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Cross-Linguistic Variation in the Phonetic Realization of Breathy Voice

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CROSS-LINGUISTIC VARIATION IN THE PHONETIC REALIZATION OF “BREATHIER VOICE” Jia Tian1, Yipei Zhou2, Jianjing Kuang3 1 3University of Pennsylvania, U.S.A 2Peking University, China [email protected], [email protected], [email protected] ABSTRACT breather voice in Zhenhai, Tamang, and Mon were considered to be this subtype [26, 27, 30]. Breathier voices are non-modal voices produced However, although theoretical studies (e.g., [3,22, with a relatively less constricted glottis. Although 25]) generally recognize the cross-linguistic varia- three major subtypes of breathier voice have been tion in the phonetic realization of “breathier voice”, identified, namely slack/lax voice, breathy voice and there is no consensus on how many subtypes should whispery voice, and distinct IPA symbols have been be identified, and how to define define these differ- proposed to transcribe them, actually there is no con- ent types of breathy voice acoustically. For example, sensus on how many subtypes should be identified, Ladefoged [16, 22, 24] does not distinguish between and how each subtype should be defined. Most stud- whispery voice and breathy voice; Catford [3] and ies simply use “breathy voice” as a general term Laver [25] do not distinguish between lax voice and to cover all its subtypes. In this study, we pro- whispery voice. One important reason for this chal- pose that different subtypes of breathier voice can lenge is that, as [15,22,25] point out, these subtypes be distinguished by evaluating the relative impor- essentially form a continuum, with no clear border- tance of the glottal constriction and the noise com- line between them. Moreover, there is often consid- ponent. Drawing data from Gujarati, White Hmong, erable individual variation in the realizations of any Southern Yi, and Shanghainese, we show that our given type of voice quality [15]. Therefore, in prac- proposed method successfully identified each of the tice, different types of “breathy voice” are generally three subtypes found in these four languages. We not distinguished and collapsed in the literature. will discuss the implication for future voice quality However, even though no language appears to studies. contrast different types of “breathier voice” phono- Keywords: phonation, voice quality, breathy, whis- logically, cross-linguistic variation has been widely pery, slack/lax observed. Different articulatory strategies in phona- tion production lead to different interactions with 1. INTRODUCTION other phonological structures such as tones, and also develop different paths of sound change. It is there- Generally speaking, breathy voice (more accurately, fore meaningful to better understand the variation of breathier voice) is the non-modal phonation pro- “breathier voice.” The question then is: since dif- duced with relatively less constricted glottis along ferent types of “breathier voice” vary rather contin- the voicing continuum [22, 24]. However, as noted uously, is it possible to quantify the variation with by a number of studies [16, 22–24], the phonetic re- acoustic measures? This study aims to provide some alization of the ’breathier voice’ substantially vary insight into this question. across languages. Particularly, three major subtypes Generalizing across previous studies [3, 7, 15, 22, of breathier voice have been recognized, namely 24, 25], the three subtypes can be defined as fol- slack/lax voice, breathy voice and whispery voice lows. 1) Compared with modal voice, slack/lax [3, 7, 15, 24, 25], and distinct IPA symbols have voice is produced mainly with less adductive ten- been proposed to transcribe them [1]. The breathier sion and medial compression in the vocal folds. The voice in languages has been classified into different arytenoid cartilages are not drawn apart as they are subcategories. For instance, the breathier voice in in breathy voice, so the turbulence noise from the Jingpho, Javanese, Yi, Wa, and Mpi were denoted glottis is relatively minor. 2) Breathy voice, by con- as “slack/lax voice”, while the breathier voice in trast, is produced with a considerable glottal aper- Chong, Gujarati, Hindi, Sindhi, and Jalapa Mazatec ture, and there is some audible noise. Compared were classified as “breathy voice” [16, 24]. Whis- with modal voice, the glottal pulse is more symmet- pery voice is relatively less documented, but the rical for breathy voice. 3) Whispery voice differs from both breathy voice and slack/lax voice in that pitch and phonation contrasts co-occur. Breathier it is produced with more aperiodic noise by main- voice is associated with lower register tones in Wu taining a higher degree of medial compression (i.e., [2, 4, 5, 11, 12, 29, 33, 35]. The breathier voice in more constricted than breathy voice, but still less Zhenhai, a closely related Chinese Wu dialect, has constricted than modal voice). Whispery voice has been reported to be “whispery voice [30].” a more skewed glottal flow pulse compared with breathy voice. 2.2. Materials We propose that the three subtypes of “breathier voice” essentially vary in the contribution of two ar- Acoustic measurements of Gujarati, White Hmong, ticulatory aspects: how much medial compression and Southern Yi were retrieved from the “Production in the vocal folds is involved and how large the pos- and Perception of Linguistic Voice Quality” project terior glottal aperture is. The former is acoustically at UCLA1. Recordings of Shanghainese were made related to the slope of the voice spectrum, and the by the first author in Shanghai. Shanghainese is latter is acoustically related to the amount of tur- gradually losing its breathier phonation [11, 33, 35], bulence noise generated in the glottis. Therefore, so we only selected speakers born before 1980 in subtypes of “breathy voice” essentially vary in the this study, because they were previously shown relative importance of cues correlated to glottal con- to maintain the breathier phonation [33]. Since striction and noise component. the recordings of all four languages were collected Therefore, by modeling the relative importance of with the same recording setup (e.g., Shure SM10A these two aspects of voice measures, we should be dynamic microphone and Glottal Enterprises EG2 able to tease apart different types of breathier voice. electroglottograph), and all measurements were ob- This paper will test this hypothesis by looking into tained using the same tools (i.e., VoiceSauce [31] the cross-linguistic variation of four languages that and EggWorks [32]), the results of the statistical involve some kind of “breathier voice.” modeling are comparable across the four languages. 2. METHODS 2.3. Statistical modeling 2.1. Languages In this section, we test the relative importance of spectral tilt and noise measures for each of the four In this study, we compare four languages that in- languages. Linear Discriminant Analysis (LDA), a volve some type of breathier voice: Gujarati (Indo- procedure that determines the relative importance European, Indo-Iranian; atonal), White Hmong of different cues between two or more groups [6], (Hmong-Mien, Hmongic; tonal), Southern Yi (Sino- was conducted in R using the lda() function from Tibetan, Tibeto-Burman; tonal), and Shanghainese the MASS package [28, 34]. This method was cho- (Sino-Tibetan, Sinitic; tonal). Typologically, these sen because it works better than logistic regression four languages come from different language fami- when the predictors are highly correlated with each lies and cover both tonal and non-tonal languages. other (like in our case, where all the spectral tilt Importantly, Gujarati and White Hmong are both measures are highly correlated). This method has considered to have a typical “breathy voice” that been found to be effective in evaluating the relative contrasts with modal voice [9, 10, 16, 18, 19, 24]. importance of different acoustic cues in various lin- Gujarati is atonal, while White Hmong has seven guistic contrasts (e.g., Mazatec phonation contrast phonemic tones. White Hmong distinguishes three [8, 13]; Korean tonogensis [17]; Tongan stress [14]; phonation types (modal, breathy, and creaky). Two Shanghainese phonation contrast [11], to name a of White Hmong tones are associated with non- few). Spectral tilt measures included were: H1*- modal phonation. Southern Yi has a three-tone sys- H2*, H2*-H4*, H1*-A1*, H1*-A2*, and H1*-A3*. tem (low, mid, and high) and two phonation reg- Noise measures included were: CPP and HNR in isters (tense vs. lax) [16, 18, 20, 21]. Both tense four regions of the spectrum (0-500 Hz, 0-1500 Hz, and lax phonations occur in syllables with both mid 0-2500 Hz, and 0-3500 Hz). Mean values over the and low tones. The high tone, on the other hand, entire vowel were used in the LDA analysis. only occurs in syllables with lax phonation. In the The Gujarati model included all breathy and literature, the number of languages that have been modal syllables in the dataset. A total of 3055 ob- reported to have a “whispery voice” is small. In servations (target words embedded in a short sen- this study, we examine Shanghainese, the most well- tence that the subject immediately thought of upon known Chinese Wu dialect. All Chinese Wu dialects seeing the target words) from 10 speakers were in- have a upper vs. lower register contrast in which cluded. The White Hmong model included all sylla- Gujarati: breathy vs modal White Hmong: breathy vs modal 1.0 1.0 0.8 0.8 0.6 0.6 0.4 0.4 0.2 0.2 Absolute correlation Absolute correlation 0.0 0.0 A1* A2* A3* A1* A2* A3* H2* H4* H2* H4* CPP CPP − − − − − − − − − − 500Hz 500Hz 1500Hz 2500Hz 3500Hz 1500Hz 2500Hz 3500Hz − − H1* H1* H1* H1* H1* H1* H1* H2* H1* H2* − − − − − − HNR 0 HNR 0 HNR 0 HNR 0 HNR 0 HNR 0 HNR 0 HNR 0 Southern Yi: tense vs lax Shanghainese: whispery vs modal 1.0 1.0 0.8 0.8 0.6 0.6 0.4 0.4 tle contribution to thenoise phonation measures (i.e., contrast CPP in andin South- HNRs) Fig.
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