Low Vowels Research Articles

Franklin D. Roosevelt and the American Theatre Standard: The low vowels

Franklin D. Roosevelt’s accent is often used as an illustration of the elite pronunciation heard among the north-eastern US upper classes until roughly the mid 20th century. Known under several names and often considered a mixture of British and American features, this variety is frequently identified with the American Theatre Standard, a norm popularized by acting schools in the early 20th century. Working on the assumption that Roosevelt is an exemplar of the north-eastern standard, the aim of the current study is a preliminary acoustic exploration of his accent with the aim of assessing the plausibility of such comparisons, focusing on the dress, trap, bath, start and lot vowels. Density plots created based on F1 and F2 measured in eight radio speeches were used to examine the relative position of these vowels in the vowel space. Linear mixed-effects regression was then used to model F1 and F2 in selected pairs of vowels to determine whether the differences along the two formant dimensions are significant. The results confirm a conclusion reached in an earlier auditory study (Brandenburg, Braden 1952) according to which Roosevelt’s bath was variable between [æ] and a lower and retracted [a], a vowel quality found in Eastern New England and in American Theatre Pronunciation. At the same time, a merged start/lot vowel in Roosevelt’s speech makes it unjustified to fully identify his accent with the latter variety.

Nasal coda neutralization in Shanghai Mandarin: Articulatory and perceptual evidence

Shanghai Mandarin is reported to neutralize /n/ and /ŋ/ after non-low vowels, a change also reported for other varieties of Chinese. However, the place of articulation of the resulting nasal is unclear. We used production and perception experiments to determine the contexts which condition neutralization and the place of articulation of the resulting nasal. Analysis of ultrasound data using a dimensionality reduction technique revealed that neutralization in production was dependent on the height of the preceding vowel: The highest vowel /i/ conditioned a consistent, non-structure-preserving neutralization to a fronted velar or palatal nasal; the mid vowel /ə/ conditioned an inconsistent, structure-preserving neutralization to [n]; and no neutralization occurred after the low vowel /a/. In contrast, Standard Mandarin controls produced the contrast in all vowel contexts. A follow-up perception experiment confirmed that, consistent with complete neutralization, Shanghai Mandarin listeners failed to distinguish alveolar and velar nasals following /i/. More surprisingly, so did Standard Mandarin listeners, suggesting a near merger of the nasal codas following /i/ in Standard Mandarin. Our results provide support for a role for substantive factors in neutralization-driven sound changes.

Harmony and disharmony in Mbat (Jarawan Bantu) verbs

This paper is the first to describe aspects of the vocalic phonology of Mbat, a Jarawan Bantu language. Mbat exhibits a series of vowel-consonant interactions in its verbs that sometimes yield height harmony between a stem and suffixal vowel. Via this stem-controlled phenomenon, high vowels (i, u, ɪ, ʊ) harmonize across a stem-final non-dorsal sonorant while the low vowel (a) harmonizes across any stem-final dorsal. Under other conditions, these verbs appear disharmonic for height. A sixth contrastive vowel, schwa (ə), does not actively participate in harmony. I show that these otherwise straightforward generalizations on harmony vs. blocking are sometimes obscured by alternations triggered by a preceding glide that affect the stem vowel itself. I offer an analysis using a feature geometric model of vowel height. I show that an approach based on well-motivated binary vocalic features like [open], [closed], and [ATR] offers a transparent account of most Mbat outcomes. There is at least one instance, however, where these features seem unintuitive relative to the phenomena being modeled. For the sake of comparison, I discuss a possible reanalysis based on abstract features. Such an approach is unencumbered by expected phonetic correlates of vocalic features and focuses instead on featural interactions. This approach aligns itself with more recent “substance-free” approaches to phonology which assume a model of phonological computation based on features whose phonetic implementation is downstream and language-specific.

‘Grandpa’ or ‘opera’? Production and perception of unstressed /a/ and /əʁ/ in German

In the description of German phonology, two distinct phonetic symbols are currently recommended for the transcription of the vowels [a] (a central low vowel, phonemically /a/) and [ɐ] (phonemically /əʁ/) in word-final, unstressed positions. The present study examines whether differences between these two vowels exist in production and perception of Standard German speakers from the north of Germany. In Experiment 1, six speakers produced a series of minimal pairs that were embedded in meaningful sentences and varied with respect to their accentuation and position within a prosodic phrase. In Experiment 2, the minimal pairs produced by the six speakers of the first experiment were extracted from their respective contexts and tested with 44 native German listeners in a forced-choice identification task. Perceptual results showed a better-than-chance performance for one male speaker of the corpus only. Phonetic analyses also confirmed that only this male speaker produced subtle, but consistent F2/F3 differences between [a] and [ɐ] while the contrast was completely neutralised in the rest of the corpus. We discuss the role of prosody in vowel neutralisation with a specific focus on unstressed vowels and make suggestions for phonetic and phonological accounts of Standard German.

Eastern Andalusian Spanish

Eastern Andalusian Spanish (henceforth EAS), is spoken in the east of Andalusia, the southernmost autonomous region of Spain. EAS is most similar to Western Andalusian Spanish (WAS) and to Murcian Spanish, the latter spoken in the autonomous region of Murcia, immediately to the east of Andalusia, and it shares some phonetic traits with EAS, such as vowel lowering. Geographically, Eastern Andalusia includes the provinces of Almería, Granada, Jaén and Málaga, although the precise linguistic delimitation of this area is somewhat more complicated (Figure 1). The main criterion to differentiate EAS from WAS is the lowering or opening of vowels preceding underlying /s/ (Villena Ponsoda 2000). More detailed information on the differences between EAS and WAS can be found in Jiménez Fernández (1999), Villena Ponsoda (2000), Moya Corral (2010) and Valeš (2014). According to Alvar, Llorente & Salvador (1973: map 1696), Cádiz and Huelva in the west are the only Andalusian provinces where vowel lowering before underlying /s/ is not found. As the geographical extent of this phenomenon is widely debated, it is difficult to calculate the precise number of speakers of EAS, but we can assert that this geolect is the native variety of Spanish of approximately 2,800,000 speakers if we take into account the figures from the last census of Andalusia in 2011 (Instituto de Estadística y Cartografía de Andalucía 2011).

Gradient and categorical assimilation of pretonic vowels in Brazilian Portuguese

This paper addresses the acoustic realisations of the pretonic vowels /e, o/ that have been previously reported to undergo regressive vowel harmony in Brazilian Portuguese. It examines how the height of pretonic /e, o/ is affected by the phonological and phonetic height of the adjacent stressed vowel in three dialects: Northeastern (Bahia), Northern (Amazonas) and Southern (Rio Grande do Sul). A pseudoword reading task was performed with two speakers each of the three different dialects. The findings suggest that there is some kind of low harmony, in that /e, o/ are realized with markedly higher F1 before the stressed low vowels /ɛ, a, ɔ/ than before the stressed non-low vowels /i, e, o, u/. This effect was found for all dialects, but appears to be categorical (and thus phonological) for the Northern and Northeastern speakers, while gradient for the Southern speakers, where it is likely due to phonetic V-to-V coarticulation. More importantly, no effect of height harmony was found in any of the dialects: pretonic /e, o/ were not produced significantly higher before a stressed /i, u/. In addition, Northern and Southern speakers showed V-to-V coarticulation for the non-high pretonic vowels, illustrating with Northern speakers that a categorical harmony process can co-occur together with a gradient vowel assimilation in the same dialect.

Affrication of Voiced Labials (/B, V/) in Changana

This article describes and analyses the frication of the voiced labial
 consonants (/b/ and /v/) in Changana, a Bantu language (S53, in Guthrie’s
 1967-1971 classification). In the light of the autosegmental phonology (Leben
 1973, 1978, 2006; 1973, Goldsmith 1976, 2004; Odden 1986) combined with
 the Feature Geometry theory, the article discusses phonological processes
 that turn voiced labials into labial-alveolar affricate [bz]. In this study, we
 assume that the process of hiatus resolution by gliding is the trigger of the
 alteration under analysis. That is, when derivative suffixes with low vowel
 (/a/) and the high front vowel (/i/) in the initial position are attached to
 words with rounded vowels (/o, u/) in final position in some morphological
 processes such as diminutivisation and locativisation, the results are
 undesirable sequences (hiatus). In order to resolve such hiatus, a series
 of phonological processes such as the turning of the rounded vowel in the
 word final position into labial-velar glide allowing the adjacency of voiced
 labials with labial glide which violates the Obligatory Contour Principle
 (OCP) takes place. The present study analyses the OCP using empirical
 Changana data collected both in the fieldwork supplemented by data from
 other sources including bibliographical and introspective data. The article
 is organised as follows. Firstly, it discusses the theoretical framework;
 secondly it analyses the Hiatus Resolution in Changana; thirdly, it analyses
 the data and lastly, it presents the main conclusions of the study.

A reanalysis of abstract contrasts and opacity in Bondu-so tongue root harmony

This paper explores a number of controversial consequences of previous abstract analyses of Bondu-so (Dogon) vowels and vowel harmony, particularly for the explanation of phonological opacity. Bondu-so has been characterised as displaying asymmetrically-patterning bidirectional harmony, a four-way [ATR] contrast on mid-vowel suffixes, and abstract [±ATR] contrasts on high and low vowels which display distinct phonological behaviours but which never surface, being absolutely neutralised (Hantgan & Davis 2012). I show that each of these unusual generalisations stems from the crucial mischaracterisation of underlying vowel contrasts and the direction of harmony in surface-ambiguous data. With a re-classification of the data, Bondu-so harmony patterns are characterisable as regular, derivationally transparent leftwards [RTR]-harmony with harmonically neutral non-contrastive high and low vowels – requiring no abstract contrasts, directional harmony asymmetries, or opacity of any kind. Following this non-abstract reanalysis, Bondu-so is revealed to be typologically and theoretically fully consistent with other harmony languages. This review of Bondu-so vowel patterns represents therefore an important contribution to the “abstractness controversy” – revealing important analytical and methodological issues in abstract approaches to phonological opacity.

On the recent history of low vowels in English

The development of low vowels in the history of English is one which shows continuous movement, usually upwards along earlier back and later front trajectories. In addition, low vowels have been subject to lengthening processes which have compensated for the loss of earlier instances of long low vowels. Shifts along a horizontal axis, from low front to low back, can also be discerned throughout the history of English. The present study begins by examining the situation in late eighteenth-century English, using theEighteenth-Century English Phonology Databaseand the works of various prescriptivist writers, to determine the outset for later developments in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. It also scrutinises realisations of low vowels in these varieties in order to offer a possible chronology for the overall development of low vowels in the past two centuries.

Patterns of Misidentified Vowels in Individuals With Dysarthria Secondary to Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis

Purpose The current study examines the pattern of misidentified vowels produced by individuals with dysarthria secondary to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). Method Twenty-three individuals with ALS and 22 typical individuals produced 10 monophthongs in an /h/-vowel-/d/ context. One hundred thirty-five listeners completed a forced-choice vowel identification test. Misidentified vowels were examined in terms of the target vowel categories (front-back; low-mid-high) and the direction of misidentification (the directional pattern when the target vowel was misidentified, e.g., misidentification "to a lower vowel"). In addition, acoustic predictors of vowel misidentifications were tested based on log first formant (F1), log second formant, log F1 vowel inherent spectral change, log second formant vowel inherent spectral change, and vowel duration. Results First, high and mid vowels were more frequently misidentified than low vowels for all speaker groups. Second, front and back vowels were misidentified at a similar rate for both the Mild and Severe groups, whereas back vowels were more frequently misidentified than front vowels in typical individuals. Regarding the direction of vowel misidentification, vowel errors were mostly made within the same backness (front-back) category for all groups. In addition, more errors were found toward a lower vowel category than toward a higher vowel category in the Severe group, but not in the Mild group. Overall, log F1 difference was identified as a consistent acoustic predictor of the main vowel misidentification pattern. Conclusion Frequent misidentifications in the vowel height dimension and the acoustic predictor, F1, suggest that limited tongue height control is the major articulatory dysfunction in individuals with ALS. Clinical implications regarding this finding are discussed.

A phonetic-phonological study of vowel height and nasal coarticulation in French

ABSTRACTThe majority of previous studies on nasal coarticulation in French find an inversely proportionate relationship between vowel opening and nasality, such that high vowels are the most nasalized, sometimes exceeding 50% nasality. However, it has been unclear whether this is a mechanical or controlled property of French, given the typically short duration of high vowels in natural speech, as well as the aerodynamic and acoustic factors rendering them more susceptible to spontaneous nasalization. This study uses nasometric data to quantify progressive and regressive nasalization in 20 Northern Metropolitan French speakers as a function of vowel height. Furthermore, the relationship between degree of nasal coupling and overall vowel duration serves as a proxy for distinguishing mechanical from controlled nasalization, in the spirit of Solé (1992, 2007). This study finds evidence that high vowel nasalization in French is mechanical in pre-nasal position, but controlled in post-nasal position. Meanwhile, nasalization of mid and low vowels is blocked in pre-nasal position but, at most, mechanical in post-nasal position. In consequence, French appears to block nasalization in otherwise lexically impossible positions (*ṼN), while passively allowing, though not actively requiring, nasalizing in positions where conflation is possible (both NṼ and NV being permitted in the lexicon).

The lowering of high vowels before [r] in Latin

This paper discusses a putative sound change in the early history of Latin and synchronic alternations apparently related to it. The lowering of short high vowels before the rhotic is problematic on several counts; so much so that serious doubt has been cast on its reality. On the other hand, due to widespread alternations in the morphophonology of Classical Latin it is reasonable to assume that such a lowering operated as a synchronic rule at that stage. A minor asymmetry in the relevant alternations of verbal affixes in infectum-based vs. perfectum-based formations presents an interesting problem to which I suggest two tentative explanations.

Vocal tract shaping of emotional speech

Emotional speech production has been previously studied using fleshpoint tracking data in speaker-specific experiment setups. The present study introduces a real-time magnetic resonance imaging database of emotional speech production from 10 speakers and presents articulatory analysis results of speech emotional expression using the database. Midsagittal vocal tract parameters (midsagittal distances and the vocal tract length) were parameterized based on a two-dimensional grid-line system, using image segmentation software. The principal feature analysis technique was applied to the grid-line system in order to find the major movement locations. Results reveal both speaker-dependent and speaker-independent variation patterns. For example, sad speech, a low arousal emotion, tends to show smaller opening for low vowels in the front cavity than the high arousal emotions more consistently than the other regions of the vocal tract. Happiness shows significantly shorter vocal tract length than anger and sadness in most speakers. Further details of speaker-dependent and speaker-independent speech articulation variation in emotional expression and their implications are described.

On the link between onset clusters and codas in Mbat (Jarawan Bantu)

This paper explores morphologically-conditioned alternations in Mbat (Jarawan Bantu) verb stems. Some inflectional affixation in Mbat results in resyllabification. The singleton coda of a CGVC verb stem will become the onset of a new syllable following the addition of a vowel-initial suffix (e.g., Perfective -am). What is surprising is that this, in turn, triggers onset simplification in the stem itself (i.e., CV.C-am). Adding further complexity to Mbat is that these alternations are limited to verb stems containing mid vowels. Stems with low vowels retain their pre-vocalic glide upon suffixation (i.e., CGV.C-am). These outcomes have implications for at least two contemporary lines of inquiry in phonological theory: i) the prosodification and behavior of pre-vocalic glides, and ii) the formal connection between so-called M2 syllable margin positions (i.e., the second member of a complex onset and the sole member of a singleton coda). I illustrate that Mbat has something to contribute to current perspectives on both these fronts. In addition to the theoretical and typological contributions entailed herein, this paper is also significant in that it is the first formal linguistic study of a Jarawan Bantu language, a cluster of languages spoken primarily in eastern Nigeria.

Vocal Release Time of Mandarin Vowels at Different Pitch Levels

To explore how vocal release time (VRT) varies when young adults articulate the three Chinese vertex vowels with increasingly higher pitch levels. Sound pressure (SP) and electroglottographic (EGG) signals were recorded synchronously from 53 males and 53 females saying sustained /A/, /i/, /u/ at five equally spaced pitch heights, each being higher than the one before. About 3030 effective ST (semitone) and VRT measures were obtained. Statistical analyses of them were done by using SPSS 13.0 and Excel 2010. As mean STs increase linearly from pitch levels one to five, mean VRTs display a rise-fall pattern in a big group of subjects, but a fall-rise pattern in a small group of them. In both cases, pitch and VRT tend to present a curvilinear relationship, although VRT varies in opposite directions. And also, high vowels tend to have larger VRT than low vowels.

Effect of emphasis spread on coronal stop articulation in Qatari Arabic

Emphasis (contrastive uvularisation) in Arabic spreads from an emphatic consonant to neighboring segments (Davis 1995). The effect of emphasis spread on a consonant is manifested as lowering of its spectral mean (Jongman et al. 2011). Although stop consonants reveal a strong effect of emphasis, it is not known how emphasis spread affects other acoustic properties of stops, e.g. voice onset time (VOT). Previous studies (Kulikov 2018) showed that VOT and emphasis are linked in speech production: plain /t/ in Gulf Arabic is aspirated; emphatic /ṭ/ has short-lag VOT. Phonological theory predicts that plain /t/ should become more emphatic in emphatic context, which might reduce stop VOT as well. The current study investigates the effect of emphasis spread on VOT in word-initial coronal stops in Qatari Arabic. The stimuli, produced by sixteen native speakers of Qatari Arabic, contained target plain and emphatic stops /t/, /ṭ/ followed by short or long low vowel, and plain coronal obstruents /t, s, ð/ or their emphatic counterparts /ṭ, ṣ, ð̣/. The acoustic analysis included measurements of VOT and spectral mean of burst in the stop, and F1, F2, F3 frequencies at the vowel beginning, middle and end. The results showed that final emphatic obstruent triggered emphasis spread across the syllable. The effect of emphasis on the vowel was stronger next to the emphatic obstruent (p < .01). Spectral mean of burst in plain /t/ was lower in the emphatic context (D = 276 Hz, p = .05). VOT, however, was not affected by emphasis spread. Plain /t/ had long-lag VOT averaging 52 ms; emphatic /ṭ/ had short-lag VOT averaging 17 ms. These values were not different in emphatic context (p = .743). The findings demonstrate that emphasis spread within a syllable affects only spectral characteristics of a coronal stop. Emphaticness of plain /t/ did not affect its VOT and did not result in complete transformation of the stop category

Vowel Acoustics and Speech Intelligibility in Young Adults With Down Syndrome

Purpose Speech production deficits and reduced intelligibility are frequently noted in individuals with Down syndrome (DS) and are attributed to a combination of several factors. This study reports acoustic data on vowel production in young adults with DS and relates these findings to perceptual analysis of speech intelligibility. Method Participants were eight young adults with DS as well as eight age- and gender-matched typically developing (TD) controls. Several different acoustic measures of vowel centralization and variability were applied to tokens of corner vowels (/ɑ/, /æ/, /i/, /u/) produced in common English words. Intelligibility was assessed for single-word productions of speakers with DS, by means of transcriptions from 14 adult listeners. Results Group differentiation was found for some, but not all, of the acoustic measures. Low vowels were more acoustically centralized and variable in speakers with DS than TD controls. Acoustic findings were associated with overall intelligibility scores. Vowel formant dispersion was the most sensitive measure in distinguishing DS and TD formant data. Conclusion Corner vowels are differentially affected in speakers with DS. The acoustic characterization of vowel production and its association with speech intelligibility scores within the DS group support the conclusion of motor control deficits in the overall speech impairment. Implications are discussed for effective treatment planning.

Morpheme dislocation in Eastern Andalusian Spanish plurals

This paper examines whether the morpheme of plurality has shifted from word-final to word-initial syllable in Eastern Andalusian Spanish. This would be explained by word-medial vowel lowering caused by vowel harmony, which extends leftwards from the vowel preceding deleted /-s/ up to the stressed vowel. Two experiments are performed: (1) Eastern Andalusian speakers have to decide if each item is singular or plural by listening to the first syllable of paroxytone disyllabic words; (2) Paroxytone disyllabic words are manipulated and the first syllable is taken from a singular word and the second syllable from its plural, and vice versa; the participants have to categorise each item as singular or plural. An analysis of 4503 answers shows that these speakers can identify singular /ˈCV.CV/ words by listening to the first syllable only when the first syllable contains /e/ or /o/ and plural only when the first syllable contains /o/; they can identify singular /ˈCVC.CV/ words when the first syllable contains /o/, /i/ or /u/ and plurals when they contain /e/ or /o/. The morpheme of plurality has not shifted completely to word-initial syllable but it is hypothesised that there is a shift currently underway and that this is more advanced for /e/ and /o/.

廣州語 文白異讀 글자들의 특징에 관한 고찰

The literary reading and colloquial reading are divided into literary pronunciation and colloquial pronunciation in the same character. In general, literary reading is used for reading, and colloquial reading is used for speaking. However, literary reading and colloquial reading are not clearly distinguished in the Cantonese Dialect. So the pronunciations of these two types are mixed in spoken language. This study analyzed 127 characters from A Survey of Dialects in the Pearl River Delta and Hanyu Fangyan Zihui. Most of the literary reading and colloquial reading in the Cantonese Dialect are appeared in kāikǒuyīn, gěngshe sānděngyun, and gěngshesiděngyun characters. Kāikǒuyīn occupy 80%, and gěngshe sānděngyun, siděngyun occupy 42%. Literary reading and colloquial reading which are appeared in the Cantonese Dialect can be divided into three categories, that is initials, finals and tones. Quanzhuoshangshēng is divided into two types, one is lower departing tone in literary reading, and the other is lower rising tone in colloquial reading. Among them, lower departing tone reflects the phenomenon of ‘Quanzhuoshangguīqu’. In the finals, low vowels were turned into high vowels. For example, the vowels in zhǐshekāikǒu sānděngyun changed like [ɐ],[ɛ]→[e]→[i], yushehekǒu sānděngyun changed like [oe]→[o]→[y], and the vowels in gěngshekāikǒu sānděngyun, siděngyun changed like [a]→[ɛ]→[e].

More odd conditions? Voiced obstruents as triggers and suppressors in Miri, Sarawak

Miri, an Austronesian language spoken in northern Sarawak, Malaysia, has two sets of vowel changes that are conditioned by voiced obstruents. In the first set, a last-syllable low vowel is fronted and raised to [e], or less commonly [i], if a voiced obstruent appears earlier in the word, while a penultimate low vowel immediately following the trigger is skipped. In the second, a high vowel in the final syllable undergoes breaking (diphthongisation) or lowering, depending upon specific conditions, unless there is a voiced obstruent anywhere earlier in the word. For both triggers and suppressors, this effect is cancelled by an intervening blocking consonant, which includes any nasal or voiceless obstruent except glottal stop. The challenge is to understand why voiced obstruents have this double function, acting as a trigger with low vowels and a suppressor with high vowels, given the lack of an a priori transparent relationship between low vowel fronting and high vowel breaking/lowering.