Tonal Characteristics Research Articles

Improving Mispronunciation Detection of Mandarin Tones for Non-Native Learners With Soft-Target Tone Labels and BLSTM-Based Deep Tone Models

We investigate the effectiveness of soft-target tone labels and sequential context information for mispronunciation detection of Mandarin lexical tones pronounced by second language (L2) learners whose first language (L1) is of European origin. In conventional approaches, prosodic information (e.g., F0 and tone posteriors extracted from trained tone models) is used to calculate goodness of pronunciation (GOP) scores or train binary classifiers to verify pronunciation correctness. We propose three techniques to improve detection of mispronunciation of Mandarin tones for non-native learners. First, we extend our tone model from a deep neural network (DNN) to a bidirectional long short-term memory (BLSTM) network in order to more accurately model the high variability of non-native tone productions and the contextual information expressed in tone-level co-articulation. Second, we characterize ambiguous pronunciations where L2 learners’ tone realizations are between two canonical tone categories by relaxing hard target labels to soft targets with probabilistic transcriptions. Third, segmental tone features fed into verifiers are extracted by a BLSTM to exploit sequential context information to improve mispronunciation detection. Compared to DNN-GOP trained with hard targets, the proposed BLSTM-GOP framework trained with soft targets reduces the tones’ averaged equal error rate (ERR) from 7.58% to 5.83% and the averaged area under ROC curve (AUC) is increased from 97.85% to 98.31%. By utilizing BLSTM-based verifiers the EER further decreases to 5.16%, and the AUC is increased to 98.47%.

ФОРМУВАННЯ ТЕХНІКИ МОВЛЕННЯ ЯК УМОВА РОЗВИТКУ МОВЛЕННЄВОЇ МАЙСТЕРНОСТІ СТУДЕНТІВ

The formation of students' speech skills is a very important problem of pedagogical education. This is especially true for students who have a related profession to acting - future teachers. After all, the task of teachers is to positively influence the consciousness of the younger generation for the education of socially active citizens, conscious, responsible individuals, creators of a better future for our society.The technique of the teacher's speech is a basic component of professional skill, which is associated with the formation and manifestation of the pedagogical voice, phonation breathing, clear diction and is a means of pedagogical influence. All elements of speech technique in pedagogical speech as one of the types of professional activity are realized.The dominant element of speech technique is the voice. It provides intonation, the creation of adequate to the design of the tonal characteristics of a particular expression. It is a professional "tool" of the teacher.The pedagogical voice is a professionally formed voice, which fully provides the sound range of pedagogical communication. Its features are: high volume, wide dynamic and pitch range, variety of timbres, melodiousness, adaptability, suggestiveness, volatility, noise resistance, flexibility, stability, endurance, it reveals the specifics of other professional voices and complements a number of professional voices - vocal voice, team voice, stage (acting) voice, narrator's voice.The first condition for the development of speech skills in the process of professional training of students is - the successful functioning of technology, i.e. the intensity of learning speech techniques in order to translate actions-exercises into pedagogical skills.It can be realized on the principle of differentiated selection of theoretical material, as a material "practically working", i.e. "serving" certain skills. Only information is selected that helps to understand the essence of the exercises and the technique of their implementation, and which will help in the independent work of the student.Thus, the theoretical consideration of the components of speech technique and awareness of their features create conditions for the development of the necessary techniques, technologies aimed at the formation of speech skills.The second condition is communicativeness, understood as the inclusion of exercises in the real practice of communication of the teacher in order to obtain constant feedback.Calling speech technique a component of communicativeness, we thus emphasize that all preparatory work should be based on achieving a high level of communication efficiency, when the exchange of information between interlocutors is carried out with minimal effort, and it is clear what, to whom and for what purpose (with what intentions) said.The real functioning of breathing, articulation and voice, in a communicative act, ensuring optimal pedagogical communication at the level of oral (acoustic) interaction; bringing to a professional level: "polishing" the voice, diction, breathing in different pedagogical situations, in direct contact with students, their parents and colleagues. - This is the main task of the teacher-educator, which must be solved and why it is necessary to learn.The third condition for the successful implementation of learning technologies is the organization of independent work on speech technique. Each methodical technique is implemented in specific exercises, which are selected depending on the individual characteristics of the performer.To consolidate the speech skills, the basis of which is laid in the classroom, it is necessary for students to train the language apparatus. Work on daily exercises for the development of combined breathing, clear pronunciation of sounds and sound combinations. Constant control over the sound quality of the voice and the clarity and standardization of speech should become a common process in the structure of professional training of speech skills of future teachers.For a professional, harmonious, meaningful interaction of the teacher with the audience, it is necessary to know and master the technique of speech action, this is the fourth condition.There is an important connection - if the teacher speaks well, diction is clear, expressive, voice, speech are melodious - then the listeners hear him/her well. If he/she has a beautiful timbre range, "paints with the voice of thought" - teacher is well understood. If the teacher is inspired, clearly intones, using the bright subtext of a living word empathizing with what is said, then the listeners feel the speaker, worried with him/her.Accordingly, the external technique of speech action provides the opportunity to hear the word, understand and feel. Namely, this is the basis of the art of speech - the speech skills of the teacher, a manifestation of intelligence, education and respect for students.Thus, the formation of speech technique in students, future teachers is a leading condition for the development of speech skills, communication in professional activities.

Intonational phonology of Boro

The pitch contour of an utterance in a tone language can surface with both tonal and intonational f0 features. In this paper we set out to analyze the intonational phonology of Boro, a tone language, and establish that there are three levels of prosodic constituents in Boro: Prosodic Word, ip and IP. Prosodic Word is the domain for distribution of lexical tones. Phonological processes show that the next higher level of prosodic structure is that of the intermediate phrase. Downstepping is within intermediate phrases (ip) and does not cross ips. The highest level of prosodic constituency is the IP which is marked by both initial and final boundary tones. This study shows that in Boro intonational phonology, boundary tones and their scaling and alignment in the context of their lexical tones is more important than assigning pitch accents.

Cosmogonic and anthropogenic myths in Sui oral literature

This article provides a brief and selective introduction to the Sui oral literature, thematically limited to cosmogonic and anthropogenic myths. An essential description is provided of the Sui living in southernChina, mainly in rural areas of the southwestern region ofGuizhouProvince, their society, numbering 400 thousand people many of whom still preserve indigenous customs and traditions, and their language which, as other members of the Kam-Sui branch of the Tai-Kadai family, possess analytic, isolating and tonal features. The description is followed by an explanation of the most popular motifs of the Sui oral literature, many of which are shared with neighbouring ethnic groups. Separate paragraphs are also dedicated to the genres and structural characteristics of Sui oral literature that have a special social function as the repository of people’s collective memory. The literature is exemplified through fragments of two songs recorded in Li Fanggui’s Studies on the Sui Language (1966), accompanied by English glosses and poetic renderings. The latter constitute the first attempt to translate Sui literature while preserving its syllabic structure and rhymes.

МЕТОДОЛОГІЧНІ ОСНОВИ ПРОВЕДЕННЯ ЕКСПЕРИМЕНТАЛЬНО-ФОНЕТИЧНОГО ДОСЛІДЖЕННЯ ФОНОСЕМАНТИЧНИХ КОМПЛЕКСІВ В СУЧАСНОМУ АНГЛОМОВНОМУ ХУДОЖНЬОМУ КІНОДИСКУРСІ


 
 
 This paper deals with the methodology of experimental research of phonosemantics complexes that are able to actualize the emotional function in modern English film discourse. It is claimed that such type of investigation must be held by means of perceptual and acoustic analyses. The article contains the program of investigation, its main stages including corpus, participants (auditors- informants and auditors-phoneticians), and their tasks. Acoustic analysis was directed on proving the results of perceptive analyses by counting and evaluation of tonal, dynamic and temporal characteristics. The given methodological grounds create a fundamental basis for investigation of phonosemantic means and complexes of modern English motion pictures.
 
 

FOCALIZATION AS LINGUISTIC PHENOMENON

The article reveals the principal notions of focalization, its functions and features (emphasis and contrast) and their influence on transforming the model of the prosodic structure of the actual division of the utterance. Most frequently, focalization of a text fragment is prosodically expressed with a high register and extension of the tonal range, a raised loudness and a distinct pronunciation. It is established that one of the most well-known factors of the transformation of the prototype prosodic model is the listener’s focus on the most important aspects of the message, the conveyance of the semantic interaction of the message’s specific aspects. Focalization is interwoven with the both possible manifestations of this function: logical stress (in case of the opposition of words) or emphatic stress is implemented by its means. Regarding the changes in the tone direction, it should be noted that this tonal feature does not participate directly in forming an intonation model of the discourse’s focalized structures. It has been observed that there exists a certain modification of the tonal contour formed under the influence of the illocutionary and phase factors and certain types of the subjective-modal meanings. Key words: emphasis, opposition, focalization, actual division of the utterance, theme, rheme.

A study on vibration of Setar: stringed Persian musical instrument

Knowing how a musical instrument vibrates can benefit the tonal characteristics shaping of the instrument. In this research, an approach for investigating the mode shapes and natural frequencies of Setar body is addressed. First, mechanical properties of wood used in the production of Setar are analyzed experimentally. Then a numerical modal test is performed to find the mode shapes and natural frequencies of Setar structure. To validate the results obtained by the numerical method, experimental modal testing is also done for the structure, and it is found that the results of both the methods are in good consistency. As the vibration pattern of plates is of utmost importance in the production of musical instruments, vibration patterns of a Setar plate are experimentally extracted and the results are compared with finite element analysis.

Identifying the distinctive acoustic cues of Mandarin tones

Using mathematical modeling, this study aims to characterize distinctive acoustic features of Mandarin tones based on a corpus of 1013 monosyllabic words produced by 21 native Mandarin speakers. For each tone, 22 acoustic cues were extracted. Besides standard F0, duration, and intensity measures, further cues were determined by fitting two mathematical models to the pitch contours. The first is a broken-line model, which models the contour as a continuous curve consisting of two lines with a single breakpoint. The second model is a parabola, which gives three parameters: a mean F0, an F0 slope, and an F0 curvature. Using Cohen’s d, we identify which of the 22 cues are important for distinguishing each tone from the others for all speakers, as well as identifying cues that are used idiosyncratically by particular speakers. Although the specific cues that best characterize each tone differ, we show that the three cues obtained by fitting a parabola to the tone contour are an effective small set of cues such that any pair of tones is well distinguished by at least one of them. We propose using these three cues as a canonical choice for defining tone characteristics.

Robust emotion recognition from speech: Gamma tone features and models

Affective computing is gaining paramount importance in ensuring the better and effective human–machine interaction. As glottal and speech signals depict the characteristics of the emotional nature of the speaker in addition to the linguistic information, speaker’s emotions are needed to be recognised to give meaningful response by the system. This paper emphasises the effectiveness and efficiency in selecting the energy features by passing the speech through the Gamma tone filters spaced in Equivalent rectangular bandwidth (ERB), MEL and BARK scale. Various modelling techniques are used to develop the robust multi-speaker independent speaker’s emotion/stress recognition system. Since EMO-DB Berlin database and SAVEE emotional audio-visual database used in this work contain the only limited set of speech utterances uttered by 10/4 actors/speakers in different emotions, it has become challenging to improve the performance of the stress/emotion recognition system. Speaker independent emotion recognition is done by extracting the Gamma tone energy features and cepstral features by passing the concatenated speech considered for training through the Gamma tone filters spaced in ERB, MEL and BARK scales. Subsequently, VQ/Fuzzy clustering models and continuous density hidden Markov models are created for all emotions and evaluation is done with the utterances of a speaker independent of speeches considered for training. The proposed features for test utterances are captured and applied to the VQ/Fuzzy/MHMM/SVM models and testing is performed by using minimum distance criterion/maximum log-likelihood criterion. The proposed Gamma tone energy/cepstral features and modelling techniques provide complementary evidence in assessing the performance of the system. This algorithm offers 96%, 79%, and 95.3% as weighted accuracy recall for the stress recognition system with respect to the classification done on emotion-specific group VQ/Fuzzy/MHMM/SVM models for GTF energy features with Gamma tone filters spaced in ERB, MEL and BARK scale respectively for the system evaluated for the EMO-DB database. Weighted accuracy recall is found to be 91%, 93% and 94% for the classification done on emotion-specific group models for GTF energy features with Gamma tone filters spaced in ERB, MEL and BARK scale respectively for the evaluation done on the utterances chosen from the SAVEE database. Gamma tone Cepstral features provide the overall accuracy of 92%, 90% and 92% for filters spaced in ERB, MEL and BARK scale for Berlin EMO-DB. Decision level fusion classification based on GTF energy features and modelling techniques provides the overall accuracy as 99.8% for EO-DB database and 100% for SAVEE database.

RETRACTED: Fuzzy clustering based self-organizing neural network for real time evaluation of wind music

Abstract In order to improve the effectiveness of the evaluation of the form of Western wind music, this paper proposes a method for evaluating the form of Western wind music based on self-organizing neural network. First of all, aiming at the problem of Western form of wind music art presentation, this paper formulates a set of objective criteria that can be quantitatively expressed, and introduces the extraction methods of western wind tone features. Secondly, this paper considers the use of a fuzzy clustering method of constructing a self-organizing neural model for the proposed evaluation matrix to achieve the classification and evaluation of the artistic presentation of western wind music. Finally, an example is used to verify the validity of the proposed self-organizing neural model in the evaluation of the presentation form of western wind music.

MULTI-FEATURE-MARKS BASED INFORMATION EXTRACTION OF URBAN GREEN SPACE ALONG ROAD

Abstract. Green space along road of QuickBird image was studied in this paper based on multi-feature-marks in frequency domain. The magnitude spectrum of green along road was analysed, and the recognition marks of the tonal feature, contour feature and the road were built up by the distribution of frequency channels. Gabor filters in frequency domain were used to detect the features based on the recognition marks built up. The detected features were combined as the multi-feature-marks, and watershed based image segmentation were conducted to complete the extraction of green space along roads. The segmentation results were evaluated by Fmeasure with P = 0.7605，R = 0.7639，F = 0.7622.

Influence of Impinging Wall Ramping Modification on the Flow Field of Open Cavity at M = 2.0

Studies were made to understand the flow features around an open cavity at Mach 2.0 corresponding to Re = 0.55 × 106 based on the cavity depth. Experiments were carried out using a blowdown type supersonic wind tunnel having a test section size of 50 mm × 100 mm. Oil flow and schlieren flow visualization were made to understand the steady flow features inside the cavity. Unsteady pressures were measured at several locations to obtain the fluctuating flow field details and the pressure spectrum. Impinging wall modifications of the cavity were made with an objective to reduce the Rossiter's mode frequencies and its amplitude. Partial ramping of the impinging wall with variations in height and angles were made. With adoption of a specific combination of the impinging wall height and angle, the first two modes of the multiple tonal characteristics could be reduced significantly. The present adopted method could result in 74% reduction of root-mean-square (RMS) pressure and a noise reduction of 11 dB.

Investigating style evolution of Western classical music: A computational approach

In musicology, there has been a long debate about a meaningful partitioning and description of music history regarding composition styles. Particularly, concepts of historical periods have been criticized since they cannot account for the continuous and interwoven evolution of style. To systematically study this evolution, large corpora are necessary suggesting the use of computational strategies. This article presents such strategies and experiments relying on a dataset of 2000 audio recordings, which cover more than 300 years of music history. From the recordings, we extract different tonal features. We propose a method to visualize these features over the course of history using evolution curves. With the curves, we re-trace hypotheses concerning the evolution of chord transitions, intervals, and tonal complexity. Furthermore, we perform unsupervised clustering of recordings across composition years, individual pieces, and composers. In these studies, we found independent evidence of historical periods that broadly agrees with traditional views as well as recent data-driven experiments. This shows that computational experiments can provide novel insights into the evolution of styles.

Improving Mandarin Tone Recognition Based on DNN by Combining Acoustic and Articulatory Features Using Extended Recognition Networks

In this paper, we investigate the effectiveness of articulatory information for Mandarin tone modeling and recognition in a deep neural network – hidden Markov model (DNN-HMM) framework. In conventional approaches, prosodic evidence (e.g., F0, duration and energy) is used to build tone classifiers, we here propose performance enhancement techniques in three areas: (i) adding articulatory features (AFs) and acoustic features, such as MFCCs (Mel frequency cepstrum coefficients), for tone modeling; (ii) adopting phone-dependent tone modeling; and (iii) using tone-based extended recognition network (ERN) to reduce the tone search space. The first approach is feature-related, it explicitly employs the AFs as a form of tonal features and is implemented through a multi-stage procedure. The second approach is model-related and directly extends to phone-dependent tone modeling so that each modeling unit (e.g., tonal phone) not only contains tone information, but also integrates the phone/articulatory information. Finally, the third technique is search-related with a phone-dependent tone-based expanding searching network. A series of comprehensive experiments is conducted using different input feature sets. It is demonstrated that (i) tone recognition accuracy is boosted by incorporating articulatory information, and (ii) ERN, attains the lowest tone error rate of 7.17%, with a 56% relative error reduction from the prosody-only baseline system error of 16.36%.

The Big Lebowski; or, Abiding with Sisyphus

This essay on Joel and Ethan Coen’s cult film, The Big Lebowski (1998), proposes that one way of accounting for its narrative, stylistic, and tonal characteristics is to see the filmmakers’ perspective as determined, above all, by the sense of the absurd as elaborated by Albert Camus. This relation is explored, among other things, by considering the Coen brothers’ play with the genres of film noir and the Western in The Big Lebowski; although I also indicate how such a reading requires that Camus’s seminal concept to some extent be qualified with reference to Michel de Certeau’s notion of ‘making do’.

Vietnamese Tones Produced by Australian Vietnamese Speakers

This paper reports an acoustic study that examined the tonal features of Vietnamese language used by the Vietnamese community in Australia. The target of this examination is the comparative analysis of the phonetic characteristics of tones produced by Vietnamese in Australia and in Vietnam. Tones produced by young (n=10) and older (n=10) Vietnamese Australians residing in Brisbane, Australia, were acoustically examined and compared with those produced by corresponding young (n=10) and older (n=10) Vietnamese residing in either Ho Chi Minh City or Can Tho City, Vietnam. The results showed that the main patterns of mispronunciation of tones by the young Vietnamese in Australia (YVA) include (i) confusing tones that are in the same registers or/and have similar characteristics, (ii) the tendency to pronounce complicated tones as simple tones, and (iii) confusing the diacritics marking tones. By “mispronunciation”, we mean the differences in tones used in Brisbane, Australia from the tones used in Vietnam. This study also examined the frequency of the contour of all tones produced by all four groups. The results show significant differences in terms of the frequency and distribution of irregular and common tone contours between the YVA group and the three other groups, suggesting that the YVA group failed to produce the tones correctly or did not reach the required standard of tone production of contemporary Southern Vietnamese. In addition, the findings with respect to tone contours showed that the tonal range of the YVA group is narrower than that of the other three groups.

Cooperative cortical network for categorical processing of Chinese lexical tone

In tonal languages such as Chinese, lexical tone with varying pitch contours serves as a key feature to provide contrast in word meaning. Similar to phoneme processing, behavioral studies have suggested that Chinese tone is categorically perceived. However, its underlying neural mechanism remains poorly understood. By conducting cortical surface recordings in surgical patients, we revealed a cooperative cortical network along with its dynamics responsible for this categorical perception. Based on an oddball paradigm, we found amplified neural dissimilarity between cross-category tone pairs, rather than between within-category tone pairs, over cortical sites covering both the ventral and dorsal streams of speech processing. The bilateral superior temporal gyrus (STG) and the middle temporal gyrus (MTG) exhibited increased response latencies and enlarged neural dissimilarity, suggesting a ventral hierarchy that gradually differentiates the acoustic features of lexical tones. In addition, the bilateral motor cortices were also found to be involved in categorical processing, interacting with both the STG and the MTG and exhibiting a response latency in between. Moreover, the motor cortex received enhanced Granger causal influence from the semantic hub, the anterior temporal lobe, in the right hemisphere. These unique data suggest that there exists a distributed cooperative cortical network supporting the categorical processing of lexical tone in tonal language speakers, not only encompassing a bilateral temporal hierarchy that is shared by categorical processing of phonemes but also involving intensive speech-motor interactions over the right hemisphere, which might be the unique machinery responsible for the reliable discrimination of tone identities.

Heavy metal incorporated helium ion active hybrid non-chemically amplified resists: Nano-patterning with low line edge roughness

Helium (He) ion lithography is being considered as one of the most promising and emerging technology for the manufacturing of next generation integrated circuits (ICs) at nanolevel. However, He-ion active resists are rarely reported. In this context, we are introducing a new non-chemically amplified hybrid resist (n-CAR), MAPDSA-MAPDST, for high resolution He-ion beam lithography (HBL) applications. In the resist architecture, 2.15 % antimony is incorporated as heavy metal in the form of antimonate. This newly developed resists has successfully used for patterning 20 nm negative tone features at a dose of 60 μC/cm2. The resist offered very low line edge roughness (1.27±0.31 nm) for 20 nm line features. To our knowledge, this is the first He-ion active hybrid resist for nanopatterning. The contrast (γ) and sensitivity (E0) of this resist were calculated from the contrast curve as 0.73 and 7.2 μC/cm2, respectively.

Tonal characteristics of saxophone mouthpieces: A comparison

The tonal characteristics of five different types of mouthpieces for the tenor saxophone will be compared. The mouthpieces are all widely available and used by present-day musicians; some are designed and marketed for general use and others are intended for specific musical styles or performance situations. Frequency spectra will be presented for each mouthpiece, and results will be discussed relative to the design features of each. Analytical data are in turn compared to the results of a survey among listeners seeking descriptive terms for the tonal characteristics produced.

Assessing tones in refrigeration and air-conditioning equipment

AHRI 1140 is a procedure for assessing the quality of sound for air-conditioning and refrigeration equipment. The procedure is based on work by Wells and Blazier in 1963 and jury listening tests by Penn State in 2001. This standard describes the measurements and calculations needed to determine the Sound Quality Index (SQI). The AHRI Technical Committee on Sound (TCoS) conducted informal surveying of manufacturing, design and consulting engineers which failed to identify any active users of SQI. TCoS has begun editing this standard in order to make it meaningful in identifying sound quality problems in a way that is useful to consultants and design engineers while being practical for manufacturers to adopt. The current effort is intended define a metric which will quantify the tonal characteristics of refrigeration and air-conditioning equipment. This presentation will briefly cover SQI and why TCoS believes SQI failed to achieve adoption. Additional tonal metrics will be reviewed, and potential difficulties with the existing metrics will be discussed. Most importantly, half of the presentation time will be used to allow audience feedback and suggestions.