MEJO 425: Voice and Diction

Communication

The process of sharing meanings with one another.

Noise

Any barrier to effective communication.

Paralinguistics

Vocal elements of communication such as pitch and tone.

Kinesics

Body language, gestures, and physical movements during communication.

Three Elements Required to Produce Sound

A vibrator (e.g., vocal folds), a force (breath), and a medium (air).

Objective Speech Characteristics

Frequency (Hertz), intensity, and complexity.

Subjective Speech Measurements

Pitch, loudness, and quality (as perceived by a listener).

Innervation

Neural control of the speech and breathing mechanism.

Phonation

Alteration of air from the lungs to create sound waves.

Resonance

Amplification of sound in the cavities of the head.

Standard Speech

Speech used by the majority of educated people in a given region.

Phoneme

A family of related speech sounds (e.g., /t/).

Allophones

Sound variations within a single phoneme sound family.

Accent vs. Dialect

Accent involves pronunciation variations; dialect includes differences in pronunciation, vocabulary, and grammar.

Consonant Classification Factors

Voicing, place of articulation, and method of articulation.

Vowel Classification Factors

Height of tongue, place of production, and muscle tension.

Cognate Sounds

Pairs of sounds produced in the same place where one is voiced and one is voiceless (e.g., /p/ and /b/, /t/ and /d/).

Plosives

Sounds you make by blocking off the breath stream entirely for a very short period of time, just long enough to build up some air pressure behind your articulators. You then suddenly “explode” this air to produce the sound. The first sound in pet is a plosive.

Fricatives

Consonant sounds made by forcing a stream of air through articulators to create friction (e.g., /f/, /v/, /s/, /z/).

Affricates

Consonant sounds created by combining a plosive and a fricative (e.g., in "chair").

Diphthong

A speech sound formed by gliding from one vowel sound to another within a single syllable.

Intrusive R

Inserting an /r/ sound into a word or phrase where it does not belong (e.g., "law(r) and order").

Lateral Sounds

Consonant sounds produced by allowing air to escape along the sides of the tongue (e.g., /l/).

linking r

A linking R is an English pronunciation rule used in non-rhotic accents (accents where people usually don't pronounce the "r" at the end of a word, such as British Received Pronunciation, Australian, or New Zealand English). [1, 2]

Affricative

Plosive + Fricative

Clear L

Beginning of a word or consonant then L sound (clear). The tip of the tongue touches the ridge behind the upper front teeth, while the back of the tongue stays flat and unraised.

Dark L

Beginning of a word or consonant then L sound (clear)

Wh sounds are

Voiceless

intensity

This refers to the loudness of a sound

Voiced

When you produce sound when you make a consonant, that is what consonant

Greek

Diphtong is derived from what

Accent

When someone speaks a second language, this is the sound of their first language

Linguistic behavior

Speaker-generated noise. How the speaker uses grammar: is there faulty language?

Nonverbal behavior

Any ticks people might have when speaking, facial movements, etc

Frequency (objective/measurable)

The number of vibrations that occur in a given period of time. Measured in Hertz (Hz). 1 Hz = 1 vibration per second

Pitch (subjective)

The highness or lowness of a sound. Higher pitch means higher frequency and vice versa.

Intensity (objective/measurable)

The amount of energy a sound has. The more energy, the more the sound travels.

Loudness (subjective)

Interpretation of intensity. We perceive high-intensity sounds as being louder that low-intensity sounds.

Complexity (objective)

Refers to the overall composition of the relative intensities and frequencies of the pure tones that make up a complex wave.

Quality (subjective)

Loudness and pitch

There are five distinct processes in producing speech sounds:

innervation, breathing, phonation, resonance, and articulation.

Nasals

You produce the nasals by lowering the soft palate and blocking the oral cavity with the lips or the tongue. You then let the air go out the nostrils. The first and last sounds in the word man are nasals.

Glides

consonant sounds you make while you’re moving your articulators from one position to another. You can hear and feel the motion. The first sound in the word yes is a glide.

Types of vowel sounds

1. Front vowels - see, sit, ate, bet, bat

2. Back vowels - book, too, rope, awful

3. Mid vowels - up, banana early, father