This book examines various aspects of Celtic linguistics from a general and more specific point of view. Amongst the topics investigated is the system of Irish initial mutations from both a linguistic universal and contrastive perspective. Other contributions analyse and cast new light on deverbal adjectives and assertive and declarative speech acts in Irish, communication and language transmission, change and policy, Breton and Sorbian grammars, as well as other issues of sociolinguistics in Irish, Welsh and Breton.

Dyslexia: Theories, Assessment and Support offers a broad perspective on dyslexia, providing a range of views from theory to practice which help explain the continued controversy surrounding the condition. Offering a framework on which to understand the concept of dyslexia, the book considers procedures that can both identify the condition and help support those with it. With a focus on self-concept, the authors highlight ways to positively influence both literacy acquisition and individual well-being. This book is ideal reading for those taking courses on dyslexia or literacy learning difficulties within education, psychology and related disciplines. It will be of great interest to specialist teachers, special education staff, educational psychologists and those in related occupations.

'Uptalk' is commonly used to refer to rising intonation at the end of declarative sentences, or (to put it more simply) the tendency for people to make statements that sound like questions, a phenomenon that has received wide exposure and commentary in the media. How and where did it originate? Who are the most frequent 'uptalkers'? How much does it vary according to the speaker's age, gender and regional dialect? Is it found in other languages as well as English? These and other questions are the subject of this fascinating book. The first comprehensive analysis of 'uptalk', it examines its historical origins, geographical spread and social influences. Paul Warren also looks at the media's coverage of the phenomenon, including the tension between the public's perception and the views of experts. Uptalk will be welcomed by those working in linguistics, as well as anyone interested in the way we talk today.

Edited in collaboration with FoLLI, the Association of Logic, Language and Information, this book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 22nd International Conference on Formal Grammar, FG 2017, collocated with the European Summer School in Logic, Language and Information in July 2017. The 9 contributed papers were carefully reviewed and selected from 14 submissions. The focus of papers are as follows: Formal and computational phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics and pragmatics Model-theoretic and proof-theoretic methods in linguistics Logical aspects of linguistic structure Constraint-based and resource-sensitive approaches to grammar Learnability of formal grammar Integration of stochastic and symbolic models of grammar Foundational, methodological and architectural issues in grammar and linguistics Mathematical foundations of statistical approaches to linguistic analysis

Originally published in 1933, this book was conceived as a collection of exercises for practice in spoken English, suitable for the use of students in the Education Department at King's College, London. The aim of the text was to 'provide exercises of the kind required by students training to be teachers, whose aim should be a type of speech acceptable among educated people, and fit for the ears of those who are being educated.' This book will be of value to anyone with an interest in the English language, speech training, pronunciation and phonetics.

This handbook presents the first systematic account of corpus phonology - the employment of corpora for studying speakers' and listeners' acquisition and knowledge of the sound system of their native languages and the principles underlying those systems. The first part of the book discusses the design, compilation, and use of phonological corpora, while the second looks at specific applications. Part 3 presents the tools and methods used, while the final part examines a number of currently available phonological corpora in various languages. It will appeal not only to those working with phonological corpora, but also to researchers and students of phonology and phonetics more generally, as well as to all those interested in language variation, dialectology, language acquisition, and sociolinguistics.

Second language acquisition has rapidly grown as a field over the past decade, as our knowledge of the ways in which children and adults learn and use a second language has become crucial for effective language teaching. In addition to this important 'applied' function, research into second language acquisition has also informed the fields of linguistics and psychology in general, as it has shed light on the differences between native and non-native models of human language and cognition. The focus of this accessible new book is second language speech - that is, how speakers perceive, process, understand and pronounce the sounds of a second language. Each chapter includes review questions, and most chapters include 'tutorial' and 'lab' sections with practical exercises based on the University of Toronto Romance Phonetics Database (available online for free). The book also has a companion website, containing illustrated answers to the exercises, scripts for running acoustic analyses and useful weblinks.

The authors of this book explore various areas of phonology and morphology. They cover a wide range of theoretical and methodological themes, among them phonological representation, allomorphy, opacity, contrast preservation, markedness, frequency of use, the interface of morphology and phonology, domains, sound change, synchronic and diachronic perspective, phonetic grounding and metrical structure. The analyses are couched in theoretical frameworks, including Optimality Theory, Derivational Optimality Theory and Government Phonology. Other than English, also Polish, Ukrainian, Belarusian, and West Slavic languages are analysed. This collection of papers is published in honour of Jerzy Rubach to recognise his contribution to the field of phonology.

This is a collection of research papers on competition in English affixation. It combines methodological chapters with descriptive chapters and incorporates both contributions by renowned international authors and also by younger researchers. The book presents diachronic and synchronic research both onomasiological and semasiological. The first three chapters review the literature and provide the theoretical framework for the experimental description of the remaining chapters.

The second edition of this distinguished textbook introduces undergraduates to the concepts, terminology and representations needed for an understanding of how English is pronounced around the world. Assuming no prior knowledge, this textbook guides the reader through the vocal tract and explains how the sounds of speech are made, offering an accessible and expanded introduction to areas including transcription, vowels and acoustic analysis. As far as possible, it uses naturally-occurring conversational speech so that readers are familiar with the details of everyday talk (and not just the careful pronunciations presented in dictionaries.) The book also includes a new concluding chapter that works through a piece of spoken data to show the reader how a more complete phonetic analysis can be conducted. Examples are taken from around the English-speaking world, including North America, Australia, New Zealand and varieties of British English. The book takes an open-minded approach to what sounds of English might be significant for making meaning, and highlights the significance of word meaning, morphology, sociolinguistics and conversational interaction in phonetic analysis.

A unique and accessible introduction to the field of phonetics through real-life applications and practical examples The dynamic field of phonetics, the science of the structure and function of human speech, has seen exciting technological innovations and new applications in recent years. Applying Phonetics introduces students to the field through a unique exploratory approach that highlights practical applications and focuses on the diverse ways in which the speech sciences influence daily life. Requiring no prior knowledge of linguistics, this accessible, student-friendly textbook introduces the key concepts in phonetics and explains their relevance to contemporary applications. Even students who have completed introductory linguistics courses will discover plenty of new material in this volume. Rather than immediately delving into complex theoretical information, the text presents a brief overview of basic concepts and then uses applications—speech synthesis, forensic speech science, language teaching—to explain the details. This unique approach increases student interest and comprehension, clearly demonstrating how speech science is beneficial to society. Engaging, easily-relatable topics include speech anatomy and physiology, the nature of normal and disordered speech development, the origins of speech, and speech applications in forensics, music, drama, film, and business. Written by a respected expert with over 25 years’ experience teaching linguistics and phonetics, this textbook  Explores the wide-ranging applications of phonetics areas such as accessibility, computer speech, education, the fine arts, and business Demonstrates how practical problems have been addressed through phonetics, such as the use of speech analysis for forensic purposes Presents real-life case studies that illustrate fundamental phonetics concepts Includes exercises and activities, discussion questions, an extensive glossary, further readings, and a companion website Applying Phonetics: Speech Science in Everyday Life is an ideal text for undergraduate students with no prior knowledge of linguistics, as well as those needing to expand their knowledge of phonetic principles. It will appeal to students in education, computer science, cognitive science, biology, psychology, business, and music.

This book deals with the expression of emotions in Igala - a Nigerian minority language with about two million speakers - from a Cognitive Linguistics perspective. The author investigates the network of the Igala language of emotions using the Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM) framework as developed by Anna Wierzbicka and her collaborators. The claims of adequacy of NSM in its present form for the analysis of emotion concepts universally will be challenged. This is due to the way emotions are conceptualized in the Igala language and due to the absence of certain semantic primes which are considered necessary for the analysis of emotions.Therefore, this study presents a testing ground for further development of the framework as well as a peek into research in African languages.

This volume contains articles based on the presentations given at the Nordic Prosody XII conference, which was held at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (Trondheim, Norway) in August 2016. The contributors investigate various prosodic aspects, including intonation, rhythm, speaking rate, intensity, and breathing, using approaches ranging from phonetic and phonological analysis to speech technology methods. While most of the studies examine read speech, some of them explore the prosodics of spontaneous speech. The languages that receive most attention are Norwegian, Swedish and Icelandic as well as Estonian, Latgalian and Polish. In addition to the larger Nordic languages, several papers focus on regional languages spoken in these areas.

How do you pronounce omega, tortoise and sloth? And why? Do charted and chartered sound the same? How do people pronounce the names Charon, Punjab, and Sexwale? In this engaging book, John Wells, a world-renowned phonetician and phonologist, explores these questions and others. Each chapter consists of carefully selected entries from Wells' acclaimed phonetics blog, on which he regularly posted on a range of current and widely researched topics such as pronunciation, teaching, intonation, spelling, and accents. Based on sound scholarship and full of fascinating facts about the pronunciation of Welsh, Swedish, Czech, Zulu, Icelandic and other languages, this book will appeal to scholars and students in phonetics and phonology, as well as general readers wanting to know more about language. Anyone interested in why a poster in Antigua invited cruise ship visitors to enjoy a game of porker, or what hymns can tell us about pronunciation, should read this book.

Dyslexia: Theories, Assessment and Support offers a broad perspective on dyslexia, providing a range of views from theory to practice which help explain the continued controversy surrounding the condition. Offering a framework on which to understand the concept of dyslexia, the book considers procedures that can both identify the condition and help support those with it. With a focus on self-concept, the authors highlight ways to positively influence both literacy acquisition and individual well-being. This book is ideal reading for those taking courses on dyslexia or literacy learning difficulties within education, psychology and related disciplines. It will be of great interest to specialist teachers, special education staff, educational psychologists and those in related occupations.

This book investigates inconsistencies in the accent adopted by advanced German learners of English with respect to differences between standard American and British English (rhoticity, t-voicing, the vowels in the lexical sets "bath", "lot" and "thought"). From a theoretical point of view, the volume contributes to understanding the status of L1 transfer in language learners at "ultimate attainment", a stabilized, late stage in language acquisition. Unlike in many studies in second language acquisition, the approach taken here is variationist, taking into account extra- and intra-linguistic factors as potential explanations for variability. The findings suggest that in addition to the target accent the strongest external factor is time spent abroad, while L1 accent and proficiency level seem to have minor impact only.

Originally published in 1932, this book presents a guide to various aspects of English phonetics aimed at foreign students of the language. Illustrative figures and a bibliography are also included. This book will be of value to anyone with an interest in the teaching of English, linguistics and phonetics.

Word stress has long presented challenges to phonologists, as they have sought to uncover patterns in its distribution, and devise models to account for its behaviour and formal representation both within single languages and cross-linguistically. In this collection, a team of world-renowned researchers present a variety of viewpoints on the methods and problems involved. Offering fresh perspectives on the topic and its study, this book is specifically concerned with basing theoretical work on broad typological surveys and focuses on the collection, selection and use of data in the analysis of word stress and word rhythm, including their phonetic manifestations. An extensive introduction presents a state-of-the-art review of stress research. The contributors also present StressTyp2, a project in an advanced stage of development, which intends to make publicly available information on word stress in a broad sample of languages and will offer new ways of understanding this key research area.

Children often mispronounce words when learning their first language. Is it because they cannot perceive the differences that adults make or is it because they can't produce the sounds involved? Neither hypothesis is sufficient on its own to explain the facts. On the basis of detailed analyses of his son's and grandson's development, Neil Smith explains the everyday miracle of one aspect of first-language acquisition. Mispronunciations are now attributed to performance rather than to competence, and he argues at length that children's productions are not mentally represented. The study also highlights the constructs of current linguistic theory, arguing for distinctive features and the notion 'onset' and against some of the claims of Optimality Theory and Usage-based accounts. Smith provides an important and engaging update to his previous work, The Acquisition of Phonology, building on ideas previously developed and drawing new conclusions with the aid of fresh data.

The concept of the 'onset', i.e. the consonant(s) before the vowel of a syllable, is critical within phonology. While phonologists have examined the segmental behaviour of onsets, their prosodic status has instead been largely overlooked. In fact, most previous accounts have stipulated that onsets are insignificant when it comes to the 'heaviness' of syllables. In this book Nina Topintzi presents a new theory of onsets, arguing for their fundamental role in the structure of language both in the underlying and surface representation, unlike previous assumptions. To capture the weight behaviour of onsets, a novel account is proposed that relates their interaction with voicing, tone and stress. Using numerous case-studies and data from a variety of languages and phenomena (including stress, compensatory lengthening, gemination and word minimality), the book introduces a model that reflects the true behaviour of onsets, demonstrating profound implications for syllable and weight theories.

First published in 1913, this book was originally intended as a manual for students in Scottish training colleges and for teachers of English in Scottish schools. Grant supplies passages from well-known literature translated into the phonetic alphabet for both the declamatory and conversational styles. This book will be of value to anyone with an interest in the history of phonetics and the presentation of Scottish accents to an English audience.

Designed for students with only a basic knowledge of linguistics, this leading textbook provides a clear and practical introduction to phonology, the study of sound patterns in language. It teaches in a step-by-step fashion the logical techniques of phonological analysis and the fundamental theories that underpin it. This thoroughly revised and updated edition teaches students how to analyze phonological data, how to think critically about data, how to formulate rules and hypotheses, and how to test them. New to this edition: * Improved examples, over 60 exercises and 14 new problem sets from a wide variety of languages encourage students to practise their own analysis of phonological processes and patterns * A new and updated reference list of phonetic symbols and an updated transcription system, making data more accessible to students * Additional online material includes pedagogical suggestions and password-protected answer keys for instructors

"Speaking is part of a whole: an expression of inner life." Cicely Berry has based her work on the conviction that while all is present in nature our natural instincts have been crippled from birth by many processes----by the conditioning, in fact, of a warped society. So an actor needs precise exercise and clear understanding to liberate his hidden possibilities and to learn the hard task of being true to the a instinct of the momenta . As her book points out with remarkable persuasiveness a techniquea as such is a myth, for there is no such thing as a correct voice. There is no right way----there are only a million wrong ways, which are wrong because they deny what would otherwise be affirmed. Wrong uses of the voice are those that constipate feeling, constrict activity, blunt expression, level out idiosyncrasy, generalize experience, coarsen intimacy. These blockages are multiple and are the results of acquired habits that have become part of the automatic vocal equipment; unnoticed and unknown, they stand between the actora s voice as it is and as it could be and they will not vanish by themselves. So the work is not how to do but how to permit: how, in fact, to set the voice free. And since life in the voice springs from emotion, drab and uninspiring technical exercises can never be sufficient. Cicely Berry never departs from the fundamental recognition that speaking is part of a whole: an expression of inner life. After a voice session with her I have known actors speak not of the voice but of a growth in human relationships. This is a high tribute to work that is the opposite of specialization. Cicely Berry sees the voice teacher as involved in all of a theatrea s work. She would never try to separate the sound of words from their living context. For her the two are inseparable. ----from Peter Brooka s foreword to Voice and the Actor

Second language phonology is approached in this book from the perspective of data-based studies into the English sound system as used by native and non-native speakers of the language. The book offers a unique combination of psycholinguistic, sociolinguistic and pedagogical approaches, with individual contributions investigating the effect of selected conditioning factors on the pronunciation of English. With all the richness of approaches, it is a strong phonetic background that unifies individual contributions to the volume. Thus, the book contains a large body of original, primary research which will be of interest to experienced scientist, practitioners and lecturers as well as graduate students planning to embark on empirical methods of investigating the nature of the sound system