Morris Halle

Preliminaries to speech analysis : the distinctive features and their correlates

This work attempts to describes the ultimate discrete components of language, their specific structure, and their articulatory, acoustic, and perceptual correlates, and surveys their utilization in the language of the world. First published in 1951, this edition contains an added paper on Tenseness and Laxness.

Acoustic Properties of Stop Consonants

The two major cues for stop consonants, the burst of the stop release and the formant transitions in the adjacent vowel, were investigated. Detailed energy density spectra of the bursts were prepared. The transitions were studied by means of sonagrams. Possible criteria for identification were developed and tested. In order to assess the efficacy of the two types of cue, perceptual tests were conducted with isolated segments that contained either stop bursts or vowel transitions alone. Common acoustical properties of bursts and formant transitions are noted; differences as well as similarities are discussed in the light of different varieties of pitch judgments.

Speech recognition: A model and a program for research

A speech recognition model is proposed in which the transformation from an input speech signal into a sequence of phonemes is carried out largely through an active or feedback process. In this process, patterns are generated internally in the analyzer according to an adaptable sequence of instructions until a best match with the input signal is obtained. Details of the process are given, and the areas where further research is needed are indicated.

Spectral Properties of Fricative Consonants

Energy density spectra of gated segments of fricative consonants were measured. The spectral data were used as a basis for developing objective identification criteria which yielded fair results when tested. As a further check gated segments of fricatives were presented for identification to a group of listeners and their responses evaluated in terms of the objective identification criteria.

Some controversial questions in phonological theory

In the first issue of this journal, Fred W. Householder discussed two papers of ours which he found defective in various respects. We feel that the issues involved are important and deserve the fullest clarification. We will therefore discuss Householders objections and the underlying issues in some detail, reiterating points that have been made in the aforementioned papers and elsewhere and making no attempt to avoid redundancy if this can contribute to clarity.

On Feature Spreading and the Representation of Place of Articulation

Since Clements (1985) introduced feature geometry, four major innovations have been proposed: Unified Feature Theory, Vowel-Place Theory, Strict Locality, and Partial Spreading. We set out the problems that each innovation encounters and propose a new model of feature geometry and feature spreading that is not subject to these problems. Of the four innovations, the new model-Revised Articulator Theory (RAT)-keeps Partial Spreading, but rejects the rest. RAT also introduces a new type of unary feature-one for each articulator-to indicate that the articulator is the designated articulator of the segment.

ON STRESS AND ACCENT IN INDO-EUROPEAN

Ablaut, the grammatically conditioned vowel alternations found in e.g. English sing vs. sang vs. sung, is one of the most characteristic features of the Indo-European languages. The different ablaut grades seem to be related to the position of the accent in Proto-Indo-European. A good understanding of the relationship between accent and ablaut in Proto-Indo-European requires thorough analyses of the role played by the two phenomena in the Indo-European daughter languages. The aim of the volume is to present the state of the art in current work on accent and ablaut in Proto-Indo-European and its daughter languages. The contributors analyse the interplay between accent and ablaut with attention both to theoretical aspects and to the specific linguistic material. Presenting up-to-date overviews of the models developed by various schools of thought, the contributors discuss a wide array of empirical as well as methodological problems, thus opening up vistas for further research.

Unexpected Plural Inflections in Spanish: Reduplication and Metathesis

We examine the puzzling displacement in various Spanish dialects of a plural suffix from a verb where it is motivated semantically, syntactically, and morphologically onto a following clitic. We present previously unreported data and a new analysis of this material that succeeds where earlier efforts fail to provide a unified account of related phenomena. Our solution, which employs recent work on reduplication and metathesis, allows us to account for seemingly disparate phenomena as special cases of a single general framework and demonstrates that these operations are more versatile than previously thought. Directions for future research are indicated.

The Accentuation of Russian Words.

This paper reviews the accentual patterns found in the various inflectional paradigms of Russian and develops a number of rules to characterize these patterns. It then surveys the most common accentual patterns found in different types of word formation, and discusses the manner in which the rules developed in the first part of the paper account for these patterns. A number of theoretical issues in phonology (cyclic rule application, the role of disjunctive ordering, etc.) are briefly discussed, as are certain accentual phenomena in other, mainly Slavic, languages.*

The Stress of English Words 1968–1998

The article begins with reflections on the theory of Chomsky and Halle 1968, which constituted a new departure in phonology. The indebtedness of the theory to Chomsky 1951 is noted, and certain inadequacies in the theory are discussed as well as the ways these were overcome in subsequent work, including Idsardi 1992. The revised theory is illustrated with an improved account of English word stress that includes a new treatment of the Rhythm Rule, in particular, of contrasts such as necdte vs. elctrde; vowel shortening in poststress position (e.g., slivte (cf. salva), nfamous (cf. famous)); and weak syllable effects (Burzio 1994) (e.g., Lombardy but Lombrdi).