Laboratoire Parole et Langage, CNRS / Université de Provence, Aix-en-Provence (France)

1. Prosody and Emotion
   • Keynote lecture: Prosody and Emotions by Sylvie Mozziconacci (Q-go and Leiden University, NL)
     The investigation of emotional speech constitutes quite a multidisciplinary research field. In order to benefit from the mutual enrichment that might result from this interdisciplinarity, it seems important to clarify what the specific contribution of a particular field can be. In this paper, an attempt is made to shed light on the type of contribution proposed by the tradition of studies of prosody to studies of expression of emotion in speech. Methodological issues that might contribute to the fruitfulness of studies of expressive speech are discussed.
     
     It is argued that the way intonation conveys emotion and attitude in speech is best studied when pitch variation is represented in the theoretical framework of a model of intonation. Using such a model structures and reduces the data, formalizes the description, facilitates control of parameters and generalization of results. The use of such a model has proven useful in the field of prosody, independently of its type. Moreover, such a context constitutes an opportunity to test the model's adequacy for dealing with extreme variations such as those occurring in emotional speech. Another point is that complementary studies of production and perception are felt to be a necessary prerequisite for establishing the communicative significance of the investigated speech parameters. The need of a reference baseline in each experiment is also reminded. Furthermore, the need for drawing a distinction between the description of the global shape of the F0 curve, i.e., the type of pith contour, and the description of how this contour is concretely implemented in terms of pitch events is also discussed. Both the abstract phonological information on the type of contour, and the concrete phonetic information on the concrete pitch implementation of the F0 curve are pertinent. The investigation of type of pitch contour and detailed pitch implementation seems particularly promising when the experimental design is such as to allow the independent study of each effect, as well as their combined effect. This may lead us to make use of an orthogonal experimental design in the investigation of prosodic parameters. Finally, by considering how well existing assumptions about intonation account for its expressive functions, some light can be shed on the functionality of intonation for conveying meaningful information in speech communication.
   • Co-speakers:
     • Anne Wichmann (University of Central Lancashire, Preston, UK): Attitudinal Intonation and the Inferential Process
     • Branka Zei Pollermann (Hôpitaux Universitaires de Genève, CH): A Place for Prosody in a Unified Model of Cognition and Emotion
   • Selected papers:
     • Boula de Mareüil, P.; Célérier, P.; Toen, J.: Generation of Emotions by a Morphing Technique in English, French and Spanish
     • Ehrette, T.; Chateau, N.; d'Alessandro, C.; Maffiolo, V.: Prosodic Parameters of Perceived Emotions in Vocal Server Voices
     • Kehrein, R.: The Prosody of Authentic Emotions
     • Oudeyer, P.-Y.: Novel Useful Features and Algorithms for the Recognition of Emotions in Human Speech
2. Prosody and Speech Technology
   • Keynote lecture: ToBI Or Not ToBI? by Colin Wightman (Minnesota State University, US)
     In the decade that has passed since the introduction of the ToBI system for the transcription of prosody, speech technology has moved out of the laboratory and into commercial applications on several fronts. However, virtually none of the commercial products have made large-scale use of prosody. Nevertheless, researchers in both recognition and synthesis continue to agree that better utilization of prosody is essential to improving the performance and acceptability of commercial systems. In this paper, we review the current state of prosody in commercial systems, and examine how the ongoing discussions related to what and how to transcribe with respect to prosody have simultaneously advanced and inhibited the field. In particular, we argue that, in hindsight, the ToBI system contains several flaws that have limited its acceptance and application.
   • Co-speakers:
     • Li Aijun (Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing, CN): Chinese Prosody and Prosodic Labeling of Spontaneous Speech
     • Hansjoerg Mixdorff (Berlin University of Applied Sciences, DE): Speech Technology, ToBI and Making Sense of Prosody
   • Selected papers:
     • Fant, G.; Kruckenberg, A.; Gustafson, K.; Liljencrants. J.: A New Approach to Intonation Analysis and Synthesis of Swedish
     • Greenberg, S.; Carvey, H.; Hitchcock, L.: The Relation Between Stress Accent and Pronunciation Variation in Spontaneous American English Discourse
     • Holm, B.; Bailly, G.: Learning the Hidden Structure of Intonation: Implementing Various Functions of Prosody
     • Kiriyama, S.; Hirose, K.; Minematsu, N.: Control of Prosodic Focuses for Reply Speech Generation in a Spoken Dialogue System of Information Retrieval on Academic Documents
3. Prosody and Syntactic, Semantic, Pragmatic Interpretation
   • Keynote lecture: Intonation and Interpretation: Phonetics and Phonology by Carlos Gussenhoven (University of Nijmegen, NL)
     Intonational meaning is located in two components of language, the phonetic implementation and the intonational grammar. The phonetic implementation is widely used for the expression of universal meanings that derive from 'biological codes', meaning dimensions based on aspects of the production process of pitch variation. Three codes are identified, Ohala's Frequency Code, the Effort Code and the Production Code. In each case, 'informational' meanings (which relate to the message) are identified, while for the first two codes also 'affective' meanings (relating to the state of the speaker) are discussed. Speech communities will vary in the extent to which they employ those meanings, and in the choices they make when they conflict. What they will never do, however, is change the natural form-function relations that they embody. By contrast, grammaticalised meanings often mimic the natural meanings, but linguistic change may create quite arbitrary form-meaning relations when forms are phonologised, and the semantics is systematised. English grammaticalised intonational meaning concerns information status.
   • Co-speakers:
     • Thorstein Fretheim (University of Trondheim, NO): Intonation as a Constraint on Inferential Processing
     • Julia Hirschberg (AT&T Labs, New Jersey, US): The Pragmatics of Intonational Meaning
   • Selected papers:
     • Dainora, A.: Does Intonational Meaning Come From Tones or Tunes? Evidence Against a Compositional Approach
     • Fletcher, J.; Wales, R.; Stirling, L.; Mushin, I.: A Dialogue Act Analysis of Rises in Australian English Map Task dialogues
     • Rialland, A.; Doetjes, J.; Rebuschi, G.: What is Focused in C'est XP qui/que Cleft Sentences in French?
     • Selkirk, E.: Contrastive FOCUS vs.Presentational Focus : Prosodic Evidence from Right Node Raising in English
4. Prosody and the Brain
   • Keynote lecture: Cerebral Strategies in the Segmentation and Interpretation of Speech by Kai Alter (Max-Planck-Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, Leipzig, DE)
     The segmentation of the acoustic speech signal is a fundamental for the processing of spoken language. The paper at hand provides a survey of studies conducted in our lab concerning the detection of segmentation cues in the speech signal and associated perception of prosodic boundaries. The first two studies presented here employ the methodology of Event-Related Potentials (ERP) to study online electrophysiological responses to acoustic stimuli varying in syntactic and prosodic constituency, as well as in segmental content. By the first study an ERP shift was identified correlated with the perception of major intonational boundaries which was termed the Closure Positive Shift (CPS). The second study was especially concerned with listener's abilities in speech segmentation, given the exclusive presence of prosodic cues. A third experiment reviewed here employs functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI), an investigation method based on hemodynamic brain responses. ERP and fMRI are complementary methodologies: while ERPs provide an accurate measure of temporal aspects of processing, fMRI methodology is particularly well suited to localize such processes in the brain.
   • Co-speakers:
     • Marc Pell (McGill University, Montreal, CA): Surveying Emotional Prosody in the Brain
     • Janet Dean Fodor (CUNY, New York, US): Psycholinguistics Cannot Escape Prosody
   • Selected papers:
     • Bagou, O.; Fougeron, C.; Frauenfelder, U.: Contribution of Prosody to the Segmentation and Storage of "Words" in the Acquisition of a New Mini-Language
     • Mayer, J.; Wildgruber, D.; Riecker, A.; Dogil, G.; Ackermann, H.; Grodd, W.: Prosody Production and Perception: Converging Evidence from fMRI Studies
     • Schirmer, A.; Kotz, S.A.: Sex Differentiates the STROOP-Effect in Emotional Speech: ERP Evidence
     • Schön, D.; Magne, C.; Schrooten, M.; Besson, M.: The Music of Speech: Electrophysiological Approach
5. Lexical Prosody and Phonemic Alignment
   • Keynote lecture: Articulatory Constraints and Tonal alignment by Yi Xu (Northwestern University, Illinois, US)
     There has been accumulating evidence in recent years that certain F0 events are consistently aligned with segmental events such as the syllable boundary. The mechanisms for the observed alignment patterns, however, are still being closely investigated. In this paper I argue that to understand the observed tonal alignment patterns, it is imperative to first understand the role of articulatory constraints in shaping the F0 contours in speech. In particular, the maximum speed of pitch change limits how fast F0 movements can be produced; and the coordination of laryngeal and supralaryngeal movements limits how syllables and tones can be aligned to each other. From a different perspective, these constraints mean that the degrees of freedom speakers have are probably less than previously thought. This may actually make our understanding of the speech signal somewhat easier than before. I will demonstrate this with a theoretical model of F0 production that is based on the new understanding of the articulatory constraints. Though conceptually simple, the model seems to be able to account for a number of phonetic patterns that have been observed in speech. Finally, I will briefly discuss the implications of the new insights on our understanding of tonal perception in speech.
   • Co-speakers:
     • Mariapaola D'Imperio (LPL Aix en Provence, FR): Language-Specific and Universal Constraints on Tonal Alignment: The Nature of Targets and "Anchors"
     • Jan van Santen (Center for Spoken Language Understanding at OGI, Oregon, US): Quantitative Modeling of Pitch Accent Alignment
   • Selected papers:
     • Gili Fivela, B.: Tonal Alignment in Two Pisa Italian Peak Accents
     • Knight, R.-A.: The Effect of Pitch Span on Intonational Plateaux
     • Prieto, P.: Coarticulation and Stability Effects in Tonal Clash Contexts in Catalan
     • Rietveld, T.; Kerkhoff, J.: The Temporal Alignment of L*H Accents
6. Prosody and Linguistic Typology
   • Keynote lecture: Acoustic Correlates of Linguistic Rhythm: Perspectives by Franck Ramus (Maison des Sciences de l'Homme, Paris, FR)
     The empirical grounding of a typology of languages' rhythm is again a hot issue. The currently popular approach is based on the durations of vocalic and intervocalic intervals and their variability. Despite some successes, many questions remain. The main findings still need to be generalised to much larger corpora including many more languages. But a straightforward continuation of the current work faces many difficulties. Perspectives are outlined for future work, including proposals for the cross-linguistic control of speech rate, improvements on the statistical analyses, and prospects raised by automatic speech processing.
   • Co-speakers:
     • Fred Cummins (Media Lab Europe and University College, Dublin, IE): Speech Rhythm and Rhythmic Taxonomy
     • Esther Grabe (University of Oxford, UK): Variation Adds to Prosodic Typology
   • Selected papers:
     • Barbosa, P.A.: Explaining Cross-Linguistic Rhythmic Variability via a Coupled-Oscillator Model of Rhythm Production
     • Galves, A.; Garcia, J.E.; Duarte, D.; Galves, C.: Sonority as a Basis for Rhythmic Class Discrimination
     • Ghazali, S.; Hamdi, R.; Barkat, M.: Speech Rhythm Variation in Arabic Dialects
     • Pellegrino, F.; Chauchat, J.-H.; Rakotomalala, R.; Farinas, J.: Can Automatically Extracted Rhythmic Units Discriminate Among Languages?

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