Vahideh Abolhasanizadeh; Anis Masoumi
Abstract
The purpose of the present study is to explore the process of vowel reduction in Kermani accent. The process of vowel reduction occurs in unstressed syllables which shifts vowels toward other vowels. In this study, 5 male and 5 female native speakers of Kermani accent, pronounced 24 words in 3 repetitions ...
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The purpose of the present study is to explore the process of vowel reduction in Kermani accent. The process of vowel reduction occurs in unstressed syllables which shifts vowels toward other vowels. In this study, 5 male and 5 female native speakers of Kermani accent, pronounced 24 words in 3 repetitions containing six simple vowels in stressed and unstressed syllables. The participants’ productions were recorded using Shure microphone and were analyzed using Praat software (Ver. 5.2.24). A text grid was made for each word. Then, duration, F1, F2 and F0 of vowels were measured and compared in stressed and unstressed syllables. Overall, the obtained results confirmed that the duration and F0 of vowels decreases in unstressed syllables and the amount of F1 of all the vowels and the F2 of the vowels [ɑ, e, o, u] have a tendency towards the F1 and F2 of /ǝ/. Results also indicated that the process of vowel reduction is centripetal in Kermani accent.
Vahideh Abolhasanizadeh; Anis Masoumi
Abstract
The purpose of this research is to study the process of vowel reduction in Kermani accent. The process of vowel reduction occurs in unstressed syllables which shifts vowels toward other vowels. In this study, 5 male and 5 female native speakers of Kermani accent, pronounced 24 words in 3 repetitions ...
Read More
The purpose of this research is to study the process of vowel reduction in Kermani accent. The process of vowel reduction occurs in unstressed syllables which shifts vowels toward other vowels. In this study, 5 male and 5 female native speakers of Kermani accent, pronounced 24 words in 3 repetitions containing six simple vowels in stressed and unstressed syllables. The participants’ production was recorded using Shure microphone and was analyzed using Praat software (Ver. 5.2.24). A textgrid was made for each word. Then, duration, F1, F2 and F0 of vowels were measured and compared in stressed and unstressed syllables. Overall, the obtained results confirmed that the duration and F0 of vowels decreased in unstressed syllables and the amount of F1 of all the vowels and the F2 of the vowels [ɑ, e, o, u] have a tendency towards the F1 and F2 of /ǝ/. Results also indicated that the process of vowel reduction is centripetal in Kermani accent.
Abstract
In certain languages, vowel quality changes in unstressed syllables. In acoustic phonetics, this characteristic, namely vowel 'undershoot' under certain conditions and the tendency to centralize, is referred to as 'vowel reduction'. Previous researches have shown that Persian vowel space reduces and ...
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In certain languages, vowel quality changes in unstressed syllables. In acoustic phonetics, this characteristic, namely vowel 'undershoot' under certain conditions and the tendency to centralize, is referred to as 'vowel reduction'. Previous researches have shown that Persian vowel space reduces and is centralized in unaccented syllables and as a result have considered the change in vowel quality to be an acoustic correlate of lexical stress in Persian. The present paper is an investigation of the effect of stress on the duration and quality of simple vowels in accented and unaccented open syllables of bisyllabic words in the speech of 14 female and male speakers of Persian. Results showed a reduction of vowel duration in unaccented syllables, but no reduction or centralization of vowel space. Rather, the vowel space was larger in unaccented syllables. Vowel quality changed, but this change was not statistically significant for all vowels. Previous research has shown that a reduction in vowel duration is not necessarily accompanied by vowel undershoot, as articulators can move faster to achieve ideal vowel quality under time limitations. Thus, vowel reduction cannot be considered as an acoustic correlate of lexical stress in Persian, since besides stress, many other factors, including speaking style, syllable type, word length and type, influence vowel quality.
