Cette thèse porte sur la perception visuelle, auditive et audiovisuelle des voyelles nasales [ɑ̃] (« lent »),[ɔ̃] (« long ») et [ɛ̃] (« lin ») par des adultes devenus sourds, implantés cochléaires et implantés dutronc cérébral. L’étude sur la perception visuelle des voyelles, auprès de 22 adultes devenus sourds,redéfinit les sosies labiaux des voyelles nasales et propose une mise à jour de la classification desvisèmes. Trois études sur l’identification auditive des voyelles nasales auprès de 82, 15 et 10 adultesimplantés cochléaires mettent en évidence leur difficulté à reconnaitre les trois voyelles nasales, qu’ilsperçoivent comme des voyelles orales. Les analyses acoustiques et perceptives suggèrent que lesadultes implantés cochléaires s’appuient sur les informations fréquentielles des deux premiers picsspectraux mais négligent les informations d’intensité relative de ces pics. D’après l’étude menéeauprès de 13 adultes implantés du tronc cérébral, des informations acoustiques linguistiques sonttransmises par l’implant du tronc cérébral mais la fusion entre les informations auditives et visuellespourrait être optimisée pour l’identification des voyelles. Enfin, une enquête auprès de 179orthophonistes pointe le besoin d’une information sur la définition phonétique articulatoire actualiséedes voyelles [ɑ̃] et [ɛ̃]. / This thesis focuses on the visual, auditory and auditory-visual perception of french nasal vowels [ɑ̃](« lent »), [ɔ̃] (« long ») and [ɛ̃] (« lin ») by Cochlear Implant (CI) and Auditory Brainstem Implant(ABI) adults users. The study on visual perception of vowels, with 22 deafened adults, redefines thelip configuration of french nasal vowels and provides an update of the classification of vocalic visualphonemes. Three studies on auditory identification of nasal vowels with 82, 15 and 10 CI usershighlight their difficulty in recognizing the three nasal vowels, which they perceive as oral vowels.Acoustic and perceptual analyzes suggest that adults with CI rely on frequency informations of thefirst two spectral peaks but miss the informations of relative intensity of these peaks. The study with13 ABI users show that some linguistic acoustic cues are transmitted by the ABI but the fusion ofauditory and visual features could be optimized for the identification of vowels. Finally, a survey of179 Speech Language and Hearing Therapists show the need of an update on the phonetic articulationof french nasal vowels [ɑ̃] and [ɛ̃].

Através desta pesquisa, investigamos efeitos de atrito linguístico (influência da L2 sobre a L1), a partir da produção da vogal átona final /e/ por porto-alegrenses (RS, Brasil), aprendizes de Espanhol como Segunda Língua (L2). Com este propósito, analisamos a produção desta vogal em ambas as línguas dos aprendizes, verificando, mais especificamente, seus padrões acústicos (os valores de F1 e F2, que dizem respeito à altura e à anterioridade da língua, respectivamente, bem como os valores de duração absoluta e relativa) em comparação à produção de monolíngues de Espanhol (variedade de Montevidéu/Uruguai) e de Português Brasileiro (variedade de Porto Alegre – RS/Brasil). Portanto, contamos com três grupos distintos de participantes: (a) um grupo de monolíngues falantes de Espanhol (Grupo Controle 1); (b) um grupo de monolíngues do Português Brasileiro, nativos da grande Porto Alegre/RS (Grupo Controle 2); e (c) um grupo de aprendizes avançados de Espanhol como L2 (Grupo Experimental). Levantamos as seguintes hipóteses de pesquisa: (i) haverá diferença significativa nos valores das frequências formânticas (F1 e F2) e no padrão duracional das produções vocálicas entre as línguas dos bilíngues (Português/L1 e Espanhol/L2), sendo que a vogal /e/ em Espanhol/L2 será mais baixa (menor F1 – em Bark), mais anterior (menor F2 – em Bark) e mais longa (duração absoluta e relativa) do que em Português/L1 (CÂMARA Jr., 1970; CALLOU, MORAES, LEITE, 1996, 2002; VIEIRA, 2002; BISOL, 2003; BATTISTI & VIEIRA, 2005; REAL ACADEMIA ESPAÑOLA, 2011; SILVA, 2012; SANTOS, RAUBER, 2016; PEREYRON, 2017); (ii) não haverá diferença significativa, no que diz respeito aos padrões acústicos de F1, F2 e duração (absoluta e relativa), entre a vogal átona final /e/ do Espanhol, produzida pelos bilíngues de nível avançado na L2, e a produzida pelos monolíngues de Espanhol; e (iii) haverá diferença significativa entre os valores de F1, de F2, de duração absoluta e de duração relativa entre a vogal átona final /e/ do PB produzida pelos bilíngues e a sua contraparte produzida pelos monolíngues de PB, pois a vogal átona final /e/ dos bilíngues será mais baixa (menor F1), mais anterior (menor F2) e mais longa do que a dos monolíngues de PB (CALLOU, MORAES, LEITE, 1996, 2002; SILVA, 2012; SANTOS, RAUBER, 2016; PEREYRON, 2017; SCHERECHEWSKY, ALVES, KUPSKE, no prelo). Os dados foram obtidos através de Tarefas de Leitura, nas quais foi solicitado que o participante lesse, em voz alta, 24 frases-veículo que continham os estímulos a serem analisados. Os grupos de monolíngues realizaram apenas a Tarefa de Leitura correspondente à sua Língua Materna (L1), e o grupo de aprendizes realizou uma Tarefa de Leitura em cada língua (Português e Espanhol). Os resultados indicaram que os bilíngues distinguem, em suas produções, a vogal átona final /e/ entre a L1 (Português) e a L2 (Espanhol), embora não tenham desenvolvido o padrão acústico de altura e anterioridade/posterioridade na L2. Além disso, em relação à L1, as produções vocálicas dos bilíngues, estatisticamente, não se diferenciam das dos monolíngues de PB. Entretanto, individualmente, alguns bilíngues apontam sinais de atrito linguístico em altura e anterioridade/posterioridade vocálica. Portanto, a partir das análises dos sistemas de Língua Materna (L1) e Segunda Língua (L2) do grupo de aprendizes, discutimos o que nossos resultados podem sugerir sobre a dinamicidade nas produções dos bilíngues e a possibilidade de atrito linguístico em ambiente de L2 não-dominante, partindo da concepção de Língua como um Sistema Adaptativo Complexo (cf. GONÇALVES et al., 1995; BECKNER et al., 2009; ALBANO, 2012). / In this study, we investigate the occurrence of language attrition (L2-L1 influence) in the production of the word-final unstressed vowel /e/ by speakers from the city of Porto Alegre (RS, Brazil), learners of Spanish as a Second Language (L2). Departing from this goal, we analyze this vowel in the two language systems produced by these learners. We verify their acoustic patterns (F1 and F2, as well as absolute and relative durations) in comparison to the vowels produced by Brazilian Portuguese monolinguals (from the city of Porto Alegre - Brazil) and Spanish monolinguals (from the city of Montevideo – Uruguay). Therefore, three groups of participants took part in this study: (a) Spanish monolinguals (Control Group 1); (b) Brazilian Portuguese monolinguals (Control Group 2); and (c) a group of Brazilian learners of Spanish showing an advanced level of proficiency (Experimental Group). We hypothesize that (i) there will be significant differences in F1, F2 and (absolute and relative) durational values between the two languages of the bilingual participants (L1: Portuguese, L2: Spanish), as the final vowel /e/ in L2 Spanish will be lower (lower F1 Bark value), more fronted (lower F2 Bark value) and longer (both in absolute and relative values) than in L1 Portuguese (CÂMARA Jr., 1970; CALLOU, MORAES, LEITE, 1996, 2002; VIEIRA, 2002; BISOL, 2003; BATTISTI & VIEIRA, 2005; REAL ACADEMIA ESPAÑOLA, 2011; SILVA, 2012; SANTOS, RAUBER, 2016; PEREYRON, 2017); (ii) there will not be significant differences in the production of word-final unstressed /e/ in Spanish, in terms of formant frequencies (F1 and F2 values) and duration (absolute and relative values), between the productions by the L2 leaners and the native speakers of Spanish; (iii) there will be significant differences, in terms of formant frequencies (F1 and F2 values) and duration (absolute and relative values), in the productions in Brazilian Portuguese by monolinguals and L2 leaners of Spanish, as the vowels produced by the latter will be lower (lower F1 value), more fronted (lower F2 value) and longer than those produced by the monolinguals (CALLOU, MORAES, LEITE, 1996, 2002; SILVA, 2012; PEREYRON, 2017; SANTOS, RAUBER, 2016; SCHERECHEWSKY, ALVES, KUPSKE, in press). The data were collected through a reading task, in which participants were asked to read 24 carrier sentences with the target words. The two Control Groups sat for one of the tasks only, while the L2 learners took part in both tasks (Portuguese and Spanish). Our results show that the L2 leaners are able to produce a difference between Brazilian Portuguese (L1) /e/ and Spanish (L2) /e/, even though the target L2 pattern has not been fully developed. As for the L1 productions, significant differences between monolinguals and bilinguals have not been found. However, when analyzed individually, some learners show some signs of language attrition in their F1 and F2 values. This considered, by analyzing these participants’ L1 and L2 systems individually, we discuss the possibility of language attrition in an L2 non-dominant environment, as we provide support to a view of language as a Complex, Adaptive System.

Unlike some Asian languages (e.g., Korean), English has lexical stress manifested by four acoustic features: duration, intensity, F0 (pitch), and vowel quality. Lexical stress has been known to have significant influences on native English speakers’ recognition of spoken words. According to Cutler (2015), lexical stress has both suprasegmental and segmental features: Suprasegmental features include duration, intensity, and F0 while vowel quality is considered a segmental feature. However, it is still unclear which lexical features are more responsible for spoken word recognition. This study examined which features, suprasegmental features or vowel quality of English, are a more significant influencer in spoken word recognition using English loanwords in Korean, which lack the prominence of any syllable realized by these features. Additionally, this study investigated the claimed advantage of the strong-weak stress pattern over a weak-strong pattern. To that end, two experiments were conducted. First, a parallel acoustic comparison was made between disyllabic English words and their corresponding English loanwords in Korean in order to investigate whether Korean has lexical stress features similar to those of English. 10 Korean and 10 English native speakers read 20 disyllabic words: the English loanwords in Korean by Korean participants and the source English words by American participants. The results showed that the differences of acoustic values between the syllables of the English words were significantly larger than those of the English loanwords. That is, the relative prominence of the stressed syllable over the unstressed syllable in English was not found in Korean. Additionally, the results indicated that Korean does not have a reduced vowel such as /ə/ in English, which is a critical feature of English vowel quality. In Experiment II, 16 English loanwords were used to create three versions of a spoken word recognition experiment, which was administered using the online survey platform, Qualtrics. Each version had a different type of manipulation: unmanipulated English loanwords, English loanwords with suprasegemental manipulation or English loanwords with vowel quality manipulation. 117 American English hearers identified the spoken words of one of the versions assigned to them; their success rates and reaction times (RT) were recorded. A binominal regression test was used for the analysis of success rates, and the Kruskal-Wallis H test for the response times. The results indicated that as far as success rates are concerned, both suprasegmental features and vowel quality play a role in recognizing spoken English words. However, when these two features were compared, vowel quality seemed to be a much stronger player. As for stress patterns, no significant differences were found in success rates across the three sets of manipulation. Moreover, this study did not find any significant difference in RTs either across the three manipulation sets or the two stress patterns. This study offered many applied implications in ESL, especially for teaching English pronunciation in Korea.

<p>This study investigates the realisation of phonological quantity in the dialects of Modern Swedish, based on a corpus containing recordings from 86 locations in Sweden and the Swedishspeaking parts of Finland. The corpus was recorded as part of the national SweDia project.</p><p>The study is explorative in character. Quantity structures in Swedish dialects and their geographical distribution, as described in the dialectological literature, are compared to the results of a data-driven categorisation (cluster analysis). The results reveal an overall good correspondence of the data driven and the traditional categorisation, although with some deviations in the detail.</p><p>The study is divided into two parts. The first part lays the foundation for the data-driven categorisation, which is then described in the second part. First, the phonology and phonetics of quantity in Swedish are described in terms of durational distinctions and vocalic quality differences that typically accompany the durational differences. Preaspiration, which appears to be a normative feature in some dialects, is covered as well. An overview of the historical development of the Swedish quantity system is provided, with special emphasis on a phonological interpretation of quantity changes. Thereafter, dialectological evidence is combined with phonological and typological considerations to develop a categorisation of Swedish dialects.</p><p>The second part explains the methodology of cluster analysis and applies this method to vowel and consonant durations from one contrastive word pair, in order to obtain an alternative dialect categorisation. Analyses of vowel quality and preaspiration are performed in addition to the durational analyses. Hypotheses derived from the cluster analysis are then tested on one additional word pair recorded in 75 locations and on three additional word pairs recorded in four locations.</p><p>The general pattern emerging from the cluster analysis is a categorisation of the dialects into three main types, a Finland-Swedish, a Northern and a Southern type. This categorisation shows a good geographical agreement with the categorisation that is derived from the analysis of the dialectological literature. Therefore, the durational patterns of the three types are interpreted as reflections of three different phonological systems: 4-way systems with vocalic and consonantal quantity, 3-way systems with vocalic quantity and with consonantal quantity only after short vowels, and 2-way systems with complementary quantity. From the historical perspective, the 4-way system constitutes the most conservative and the 2-way system the most recently developed system.</p><p>Finally, it is argued that the historical development is one of the factors behind occasional mismatches between the data-driven and the dialectological categorisation. Data from one of the dialects, which has recently abandoned a 4-way system but has obviously retained the durational properties of the older system, is used as an example to illustrate this historical hypothesis.</p>

This study investigates the realisation of phonological quantity in the dialects of Modern Swedish, based on a corpus containing recordings from 86 locations in Sweden and the Swedishspeaking parts of Finland. The corpus was recorded as part of the national SweDia project. The study is explorative in character. Quantity structures in Swedish dialects and their geographical distribution, as described in the dialectological literature, are compared to the results of a data-driven categorisation (cluster analysis). The results reveal an overall good correspondence of the data driven and the traditional categorisation, although with some deviations in the detail. The study is divided into two parts. The first part lays the foundation for the data-driven categorisation, which is then described in the second part. First, the phonology and phonetics of quantity in Swedish are described in terms of durational distinctions and vocalic quality differences that typically accompany the durational differences. Preaspiration, which appears to be a normative feature in some dialects, is covered as well. An overview of the historical development of the Swedish quantity system is provided, with special emphasis on a phonological interpretation of quantity changes. Thereafter, dialectological evidence is combined with phonological and typological considerations to develop a categorisation of Swedish dialects. The second part explains the methodology of cluster analysis and applies this method to vowel and consonant durations from one contrastive word pair, in order to obtain an alternative dialect categorisation. Analyses of vowel quality and preaspiration are performed in addition to the durational analyses. Hypotheses derived from the cluster analysis are then tested on one additional word pair recorded in 75 locations and on three additional word pairs recorded in four locations. The general pattern emerging from the cluster analysis is a categorisation of the dialects into three main types, a Finland-Swedish, a Northern and a Southern type. This categorisation shows a good geographical agreement with the categorisation that is derived from the analysis of the dialectological literature. Therefore, the durational patterns of the three types are interpreted as reflections of three different phonological systems: 4-way systems with vocalic and consonantal quantity, 3-way systems with vocalic quantity and with consonantal quantity only after short vowels, and 2-way systems with complementary quantity. From the historical perspective, the 4-way system constitutes the most conservative and the 2-way system the most recently developed system. Finally, it is argued that the historical development is one of the factors behind occasional mismatches between the data-driven and the dialectological categorisation. Data from one of the dialects, which has recently abandoned a 4-way system but has obviously retained the durational properties of the older system, is used as an example to illustrate this historical hypothesis.

A Mandarin phrase recognition system based on MFCC, LPC scaled excitation, vowel model, hidden Markov model (HMM) and Viterbi algorithm is proposed in this thesis. HMM, which is broadly used in speech recognition at present, is adopted in the main structure of recognition. In order to speed up the recognition time, we take advantage of stability of vowels in Mandarin and incorporate with vowel class recognition in our system. For the speaker-dependent case, a single Mandarin phrase recognition can be accomplished within 1 seconds on average in the laboratory environment.

Η παρούσα εργασία εστιάζει στην περιγραφή του φωνηεντικού συστήματος των Μιστιώτικων, - μιας Καππαδοκικής ποικιλίας που μιλιόταν στην περιοχή του Μιστί-, όπως αυτό διαμορφώνεται στις μέρες μας από διαφορετικές γενιές ομιλητών σε ένα μικτό προσφυγικό χωριό της Βόρειας Ελλάδας. Επιπλέον, πραγματοποείται μια σύγκριση ανάμεσα στο σημερινό φωνηεντικό σύστημα σε σχέση με το παλαιό της Καππαδοκικής διαλέκτου, όπως το έχει περιγράψει ο Dawkins (1916), και προτείνεται μια υπόθεση, η οποία έχει ως στόχο να εξηγήσει τις διαφορές που αναδεικνύονται μεταξύ τους, λαμβάνοντας υπ’όψιν τους γλωσσικούς μηχανισμούς και την επαφή διαλέκτων. Σύμφωνα με τον Dawkins (1916), το φωνηεντικό σύστημα της Καππαδοκικής διαλέκτου αποτελούνταν από οκτώ φωνήεντα. Εκτός από τα φωνήνετα [i,e,a,o,u], που έχει και η ελληνική, πραγματώνονταν και τα φωνήεντα [y,œ,ɯ], εξαιτιας της επαφής της διαλέκτου με την τουρκική γλώσσα. Αυτά τα φωνήεντα εμφανίζονταν κυρίως σε τούρκικα δάνεια, π.χ. Τ. karı 'γυναίκα'> [karɯ]• T. tütün > ‘καπνό’ [tytyn] (Janse 2009;2015), ενώ η παρουσία τους σε ελληνικές λέξεις ήταν σπάνια. Όμως, σύμφωνα με τα αποτελέσματα της έρευνας, φάνηκε ότι το τωρινό φωνηεντικό σύστημα αποκλίνει σημαντικά από αυτό που περιγράφουν προηγούμενες μελέτες. Τα τούρκικα φωνήεντα [y,œ,ɯ] έχουν σχεδόν εξαφανιστεί, κυρίως από την ομιλία των νέων. Την ίδια στιγμή όμως, ένα νέο φωνήεν έδειξε να έχει ενσωματωθεί στο σύστημα, το φωνήεν [æ], το οποίο εντοπίστηκε στο λόγο τόσο των ηλικιωμένων όσο και των νέων πληροφορητών. Με σκοπό να δωθεί μια εξήγηση για αυτές τις αλλαγές που παρατηρήθηκαν, υποστηρίζουμε ότι είναι αποτέλεσμα διαδικασιών γλωσσικής και διαλεκτικής επαφής. Συγκεκριμένα, θεωρούμε ότι τα φωνήεντα [y,œ,ɯ] βρίσκονται σε μια φάση εξάλειψης εξαιτίας της ενεργοποίησης του μηχανισμου εξομοίωσης, καθώς τα Μιστιώτικα ήρθαν σε επαφή με τα Ελληνικά και τα Ποντιακά μετά την ανταλλαγή των πληθυσμών και τα τούρκικα χαρακτηριστικά θεωρούνται γενικά στιγματιζμένα εδώ και δεκαετίες. Επιπρόσθετα, το φωνήεν [æ] υποθέτουμε ότι μπορεί να έχει υιοθετηθεί ως ένα εξέχων χαρακτηριστικό από την Ποντιακή διάλεκτο, κάτι που επίσης εκλαμβάνεται ως μια άλλη μορφή εξομοίωσης. / The aim of this study is to present the vowel system of Mišotika, –a varierty of Cappadocian that was spoken at Misti-, as it is spoken by different generations in a mixed refugee village in Northern Greece at the present day. Moreover, we compare this vowel system with the Cappadocian vowel system that has been described by Dawkins (1916), and we propose a hypothesis that aims to explain the differences that appear between these hundred years, taking into consideration mechanisms of language and dialect contact. According to Dawkins (1916), the vowel system of Cappadocian dialect consisted of eight vowels. Besides the Greek vowels [i,e,a,o,u], the dialect also had the vowels [y,œ,ɯ], presumably due to contact with the Turkish language. These vowels appeared mainly in Turkish loans, e.g. Turk. karı 'woman'> [karɯ]• Turk. tütün > ‘tobacco’ [tytyn] (Janse 2009;2015), while their presence in Greek words was rare. However, according to the results of our research, the current vowel system diverges significantly from what earlier studies have described. The vowels [y,œ,ɯ] are almost extinct, especially at the casual speech of the young adults. At the same time, a new realisation has emerged, i.e. the vowel [æ], which is evident in the speech of elders and young adults. In order to explain the above changes, we argue that they are result of language and dialect contact processes. In particular, the Turkish vowels [y,œ,ɯ] are in the process of elimination due to mechanism of levelling, as Mišótika has been in contact with Modern Greek and Pontic since the population exchange of the 1920s, and Turkish features were highly stigmatized for many decades. Similarly, the vowel [æ] has been adopted as a salient feature of the Pontic variety, which is also considered as another aspect of levelling.

In this research, Communicative Accommodation Theory (CAT) is investigated while native speakers address nonnative peers. For the intentions of this research, three native speakers of Canadian English were asked to have conversations with native and nonnative peers. The conversations were in the form of giving directions on the map. Later on, the participants’ formants and vowel durations were measured and used for comparing native-nonnative peer effect(s) on the speakers’ vowel formants and duration. Based on the analyses, it is suggested that accommodation may take place based on providing stereotypical vowel durations and formants, as well as reducing inter-token variations in the nonnative peer context.

Cette thèse porte sur la perception visuelle, auditive et audiovisuelle des voyelles nasales [ɑ̃] (« lent »),[ɔ̃] (« long ») et [ɛ̃] (« lin ») par des adultes devenus sourds, implantés cochléaires et implantés dutronc cérébral. L’étude sur la perception visuelle des voyelles, auprès de 22 adultes devenus sourds,redéfinit les sosies labiaux des voyelles nasales et propose une mise à jour de la classification desvisèmes. Trois études sur l’identification auditive des voyelles nasales auprès de 82, 15 et 10 adultesimplantés cochléaires mettent en évidence leur difficulté à reconnaitre les trois voyelles nasales, qu’ilsperçoivent comme des voyelles orales. Les analyses acoustiques et perceptives suggèrent que lesadultes implantés cochléaires s’appuient sur les informations fréquentielles des deux premiers picsspectraux mais négligent les informations d’intensité relative de ces pics. D’après l’étude menéeauprès de 13 adultes implantés du tronc cérébral, des informations acoustiques linguistiques sonttransmises par l’implant du tronc cérébral mais la fusion entre les informations auditives et visuellespourrait être optimisée pour l’identification des voyelles. Enfin, une enquête auprès de 179orthophonistes pointe le besoin d’une information sur la définition phonétique articulatoire actualiséedes voyelles [ɑ̃] et [ɛ̃]. / This thesis focuses on the visual, auditory and auditory-visual perception of french nasal vowels [ɑ̃](« lent »), [ɔ̃] (« long ») and [ɛ̃] (« lin ») by Cochlear Implant (CI) and Auditory Brainstem Implant(ABI) adults users. The study on visual perception of vowels, with 22 deafened adults, redefines thelip configuration of french nasal vowels and provides an update of the classification of vocalic visualphonemes. Three studies on auditory identification of nasal vowels with 82, 15 and 10 CI usershighlight their difficulty in recognizing the three nasal vowels, which they perceive as oral vowels.Acoustic and perceptual analyzes suggest that adults with CI rely on frequency informations of thefirst two spectral peaks but miss the informations of relative intensity of these peaks. The study with13 ABI users show that some linguistic acoustic cues are transmitted by the ABI but the fusion ofauditory and visual features could be optimized for the identification of vowels. Finally, a survey of179 Speech Language and Hearing Therapists show the need of an update on the phonetic articulationof french nasal vowels [ɑ̃] and [ɛ̃].

In this research, Communicative Accommodation Theory (CAT) is investigated while native speakers address nonnative peers. For the intentions of this research, three native speakers of Canadian English were asked to have conversations with native and nonnative peers. The conversations were in the form of giving directions on the map. Later on, the participants’ formants and vowel durations were measured and used for comparing native-nonnative peer effect(s) on the speakers’ vowel formants and duration. Based on the analyses, it is suggested that accommodation may take place based on providing stereotypical vowel durations and formants, as well as reducing inter-token variations in the nonnative peer context.