School of Languages and Linguistics - Research Publications
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ItemThe Pacific Expansion: Optimizing phonetic transcription of archival corpora(ISCA-INT SPEECH COMMUNICATION ASSOC, 2021)For most of the world’s languages, detailed phonetic analyses across different aspects of the sound system do not exist, due in part to limitations in available speech data and tools for efficiently processing such data for low-resource languages. Archival language documentation collections offer opportunities to extend the scope and scale of phonetic research on low-resource languages, and developments in methods for automatic recognition and alignment of speech facilitate the preparation of phonetic corpora based on these collections. We present a case study applying speech modelling and forced alignment methods to narrative data for Nafsan, an Oceanic language of central Vanuatu. We examine the accuracy of the forced-aligned phonetic labelling based on limited speech data used in the modelling process, and compare acoustic and durational measures of 17,851 vowel tokens for 11 speakers with previous experimental phonetic data for Nafsan. Results point to the suitability of archival data for large-scale studies of phonetic variation in low-resource languages, and also suggest that this approach can feasibly be used as a starting point in expanding to phonetic comparisons across closely-related Oceanic languages.
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ItemNo Preview AvailableSustainable data from digital research(Custom Book Centre, University of Melbourne, 2011)
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ItemPhonetic evidence for phonotactic change in Nafsan (South Efate)(Pacini Editore SpA, 2020)Nafsan, an Oceanic language of central Vanuatu, is notable for the complex phonotactic structures it exhibits compared to languages spoken further to the north, and compared to the general preference for CV syllables among Oceanic languages. Various types of heterorganic consonant clusters are found in syllable onsets, and are thought to have arisen from the loss of selected medial vowels. Medial vowel deletion is suggested to be a process of change which has been underway for some time in the language, but the details of how this process operates have not been fully clear. Unresolved questions relating to the status of length in the vowel system and the location of lexical prominence have posed a challenge to arriving at a detailed description of vowel deletion and its consequences. Drawing together recent phonetic analyses and previous work, this paper provides an overview of phonotactic structures in contemporary Nafsan and outlines the main factors which lead to the deletion of medial vowels and result in the complex syllable onsets observed today.
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ItemAcoustic evidence for right-edge prominence in Nafsan(AIP Publishing LLC, 2020)Oceanic languages are often described as preferring primary stress on penultimate syllables, but detailed surveys show that many different types of prominence patterns have been reported across and within Oceanic language families. In some cases, these interact with segmental and phonotactic factors, such as syllable weight. The range of Oceanic prominence patterns is exemplified across Vanuatu, a linguistically diverse archipelago with over 130 languages. However, both impressionistic and instrumentally-based descriptions of prosodic patterns and their correlates are limited for languages of this region. This paper investigates prominence in Nafsan, an Oceanic language of Vanuatu for which previous observations of prominence differ. Acoustic and durational results for disyllabic and trisyllabic Nafsan words show a clear pattern of higher fundamental frequency values in final syllables, regardless of vowel length, pointing towards a preference for prominence at the right edge of words. Short vowels also show centralisation in penultimate syllables, providing supporting evidence for right-edge prominence and informing the understanding of vowel deletion processes in Nafsan.
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ItemBuilding capacity for community-led documentation in Erakor, Vanuatu(Wydawnictwo Nauka i Innowacje, 2019)Close collaboration between community members and visiting researchers offers mutual benefits, including opportunities for new research insights and an expanded scope for supporting language maintenance and developing practical materials. We discuss a collaboration in Erakor, Vanuatu aiming to build the capacity of community-based researchers to undertake and sustain language and cultural documentation projects. We focus on the technical and procedural skills required to collect, manage, and work with audio and video data, and give an overview of the outcomes of a community-led project after initial training. We discuss the benefits and challenges of this type of project from the perspective of the community researchers and the external linguists. We show that the community-led project in Erakor, in which data management and archiving are incorporated into the documentation process, has crucial benefits for both the community and the linguists. Two most salient benefits are: a) long-term documentation of linguistic and cultural practices calibrated towards community’s needs, and b) collections of large quantities of data of good phonetic quality, which, besides being readily available for research, have a great potential for training and testing emerging language technologies based on machine learning.
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ItemThe /el/-/æl/ merger in Australian English: Acoustic and articulatory insights(Australasian Speech Science and Technology Association, 2019)This paper investigates a merger-in-progress of /e/-/æ/ in prelateral contexts for speakers of Australian English in Victoria. Twelve participants (7F, 5M) were recorded producing a wordlist resulting in acoustic and concurrent articulatory data via stabilised mid-sagittal ultrasound tongue imaging. Focusing on a subset of the data comprising short front vowels /ɪ, e, æ/ in /hVt/ and /hVl/ contexts, findings show that there are robust acoustic differences between /e/ and /æ/ preceding /t/, as anticipated. However, individual differences emerge for /e/ and /æ/ preceding /l/, with highly gradient production patterns across the speakers, ranging from speakers who exhibit merger behaviour to those who maintain categorical distinctions. The evidence for merging behaviour across speakers is similar, but does not map directly, across both the acoustic and articulatory data, and illustrates the value of incorporating a range of data types in investigating a merger-in-progress.
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ItemProsodic marking of focus in Nafsan(Australasian Speech Science and Technology Association, 2019)Languages use a variety of means to realise informational structure categories like topicalisation and focus. The interaction between prosody and focus realisation strategies was examined in Nafsan, a Southern Oceanic language of Vanuatu, in a series of tasks that were designed to explore prosodic realisation of informational and contrastive focus on nouns that were subjects or objects in mini-dialogues where word-order was manipulated. All speakers produced utterance-initial or utterance-final focal elements with a major pitch movement associated with the focused noun (subject or object). Focused nouns were also realised with a wider pitch and often realised in their own prosodic phrase compared to the same item in non-focal contexts. There was also significant syllable lengthening at the right edge of in-focus words. In utterance-initial contexts, post-focal material in Nafsan was almost always produced in a relatively compressed pitch range and there was evidence of de-phrasing of non-focal nouns regardless of utterance position, suggesting prosodic phrasing patterns similar to other languages with edge-marking prominence.
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ItemHomogeneity vs heterogeneity in Indian English: Investigating influences of L1 on f0 range(ISCA, 2018-01-01)We present an exploratory analysis of several long-term distributional measures of f0 range in the speech of university-educated speakers of Indian English from four L1 backgrounds (Telugu, Tamil, Hindi and Bengali). The aim of this study is to investigate the degree of homogeneity in Indian English prosody and any similarities between the speakers' productions in English and their L1. Following recent studies, we examine three aspects of f0 range: pitch level (relative height of habitual f0), pitch span and pitch dynamism. Overall, across varieties, pitch level measures reveal individual speaker differences and only weak L1 effects on max f0 and median f0. Some speakers show higher f0 in their L1 productions compared to their English productions. More robust patterns were found for pitch span and dynamism: for all measures (maximum-minimum f0, pitch dynamism quotient and standard deviation), significant differences were found between L1 and English (p<0.001) for Bengali and Telugu L1 speakers. The relative weakness of L1 effects would suggest a degree of homogeneity in Indian English, at least for the prosodic parameters investigated. Evidence of a shift in pitch span when talking in English, regardless of L1, further suggests a convergent speech variety.
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ItemAcoustic correlates of prominence in Nafsan(Australasian Speech Science and Technology Association, 2018)Though Oceanic languages are often described as preferring primary stress on penultimate syllables, many different patterns have been noted across and within language families, and may interact with segmental and phonotactic factors. This is exemplified across linguistically diverse Vanuatu. However, both impressionistic and instrumentally-based escriptions of prosodic patterns and their correlates are limited for languages of this region. This paper presents preliminary acoustic and durational results for Nafsan, an Oceanic language of Vanuatu, which suggest a preference for prominence at the right edge of words, with fundamental frequency as a primary correlate.
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ItemTemporal correlates of Lopit singleton and geminate glides(Australasian Speech Science and Technology Association, 2016)