Klaus J. Kohler University of Kiel, Germany

1. Speech Sounds, Speech Reduction, Speech Rhythm in the Transmission of Meaning Foundations of Communicative Phonetic Science Klaus J. Kohler University of Kiel, Germany Talk at the Institute of Linguistics of the Academia Sinica (ILAS) 15 August 2011

2. 1 Goals and principles of Phonetic Science • We speech scientists need to reflect on what we are doing • how does our daily routine work relate to scientific goals and principles of our subject? • are we asking the right questions to elucidate speech communication? • or playing highly competitive academic games? • This is what my talk is about • the foundations of a communicative phonetic science • in a discussion of the transmission of meaning in 3 time-honoured aras of phonetic study

3. speech sounds in words • their reduction in connected speech • their chaining to form rhythmic patterns

4. The subject matter of Phonetics • human speech, based on • the language faculty of homo sapiens • the socio-cultural systems of individual languages • dependent on a physical, acoustic carrier • generated by physiological and articulatory processes • for the transmission of communicative meaning from a speaker to a hearer

5. theories and methodologies • academic division between humanities and natural sciences • 2 approaches have shaped the study of speech • linguistics • speech signal analysis • good as long as converging on same ultimate goal • has hardly happened in speech science • phonology as a study field in the humanities • phonetics as a study field in the sciences

6. historical accident • speech measurement was developed • first instrumental and experimental phoneticians Rousselot his doctoral student and later director of the Phonetics Lab at Hamburg University Panconcelli-Calzia "Phonetik als Naturwissenschaft" (Berlin 1948)

7. "Phonetics is a part of physiology, like walking, running, jumping it belongs to the study of motion" (p. 8) "so, the former wild ear-phonetician, the philologus auricularius furibundus, has become ever more rare" (p.18)

8. the American psychologist Scripture "All scientifically valid statements concerning speech – like those concerning anthing else – are figurative or imaginary assemblages of words that have no real meaning except for the measurement-numbers they contain. There can be no science of speech that is not based on measurement-numbers. The 'nature of speech' is a summaryof these numbers…

9. The investigator might be – and preferably should be – congenitally deaf and totally ignorant of any notions concerning sound and speech. The entire statement of the results is confined to the measurement-numbers and their harmonies." Archives Néerlandaises de Phonétique Expérimentale 12: 1936.

10. this false objectivity was countered by phonology of the Prague Circle and the American Structuralists • who divided the study of speech • into a humanities subject phonology • and a science subject phonetics • this dichotomy has been with us ever since • it is a purely academic frame of reference • no reality in the speech communication process • equally uninteresting to devise interfaces between the two constructs • as in Laboratory Phonology

11. We need to start afresh • develop the study of speech as a unitary communicative speech science • which we should happily call PHONETICS • in which every speech phenomenon may be studied from 4 perspectives • that must converge on the central goal to understand how humans communicate meaning with speech in languages

12. auditory assessment and linguistic categorization • speech signal analysis • speech perception and understanding • communicative function • in a step-wise progression • from the isolated word and sentence • to complex phonetic patterns in speech interaction

13. This paper deals with 3 areas of phonetic study • phonetic sounds and phonemes for differentiation of lexical meaning in word citation • sound reduction (and elaboration) at the utterance level to index interactional meaning • rhythm in language and speech • a typology of stress and syllable timing • a guiding function in speech interaction.

14. 2 The study of segments in speech science auditory assessment and linguistic categorization • impressionistic sound classification according to IPA • auditory assessment by analytically trained ear • articulatory labels for consonants • auditory classification in relation to recordings of Cardinal Vowels • projection onto articulatory chart

16. Phonetic Association of China (JIPA 2011, Fang Hu)

17. Cardinal Vowel Chart

18. Phonetic Association of China (JIPA 2011, Fang Hu)

19. American English vowels IPA Handbook, p.42

20. Beijing vowels Wai-Sum Lee & Eric Zee, JIPA33 (2003)

21. transcription of sounds • grouping of sounds to phonemes • lexical differentiation • concept already in broad vs narrow transcription • typology of phoneme systems • Ian Maddieson • Eric Zee:"Vowel typology in Chinese", ICPhS 2007

22. these linguistic studies provide basic knowledge of the pronunciation of words in languages • pronouncing dictionaries • devising economical alphabetic writing systems for unwritten languages • dialectology • but little contribution to the phonetics of every-day spontaneous speech interaction in communicative settings

23. speech signal analysis • acoustic measurement of formants, usually F1/F2 • Peterson and Barney 1952

24. mixture of dialects, male-female, adult-child • perceptual equivalence not clear • filling phonological categories with (acoustic) substance • similar studies for other languages • e.g. Hong Kong Cantonese vowels LEE Wai-Sum, PCC2008 • separation of gender and age • but still only vowels in isolated words • we have limited information on physical manifestation of vowels in speech interaction

25. LEE Wai-Sum, PCC2008

26. speech perception and understanding • in these F1/F2 measurements the relationship between acoustic variability and the perception of the “same sound” category remains opaque • Traunmüller, Stockholm, changed vowel perception along different dimensions, starting from natural [i] production

27. raising 1st formant changes vowel height 1-Bark steps, starting at 2.5 Bark

28. raising first formant and f0 in unison • 1-Bark steps, f0 starting at 1.5 Bark • changes vocal effort; keeps same vowel quality

29. raising f0 and all formants in unison, 1-Bark steps • changes speaker size, keeps same vowel quality

30. These examples show • acoustic data have no value in themselves • particularly when reduced to F1/F2 in vowels • unless they are related to perception • not insightful to ask what the F1/F2 values are for the vowel phonemes of a language

31. Here is an example of misguided data interpretation on the basis of restricted F1/F2 measurements. • J. Harrington, S. Palethorpe, C. I. Watson Does the Queen speak the Queen’s English? Nature 408, 927-928 (2000). Monphthongal vowel changes in Received Prounuciation: an acoustic analysis of the Queen’s Christmas Broadcasts. JIPA 30, 63-78 (2000). • J. Harrington. An acoustic analysis of ‘happy tensing’ in the Queen’s Christmas broadcasts. JPhon 3, 439-457 (2006).

32. Researchers like John Wells describedchanges in monophthongsofyounger RP speakers on thebasisofmainlyauditoryfamiliaritywith SSB • e.g. greateropeningof[Q] infamily > CV4 • orclosing, tensingof final unstressed[I] in happy > [iù] • Harrington pickedupthisdescriptivephoneticthread • woveitinto an investigationofsociophoneticchange • by a spectral F1/F2 analysisofthemonophthongs

33. He startedfromthefollowingquestion/premisses: • Does Queen Elizabeth II, therepresentativeofthe RP establishment, followthistrend in her Christmas broadcastssince 1952, whenthoseofthe 50s, the 80s andthe 90s arecompared? • If so, thiswouldindicate“a drift in the Queen’s accent towards one that is characteristic of speakers who are younger and/or lower in the social hierarchy” (Nature) • Thusthequestionbecomesoneofsocialchange. • The answertothisquestioncanbegivenby F1/F2 measurementindependentofauditoryassessment.

34. The analysis rests on two highly dubious assumptions • that change in a speaker’s accent can be measured by looking at selected segments in selected words • phonetic variation in the “same” phonemes • narrowed down to a sub-class of vowels • excised and thus treated as context-free • that F1 and F2 reflect the articulatory parameters low/high and front/back, respectively

35. An upper-class English army officer does not sound like one because of the way he pronounces certain phonemic segments but because of his general basis of articulation, his voice quality, his prosodic patterns. General Sir Mike Jackson • Similarly, the Queen sounds like the young sovereign of the 50s or the older sovereign of later decades, especially because of drastic differences in pitch level. • 1957: above 200Hz up to 450 Hz • 2008: between 180 Hz and 250 Hz 1957 2008

36. This large pitch change has two consequencies for the determination of vowel quality • Traunmüller’s studies show that perceptual quality of vowel height is determined by the distance between f0 and F1 • thus acoustic F1 measurements do not represent a speaker’s vowels adequately • they need a complementary auditory evaluation • high f0 makes the analysis of F1 in high vowels very difficult and unrealiable.

37. Consequently H.’s conclusion that final [I] iscloser to [iù] in the 90s than in the 50s on account of lower F1 should not be derived from his data. • On the contrary, auditory comparison of the vowels in the two data sets proves that the conclusion is wrong • this vowel has not changed as a perceptual entity • F1 measurements give the wrong picture • the result is a statistical artefact • problem of context-free treatment of vowels.

38. Itbecomes evident whenthecontextofthewordhappy in a Christmas broadcast is considered • Happy Christmas • thetonguecontinuestomoveuptocompleteclosurefor [k] • consequently[I] in this context must be expected to be higher than in e.g. happy family, or phrase-final in, e.g., happy, and united family,or even sentence-final in tremendously happy • the different contextsshouldthus not beconflated

39. happy_1958fin-1957chr.wav happy_1997fin-2008chr.wav happy_1958fin-1997fin.wav happy_1957chr-2008chr.wav • These datashowtwothings • theauditoryqualityof[I] is contextually conditioned • closer before[k] – opener phrase-final • the 50s and 90s dataareperceptuallycongruent.

40. Further contextual conditions are to be expected for this and all the other [I] words analysed • the frequencies of occurrence of these various conditions will vary across the two data sets • but F1 averages in each set are computed for all the [I] words, irrespective of phonetic contexts • therefore acoustic measurement without auditory control can produce differences one way or the other • the result then becomes a statistical artefact.

41. The noteworthy change in the Queen’s speech is • not a move towards sound features of younger and more middle-class speakers of RP • but a lowering of her pitch level • occurring in the 60s • not due to ageing • but in a deliberate effort to overcome her former girlish voice and to sound more authoritative • no doubt with help from advisers

42. From this perspective, changes in the Queen’s speech do not reflect social changes in Britain in the 60s • as H. suggests • and as the press marketed his study e.g. the Telegraph website 21 February 2007 “Is the Queen’s English now more common?” “How Queen’s English has grown more like ours” • the exact opposite seems to be the case transmitting authority to her subjects • So, speech scientists should be more careful in their acoustic analyses and their sociophonetic deductions.

43. communicative function • even when physical measures are related to linguistic categories via the listener • more variability needs to be considered for the modelling of speech communication • we need to transcend the isolated sound and the phoneme in word citation forms • and look at sound patterns in utterances • these patterns are determined by stylistic and communicative functions

44. Francis Nolan "Overview of English Connected Speech Processes" AIPUK 31 (1996) • orthographic I don't suppose you could make it for eighteen hundred • word pronunciations ÈaI Èd«Unt s«ÈpH«Uz Èjuù ÈkHUd ÈmeIkH ÈIt Èfù ÈeItHiùn ÈhÃnd¨«d

45. careful aI Èd«Unt s«ÈpH«Uz jukHUd ÈmeIk+Hit fù¨ ÈeItHiùn ÈhÃnd¨«d • natural Œ Èd«Unsp«Uü«x«b ÈmeIx+Ipf«¨ ÈeIt4iùn ÈhÃnd¨«d • casual Èmsp«Uüx«b ÈmeIx+I8 Èf¨8eIt4iùn ÈhÃn4¨«d

46. Examplefrom American English: N. Warner’swww • “I don‘tevenknowwhatwe‘regonna do.” • [E_ n i)v)«) ÈnU ¨J«n« Èdu_Uù] • canonicalwordtranscription [aIdoUntHiùv«nÈnoU hwt wI¨ g«n«Èdu_Uù]

48. These phrase-phonetic patterns are regular in relation to communicative situations • and can go even further • Sarah Hawkins & Rachel Smith "Polysp: a polysytemic, phonetically rich approach to speech understanding", Italian Journal of Linguistics, 13 (2002) • conveying the meaning of I DO NOT KNOW • I don't know 2 speakers • (I) dunno 2 speakers

49. 2 expanded forms, different kinds of exasperation • 2 forms reduced to dynamically changing vocalic resonances, rudiments of three syllables • from more open to less open • with increasing lip narrowing • most extreme form can be «)4«)«)3¦ • not slurred drunken speech • but casual speech when otherwise occupied

50. These stylistic sound patterns in relation to communicative function are far from well described • there are only very few languages for which we have some communicative realization rules • English • even more so for German, due to work at Kiel • and how listeners are able to decode such variously degraded speech successfully is an open question • not just a matter of surface signal perception • but top-down interpretation within the communicative situation