Paolo Mairano | Université de Lille (original) (raw)

Papers by Paolo Mairano

Language and Speech, Sep 23, 2019

It is often claimed that patterns of gemination are different across varieties of Italian. In par... more It is often claimed that patterns of gemination are different across varieties of Italian. In particular, northern speakers are sometimes said to degeminate, or to produce shorter geminates than central and southern speakers. However, experimental data proving such claims is largely missing. In this article, we perform an analysis of the CLIPS corpus with the aim of comparing gemination for northern versus central and southern speakers of Italian. The analysis of different data types (target words in isolated position, read sentences, dialogues, local radio and TV broadcasts) revealed that: (a) geminate consonants are produced by all speakers, incl. northern speakers; (b) differences in the magnitude of consonant lengthening are small (< 19 ms) and reach significance only for some data types; (c) the shortening of vowels preceding geminate consonants is mainly restricted to isolated target words in nuclear position, with no significant differences between northern and central/ southern speakers. We argue that regional differences in Italian gemination have been overestimated and overemphasized in the literature. In fact, the evidence suggests that they are not as sizeable as previously thought, probably because of the progressive standardization of the language.

HAL (Le Centre pour la Communication Scientifique Directe), Aug 29, 2022

HAL (Le Centre pour la Communication Scientifique Directe), Jun 21, 2021

Proceedings of the 14th EURALEX International Congress, 2010

We shall explain how different pronunciation variants were selected for inclusion in the dictiona... more We shall explain how different pronunciation variants were selected for inclusion in the dictionary and how the transcriptions of anglicisms had to be adapted to the phonology and phonetics of Italian. A discussion will follow about the effects caused by the juxtaposition of English and Italian transcriptions. In fact, because of the intereference of the two phonetic and phonological systems, traditional conventions were in some cases abandoned in favour of more accurate phonetic transcriptions: this has been done with the aim of illustrating the most remarkable differences between the pronunciation of the words by Italian and English speakers.

This paper is intended to discuss aspects of durational variability of V-to-V intervals in Italia... more This paper is intended to discuss aspects of durational variability of V-to-V intervals in Italian from a phonetically based perspective. Recently, the interest in the phonetic properties underlying rhythm typologies has been growing, also as a consequence of the repeatedly observed weakness of phonological factors in the explanation of rhythmic differences. Timing is only one of the many aspects contributing to language rhythm. The speaker and the text are fundamental sources of variation, in the sense that rhythm depends far more on individual timing strategies than on the phonological structure of a language.

ABSTRACT The present study is motivated by the observation that TTS samples of concatenative synt... more ABSTRACT The present study is motivated by the observation that TTS samples of concatenative synthesis may often sound as a-rhythmic to the human ear. For this reason, we aimed at comparing samples of speech from real speakers (studio recordings) vs. synthetic samples. We followed a fairly complicated procedure in order to obtain comparable samples, including several steps. First, we selected 2000 recorded sentences of (each) English, French, German, Spanish, Italian and Japanese from bigger speech corpora (1 speaker per language). Then, we further divided them into (a) 1500 sentences to be included in the speech-base of the TTS system, and (b) 500 sentences for test. The former 1500 sentences were used to create TTS voices (for each of the six languages), with which we synthesized the latter 500 sentences. We thereby obtained 500 sentences in two flavours, i.e. as recorded samples and as TTS samples. These were all automatically segmented starting from the text, which was itself phonetically transcribed by our in-house software. The result of the transcription and segmentation was then converted to C and V intervals by an ad-hoc script and imported to R for analysis. Pearson's correlation coefficient was calculated for each segment of recorded speech vs. TTS samples. Results show that correlation is high overall (ranging from 0.82 to 0.93 for the six speaker-TTS pairs) and prove that concatenative synthesis is able to reproduce global durational characteristics of speech. Values for the most popular rhythm metrics (deltas, %V, PVIs, CCIs) were also computed and plotted to charts to illustrate durational variability for the samples. Results for recorded samples of the six languages studied here reflect previous results reported in the literature: English and German samples tend to show greater durational variability than French, Spanish, Italian and Japanese; and they tend to have lower vocalic percentage. Results for TTS samples also show the very same trend. In fact, the mean values for each TTS system tends to sit very close to its recorded speech counterpart. Also, it is remarkable that no general trend was found to connect TTS samples with their recorded speech counterpart: that is to say, TTS samples may sometimes show (slightly) more or (slightly) less durational variability of C and V segments: there does not seem to be a general tendency in our data in this respect. We claim that traditional rhythm correlates are global measures that account for average durational variability of speech samples. They are good at giving a general overview of the rhythmic/timing properties of speech, but they are not able to detect specific local a-rhythmical phenomena found in TTS output, which are probably rooted in the prosodic pattern of the sentence. In the future, it would be desirable to develop acoustic indices that are able to detect such phenomena.

Anglophonia, Dec 20, 2020

Cette etude examine la regle d'assimilation progressive de voisement du -s morphemique final ... more Cette etude examine la regle d'assimilation progressive de voisement du -s morphemique final en anglais L2. Nous avons analyse les donnees du corpus IPCE-IPAC de productions orales d'apprenants en mesurant la periodicite de toutes les realisations du -s morphemique et nous avons compare trois groupes de locuteurs : 15 francophones natifs, 15 italophones natifs et 10 hispanophones natifs. En nous appuyant sur les distributions et sur le statut phonologique de [s] et [z] dans les L1 des apprenants, ainsi que sur le SLM (Speech Learning Model) et la MDH (Markedness Differential Hypothesis), nous avons emis l'hypothese que les locuteurs francophones et italophones natifs seraient capables de reproduire la regle d'assimilation de voisement de l'anglais plus facilement que les apprenants hispanophones natifs. Nos predictions ne sont que partiellement confirmees par les resultats obtenus : les apprenants francophones natifs (dont la L1 presente /s/ et /z/ en qualite de phonemes en position finale) reussissent effectivement mieux a reproduire les schemas de periodicite. Cependant, les hispanophones natifs reproduisent la regle de voisement de maniere plus fidele que les italophones natifs. Nous comparons ces resultats avec notre etude precedente sur /s/ et /z/ non-morphemiques par les memes locuteurs et nous les discutons en relation avec la marque de ces deux sons. Nous proposons que l’opposition de voix entre /s/ ~ /z/ pourrait constituer une exception a la hierarchie de la marque pour les contrastes de voix des consonnes obstruantes (debut de mot < milieu de mot < fin de mot), ou la position finale de mot ne se revele pas plus marquee que les autres. De plus, les resultats de nos deux etudes revelent des differences de voisement concernant les sibilantes morphemiques et non-morphemiques dans les productions d’anglais L2 (comme pour l’anglais L1). Cela pourrait avoir des repercussions sur les modeles d’acquisition de la phonologie des langues secondes, car ces modeles ne prennent actuellement pas en compte une interaction entre les sons d’une L2 et leur statut morphologique.

Prosody, phonology and phonetics, 2015

To distinguish between questions and statements, the use of high pitch has been claimed to prevai... more To distinguish between questions and statements, the use of high pitch has been claimed to prevail cross-linguistically. However, the implementation of the high pitch feature may differ across languages and dialects. Terminal rises for questions are probably the most widespread (and French is no exception), but initial high tones and final falls may also be observed in the French variety spoken in Corsica as well as in the Corsican language. This chapter investigates to what extent these patterns can be measured, perceived and interpreted as a prosodic transfer from Corsican to Corsican French. A corpus of transparent sentences (i.e. similar, easily intercomprehensible sentences) such as la touriste trouve la caserne (French) or a turista trova a caserna (Corsican) was designed and the productions of bilingual speakers, recorded in Corsica, were compared with the French counterparts of Parisian reference speakers. Two perception experiments were conducted. The first one, using delexicalisation, focused on the comparison between Corsican, Corsican French and Parisian French question prosodies: it revealed a significant bias of Corsican French question prosody towards Corsican prosody. The second experiment focused on question/statement discrimination: it showed, in particular, that Corsican French questions are often misidentified as statements by Parisian listeners but accurately identified by Corsican listeners. Several (socio)linguistic hypotheses are finally put forth to account for these results.

HAL (Le Centre pour la Communication Scientifique Directe), Dec 31, 2009

HAL (Le Centre pour la Communication Scientifique Directe), Mar 16, 2012

Evolution du projet d'Atlas Multimedia Prosodique de l'Espace Roman (AMPER) lance en 2001... more Evolution du projet d'Atlas Multimedia Prosodique de l'Espace Roman (AMPER) lance en 2001. Explication de la methodologie employee et resultats.

HAL (Le Centre pour la Communication Scientifique Directe), 2017

Prosody represents a fundamental cue in the geographical identification of many Italian dialectal... more Prosody represents a fundamental cue in the geographical identification of many Italian dialectal varieties. Especially in the interrogative modality, prosody can vary according to specific areas. Previous studies, based on the identification of specific prosodic functions, confirmed the fundamental role played by prosodic cues alone. But what happens when prosodic variations are not so obvious? Starting from five dialectal varieties spoken in Italy, we tested whether details characterising dialectal varieties are perceptively distinguishable. We devised an auditory discrimination task with delexicalized stimuli reproducing prosodic cues only. The results show that participants are able to discriminate dialects irrespective of the amount of prosodic distance.

HAL (Le Centre pour la Communication Scientifique Directe), Aug 1, 2019

Evaluating L2 pronunciation via acoustic measures is problematic. In the literature, this is some... more Evaluating L2 pronunciation via acoustic measures is problematic. In the literature, this is sometimes accomplished via fluency metrics (speech rate, average length of IPUs, etc), which however do not capture pronunciation accuracy. Other studies use VOT measurements (only possible if L1 and L2 differ in this respect) or comparison of vowel formants with native values. This contribution uses vowel distances in an F1-F2 space, Pillai scores and classification scores for vowel pairs as acoustic metrics of L2 vowel pronunciation. We compute these metrics on speech produced by 25 learners of L2 English and we compare them with (a) fluency metrics computed on the same productions, (b) VOT measurements, (c) impressionistic judgments provided by native speakers. The advantage of this approach is that L2 pronunciation accuracy is not judged in reference to comparable native productions, but intrinsically: it measures the extent to which phonological vowel contrasts are kept apart in L2 speakers' realisations.

HAL (Le Centre pour la Communication Scientifique Directe), May 22, 2012

This study investigates whether a prosodic transfer can be highlighted from Corsican (an Italo-Ro... more This study investigates whether a prosodic transfer can be highlighted from Corsican (an Italo-Romance language) to French spoken in Corsica, where French is now the dominant language. A corpus of transparent sentences such as la touriste trouve la caserne (French) or a turista trova a caserna (Corsican) was designed and the productions of bilingual speakers, recorded in Corsica, were compared with the French counterparts of Parisian reference speakers. The melody of yes/no questions turns out to contrast Corsican and Corsican French (both with high tones followed by final pitch falls) and standard French (with utterance-final high tones). The former pattern can be interpreted as a prosodic transfer from Corsican to French. Various methods are considered to validate this hypothesis and an experimental paradigm is proposed.

HAL (Le Centre pour la Communication Scientifique Directe), Jun 4, 2012

_________________________________________________________________________________________________... more ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Cet article aborde la question suivante : peut-on mettre en évidence un transfert prosodique du corse (une langue italo-romane) vers le français parlé en Corse, où le français est maintenant la langue dominante ? Un corpus de phrases transparentes en corse et en français telles que a turista trova a caserna (« la touriste trouve la caserne ») a été mis au point, et les productions de locuteurs bilingues enregistrés en Corse ont été comparées avec les contreparties françaises de locuteurs parisiens de référence. Il apparaît que la mélodie des questions totales différencie d'un côté le corse et le français de Corse (avec tous deux des tons hauts suivis de descentes mélodiques finales), de l'autre le français standard (avec des tons hauts en fin de question). Ce premier patron peut être interprété comme un transfert prosodique du corse vers le français. ABSTRACT _________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Corsican questions: is there a prosodic transfer from Corsican to French? This study investigates whether a prosodic transfer can be highlighted from Corsican (an Italo-Romance language) to French spoken in Corsica, where French is now the dominant language. A corpus of transparent sentences such as la touriste trouve la caserne (French) or a turista trova a caserna (Corsican) was designed and the productions of bilingual speakers, recorded in Corsica, were compared with the French counterparts of Parisian reference speakers. The melody of yes/no questions turns out to contrast Corsican and Corsican French (both with high tones followed by final pitch falls) and standard French (with utterance-final high tones). The former pattern can be interpreted as a prosodic transfer from Corsican to French. MOTS-CLÉS : prosodie en contact, questions, accent corse en français, langues en danger. KEYWORDS: prosody in contact, questions, Corsican accent in French, endangered languages.

HAL (Le Centre pour la Communication Scientifique Directe), Jun 21, 2021

HAL is a multidisciplinary open access archive for the deposit and dissemination of scientific re... more HAL is a multidisciplinary open access archive for the deposit and dissemination of scientific research documents, whether they are published or not. The documents may come from teaching and research institutions in France or abroad, or from public or private research centers. L'archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, émanant des établissements d'enseignement et de recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires publics ou privés.

Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, Dec 1, 2021

Where a licence is displayed above, please note the terms and conditions of the licence govern yo... more Where a licence is displayed above, please note the terms and conditions of the licence govern your use of this document. When citing, please reference the published version. Take down policy While the University of Birmingham exercises care and attention in making items available there are rare occasions when an item has been uploaded in error or has been deemed to be commercially or otherwise sensitive.

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Spanish in Context, 2022

We analyse articulation rate and speech rate, number and duration of pauses for 22 speakers of tw... more We analyse articulation rate and speech rate, number and duration of pauses for 22 speakers of two Spanish regional varieties (Madrilenian vs Mexican) in three different tasks (read speech, picture description and interview). Our results show that speakers from Madrid have higher articulation rate and speech rate than speakers from Mexico, but that such differences are mainly observed in spontaneous speech (picture description). Instead, the number and duration of pauses were not significantly affected by the provenance of speakers. Some methodological issues are discussed in order to make legitimate inferences from this exploratory study.