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19th November SSF - Jalal Al-Tamimi

19 November 2020, 4:00 pm–5:00 pm

Please join us on November 19th for Dr. Jalal Al-Tamimi's talk, "The role of the epilarynx in the production of guttural consonants in Levantine Arabic: An Ultrasound Tongue Imaging study"

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Dr. Antony Scott Trotter – Speech, Hearing and Phonetic Science
07504204514

Talk Title: The role of the epilarynx in the production of guttural consonants in Levantine Arabic: An Ultrasound Tongue Imaging study

Abstract:

In this presentation, I will be evaluating the role of the epilarynx in the production of guttural consonants (i.e., uvular, pharyngealized, pharyngeal and glottal) in comparison with plain coronal consonants. We will look at the impact of larynx raising and tongue retraction, as a combined gesture, in explaining the gradience in epilaryngeal constriction. Following the “Laryngeal Articulator Model” (LAM, Esling, 2005; Esling, Moisik, Benner, & Crevier-Buchman, 2019), an epilaryngeal constriction leads to a raised larynx posture that induces retraction of the tongue due to constriction of the hyoglossus muscle, which pulls the tongue in a combined back and down gesture. Epilaryngeal consonants are expected to have this type of constriction, whereas pharyngeal/pharyngealized are expected to show partial “retraction” and uvular show nil “retraction”. The study looks at synchronised recordings of Ultrasound Tongue Imaging (UTI), Electroglottography (EGG) and acoustic data obtained from 10 Levantine Arabic speakers (5 males, 5 females) producing 21 consonants in Arabic in a /ʔVV1CVV2/ frame with three subsequent repetitions (VV = symmetric /iː aː uː/; C = plain /t d ð s z l/, velar /k ɡ x ɣ/, uvular /q/, pharyngealized /tˤ dˤ ðˤ sˤ zˤ lˤ/, pharyngeal /ħ ʕ/ and glottal /h ʔ/; n = 2034 items). Dynamic (multiple intervals within VCV) and static analyses are evaluated. We use GAMMs for UTI data, Convolutional Neural Networks (CNN) and random forests for acoustic data (bark-difference and voice quality metrics) and larynx height and constriction for EGG data. The results point to the use of tongue retraction as a gradient rather than categorical, in addition to changes associated with voice quality in gutturals. I discuss the implications of these results in the lights of LAM.

About the Speaker

Dr. Jalal Al-Tamimi

Senior Lecturer at Department of Linguistics, Newcastle University

I am a Senior Lecturer in experimental phonetics and phonology interested in examining the links between production, perception and learning/acquisition.

I received my BA in Jordan at Yarmouk University, Irbid in Modern Languages: French and English Language and Literature in 1998. I moved to France to Lyon II University where I obtained two BAs: BA in Teaching French as a Foreign Language (FLE) in 1999, and a BA in Language Sciences in 2000. I then obtained two MA degrees in Language Sciences, option Phonetics and Phonology in 2001 and 2002. I started working on my PhD in 2002 at the University Lyon 2 on the role of Dynamic cues in Production and Perception of vowels in Arabic and French, and earned my Diploma in 2007. I started working at the University of Newcastle in December 2007 as a Research Associate with Dr. Ghada Khattab on the Acquisition of Phonology by Lebanese Arabic speaking children. In September 2013, I was appointed as a Lecturer in Phonetics, then from August 2019, I am Senior Lecturer in Phonetics at Newcastle University.

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