestimated in education. The objective of the thesis is to find out the most frequent mistakes and to propose some improvements for tuition. I have thoroughly analysed 20 read speeches made by German speakers. I have also compared course books from the point of view of pronunciation engagement. The most problematic issue appeared to be the assimilation of voicing on the boundaries of syllables and words. The main contribution of the thesis should be the summary of German speakers' pronunciation difficulties and the materials which can be used for further tuition.

This diploma thesis deals with pronunciation of English speakers in Czech, especially with assimilation of voicing. The theoretical part describes Czech and English consonants, speech processes in both languages, factors influencing foreign accent and textbook analysis focusing on the practice of assimilation of voicing. The following part presents a research with 12 English native speakers. From these analyses, conclusions were drawn about the correctness of pronunciation and also about the correctness of assimilation of voices in general and for individual speakers. On the basis of the obtained data, a didactic plan for this phenomenon was created. Key words: English, Czech as a foreign language, assimilation of voicing, pronunciation, consonants, voicing, phonetics