Speech Timing


Book Description

This book explores the nature of cognitive representations and processes in speech motor control, based primarily on evidence from speech timing. It engages with the key question of whether phonological representations are spatio-temporal, as in the Articulatory Phonology approach, or symbolic (atemporal and non-quantitative); this issue has fundamental implications for the architecture of the speech production planning system, particularly with regard to the number of planning components and the type of timing mechanisms. Alice Turk and Stefanie Shattuck-Hufnagel outline a number of arguments in favour of an alternative to the Articulatory Phonology/Task Dynamics model. They demonstrate that a different framework is needed to account for evidence from speech and non-speech timing behaviour, and specifically that three separate planning components must be posited: Phonological Planning, Phonetic Planning, and Motor-Sensory Implementation. The approach proposed in the book provides a clearer and more comprehensive account of what is known about motor timing in general and speech timing in particular. It will be of interest to phoneticians and phonologists from all theoretical backgrounds as well as to speech clinicians and technologists.




Discrete-Time Speech Signal Processing


Book Description

Essential principles, practical examples, current applications, and leading-edge research. In this book, Thomas F. Quatieri presents the field's most intensive, up-to-date tutorial and reference on discrete-time speech signal processing. Building on his MIT graduate course, he introduces key principles, essential applications, and state-of-the-art research, and he identifies limitations that point the way to new research opportunities. Quatieri provides an excellent balance of theory and application, beginning with a complete framework for understanding discrete-time speech signal processing. Along the way, he presents important advances never before covered in a speech signal processing text book, including sinusoidal speech processing, advanced time-frequency analysis, and nonlinear aeroacoustic speech production modeling. Coverage includes: Speech production and speech perception: a dual view Crucial distinctions between stochastic and deterministic problems Pole-zero speech models Homomorphic signal processing Short-time Fourier transform analysis/synthesis Filter-bank and wavelet analysis/synthesis Nonlinear measurement and modeling techniques The book's in-depth applications coverage includes speech coding, enhancement, and modification; speaker recognition; noise reduction; signal restoration; dynamic range compression, and more. Principles of Discrete-Time Speech Processing also contains an exceptionally complete series of examples and Matlab exercises, all carefully integrated into the book's coverage of theory and applications.




Time to Talk


Book Description

When it comes to language acquisition, all parents have questions…and?this invaluable resource?has all the answers. When should I expect my baby’s first word? Is my toddler on his way to talking soon? Is my child speaking as clearly as her peers? All parents end up thinking questions like these during their children’s formative years, but too few act on them, assuming the answers are too unpredictable to be certain. Time to Talk answers these questions for the curious parent. Written by an experienced speech-language pathologist and mom, this practical and proactive guide will help parents: Understand the building blocks of speech and language Monitor progress against expected milestones Enhance their child’s communication skills Spot signs of potential problems with hearing, speech, or language development Address common concerns, such as articulation, late talking, stuttering, dyslexia, etc. Foster literacy Raise bilingual children successfully Your child’s language acquisition no longer must be a guessing game for you. From baby’s first babbling to reading readiness, Time to Talk provides everything a parent needs so this vital fundamental skill doesn’t have to be left to chance.




Time to Talk


Book Description

Time to Talk provides a powerful and accessible resource for practitioners to help develop their own skills, as well as supporting a whole-school or setting approach to speaking and listening. Written by the government’s former Communication Champion for children, it showcases and celebrates effective approaches in schools and settings across the country. Jean Gross helpfully summarises research on what helps children and young people develop good language and communication skills, and highlights the importance of key factors: a place to talk, a reason to talk and support for talk. This practical and engaging book also provides: whole-class approaches to developing all children and young people’s speaking and listening skills; ‘catch-up’ strategies for those with limited language ways in which settings and schools can develop an effective partnership with specialists, such as speech and language therapists, to help children with more severe needs; examples of good practice in supporting parents/carers to develop their children’s language skills; answers to practitioners’ most frequently asked questions about speech and language. This book is for all school leaders, teachers and Early Years practitioners concerned about the growing number of children and young people with limited language and communication skills.




Speech and Language


Book Description

Speech and Language: Volume 4, Advances in Basic Research and Practice is a collection of papers that deals with the theories, clinical issues, and pathology of language and speech. Several papers discuss nonlinguistic and linguistic processing in children, phonological development in infants, and the development of speech fluency in children. Other papers examine the four major speech production models, the physiological and acoustical aspects of speech adaptation, spatial-temporal model of velopharyngeal function, and variations in the supraglottal air pressure waveform. One paper notes the relationships of two systems of development as follows: language development is dependent upon cognitive products and cognitive development is dependent upon language development. Such relationship leads to the hypotheses that language and cognitive developments are independent, are interdependent, and are both dependent upon some X abilities. One paper suggests that speech clinicians should have as a goal the achievement of speech that is as normal as possible in all respects, and not just for patients to sound normal. The collection will benefit linguists, ethnologists, psychologists, speech therapists, neurologists, neuropsychologists, neurolinguists, or speech pathologists.




Real-time Speech and Music Classification by Large Audio Feature Space Extraction


Book Description

This book reports on an outstanding thesis that has significantly advanced the state-of-the-art in the automated analysis and classification of speech and music. It defines several standard acoustic parameter sets and describes their implementation in a novel, open-source, audio analysis framework called openSMILE, which has been accepted and intensively used worldwide. The book offers extensive descriptions of key methods for the automatic classification of speech and music signals in real-life conditions and reports on the evaluation of the framework developed and the acoustic parameter sets that were selected. It is not only intended as a manual for openSMILE users, but also and primarily as a guide and source of inspiration for students and scientists involved in the design of speech and music analysis methods that can robustly handle real-life conditions.




Speech Synthesis and Recognition


Book Description

With the growing impact of information technology on daily life, speech is becoming increasingly important for providing a natural means of communication between humans and machines. This extensively reworked and updated new edition of Speech Synthesis and Recognition is an easy-to-read introduction to current speech technology. Aimed at advanced undergraduates and graduates in electronic engineering, computer science and information technology, the book is also relevant to professional engineers who need to understand enough about speech technology to be able to apply it successfully and to work effectively with speech experts. No advanced mathematical ability is required and no specialist prior knowledge of phonetics or of the properties of speech signals is assumed.




Approaches to the Study of Sound Structure and Speech


Book Description

This innovative work highlights interdisciplinary research on phonetics and phonology across multiple languages, building on the extensive body of work of Katarzyna Dziubalska-Kołaczyk on the study of sound structure and speech. // The book features concise contributions from both established and up-and-coming scholars who have worked with Katarzyna Dziubalska-Kołaczyk across a range of disciplinary fields toward broadening the scope of how sound structure and speech are studied and how phonological and phonetic research is conducted. Contributions bridge the gap between such fields as phonological theory, acoustic and articulatory phonetics, and morphology, but also includes perspectives from such areas as historical linguistics, which demonstrate the relevance of other linguistic areas of inquiry to empirical investigations in sound structure and speech. The volume also showcases the rich variety of methodologies employed in existing research, including corpus-based, diachronic, experimental, acoustic and online approaches and showcases them at work, drawing from data from languages beyond the Anglocentric focus in existing research. // The collection reflects on Katarzyna Dziubalska-Kołaczyk’s pioneering contributions to widening the study of sound structure and speech and reinforces the value of interdisciplinary perspectives in taking the field further, making this key reading for students and scholars in phonetics, phonology, sociolinguistics, psycholinguistics, and speech and language processing.




Phonological Encoding and Monitoring in Normal and Pathological Speech


Book Description

Bringing together a range of experts, the editors of this volume aim to show how psycholinguistic models of normal speech processing can be applied to the study of disorders of speech production, such as stuttering, aphasia and verbal dyspraxia.




Fundamentals of the Speech and Language Sciences


Book Description

For a strong foundation upon which to build their futures, students in communication sciences and disorders programs need the best, most up-to-date information available to guide them. To this end, Fundamentals of the Speech and Language Sciences provides a thorough understanding of the core concepts in speech and language while maintaining a readable, engaging tone. Students will be exposed to the fundamentals of acoustics, respiratory science, voice production, acoustic phonetics, and sound spectrography. Language representation and motor programming as they pertain to the dynamic process of speech communication are also explored, as are the fundamentals of speech perception and instrumentation. To give students context, side bars feature the stories of seminal scientists and scholars and their contributions to the topics being discussed. This text benefits from Dr. William Culbertson’s nearly three decades of experience in teaching, as well as another decade of experience as a clinical speech-language pathologist. That experience has honed his ability to clearly communicate these crucial topics in a way that students will understand. Topics covered: The scientific method and various types of research used to study the normal aspects of human speech and hearing The basics of physics as they pertain to energy, motion, displacement, force, and pressure and their relationship to speech production The process of respiration as it pertains to gas compression, speech valving, driving pressure, impedance, and flow Voice onset, modes of vocal vibration, pitch adjustment, volume and quality The process of dynamic interaction representation at the cortical and subcortical levels of the five basic speech processes: respiration, phonation, articulation, resonance, and prosody Undergraduate students in communication sciences and disorders programs, as well as the related programs of music (voice), special education, and speech communication, will value Fundamentals of the Speech and Language Sciences as the formative text for their understanding of the speech and language sciences.