School of Languages and Linguistics - Research Publications

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Type: Conference Paper × Author: Maxwell, Olga × Author: Fletcher, Janet ×

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    Phonetic cues to accentual prominence in Bengali English
    MAXWELL, O ; Fletcher, J (City University of Hong Kong, 2011)
    This paper examines the acoustic correlates of accentual prominence in English spoken by L1 Bengali speakers. The acoustic phonetic correlates of stressed unaccented vowels, and stressed vowels produced in positions of narrow focus were compared. As observed for many varieties of English, the main correlates of accentual prominence in narrow focused contexts were presence of/and extent of f0 movement throughout the stressed vowel, followed by a concomitant increase in RMS-db. Vowels were also longer compared to stressed unaccented vowels although the differences were relatively small and highly variable.
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    Tonal alignment of focal accents in two varieties of Indian English
    Maxwell, O ; Fletcher, J ; Hay, J ; Parnell, E (University of Canterbury, 2014)
    This study examines the tonal alignment of focal rising pitch movements in two varieties of Indian English: Bengali and Kannada English. The results revealed that all speakers use a bitonal rising pitch accent to realise focal prominence. An examination of the alignment patterns of Low and High tone targets shows that a late rising L*+H accent on focally prominent words is characteristic of Bengali English speakers whereas Kannada English speakers use an L+H* accent. Consistent with the literature, the phonetic location of the tone targets is also strongly correlated with accented syllable duration and a range of other phonetic factors.
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    A comparison of the acoustics of nonsense and real word stimuli: coronal stops in Bengali
    Maxwell, O ; BAKER, B ; Bundgaard-Nielsen, R ; Fletcher, J ; The Scottish Consortium for ICPhS 2015, (International Phonetics Society, 2015)
    Research suggests that nonsense and real words often exhibit differences in their acoustic properties. Despite this, the use of nonsense stimuli is prevalent in acoustic analyses of a range of phenomena and in experimental studies of segmental perception. The present study examined stop duration and preceding vowel formant transitions for two Bengali coronal stops produced in real and nonsense word stimuli. Firstly, significant differences were observed based on the stimulus type. Nonsense word production showed more distinct dental-retroflex differentiation. Secondly, the results revealed that F3 was a more reliable cue to place of articulation than closure duration and voice onset time.
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    Wubuy coronal stop perception by speakers of three dialects of Bangla.
    Bundgaard-Nielsen, R ; BAKER, B ; Maxwell, O ; Fletcher, J (International Speech Communication Association, 2015)
    We tested native speakers from three major dialect groups of Bangla, on their discrimination of a four-way coronal stop contrast from the Australian Indigenous language Wubuy. Bangla is generally assumed to have a two-way contrast in coronal stops, with an additional place distinction in affricates. The results show that Bangla speakers are able to discriminate the Wubuy contrasts, but also that certain contrasts are more difficult to discriminate than others. We discuss these results with respect to the Bangla coronal inventory, and importantly, with respect to the variation in the phonetic realisation of coronals between the dialects of Bangla. We argue that the phonetic realisation of what is regarded to be the 'same' phonemic inventory can have implications for the perceptual behaviour of speakers.