LIN328H5

Acoustic Phonetics

Fall 2024

This course provides an overview of the fundamentals of acoustics, as well as the acoustic properties of vowels and consonants. Students will gain hands-on experience with primary acoustic data analysis through laboratory work, and will be exposed to classic and current research in the field. Additional topics that may be addressed include speech perception, second-language phonetics, and clinical applications.

Prerequisites: LIN228H5 and 0.5 credit from (JLP384H5, LIN229H5, LIN318H5, PSY270H5, or PSY274H5).

Exclusions: LIN323H1

Learning Outcomes

By the end of this course, students should be able to:

•    Describe how physical properties of speech sounds relate to the mechanics of speech production.

•    Identify main ideas from, and critically assess, primary research in the field of phonetics.

•    Analyze and interpret acoustic data in Praat; visualize, analyze, and interpret quantitative data in R.

•    Demonstrate an understanding of the fundamentals of experimental research: formulating research  questions/hypotheses, designing methodologically sound studies, and analyzing/interpreting results.

Textbooks and Other Materials

•    We will be using the following textbook, available for free in electronic format from the  UofT library: Johnson, Keith (2012). Acoustic and Auditory Phonetics, 3rd  Edition. Wiley.

•    We will regularly be doing hands-on, computer-based lab and listening activities in class. Please bring a laptop computer and headphones/earbuds to each class session. If you do not have access to this  equipment, please let me know before the first day of classes.

•    You will need to download and install the following (free) software on the laptop you bring to class. Note that Praat will not run on a tablet. Installation instructions will be provided.

o Praat (acoustic analysis):http://www.fon.hum.uva.nl/praat/ .

o R:http://cran.utstat.utoronto.ca/

o RStudio Desktop (free version):https://www.rstudio.com/products/rstudio/download/

Participation in all class sessions is an integral part of this course. The participation and engagement mark will reflect your active engagement during and outside of class sessions. Examples of active engagement include: asking questions, volunteering answers, participating in class activities, contributing to discussion, showing non-verbal engagement, coming to office hours, etc.). For this class, the participation and engagement mark will consist of two components, each weighted 4%:

1.    My assessment of your active engagement throughout the course

2.    Completion and submission of in-class activity reports: We will often do in-class labs or other activities, with a report to be completed and submitted in class, marked for completion.

If you need to miss class for reasons beyond your control, such as illness, your mark will not be affected, but please send mean email (within 24 hours of the missed class) to let me know.

You will complete a lab report that will involve phonetic data analysis using Praat, using skills we have practiced during in-class labs and activities. You may work with other students on the lab writeup, but you must do all components yourself: you must record your own speech, complete your own phonetic annotations, and write up and submit your own work.

All required readings should be done before class. Reading guides will be provided to help you know what is important to focus on, and must be completed and submitted to Quercus by 10am on the due date (see course calendar) . Please come to lecture prepared with any questions on things you did not understand from the reading guide; otherwise, it will be assumed that you have understood the material. Full credit will be given for reading guides that demonstrate that you have done the reading and engaged with the questions. You may work with others on these, but each student must write up and submit their work. Your lowest score will be dropped, so you may miss one without penalty.

Three quizzes will assess understanding of the main concepts covered in readings, lectures, and lab work. These will take place in person, on paper, during the regular class time.

During the last half of the class, you will complete a final project that will give you hands-on practice with all stages of phonetic data analysis: formulating a research question and hypotheses, summarizing literature, carrying out a phonetic production experiment, analyzing the data, and interpreting the results. Details about all stages of the project will be provided on Quercus.