Annotation of details of the gestural score

 

Alphabetic symbols between square brackets [...]
e.g.,

Two transcriptions that differ in at least one symbol represent utterances that may or may not contrast

English:

in "ten times"

in "ten things"

 

Details of gestural score differ from language to language.

Narrow transcription is much harder to learn than broad transcription.

 

What kind of details are represented?

(1) details of gestural overlap

aspiration of initial stops

nasalization of vowels before final nasals

(2) details of gestures' constriction degree and location

degree

Coronal stops and the laryngeal opening gestures "shrink" between stressed and unstressed vowels, and become approximants or "flaps"

e.g., "latest" []

location

Coronal stops are usually alveolar, but are dental before a dental fricative.

in "ten times"

in "ten things"

 

Variation in the narrow transcription of the same word

The same word can have different narrow transcriptions in different contexts.

"miss it" vs."miss you"

 

Sentence recorded at two rates:

"I'm sure I'm going miss you."

 

slow	sentence	"miss" only
fast	sentence	"miss" only

 

Why does this change happen?

The gestural score for the word itself does not change, but when words are put together, they overlap at their edges.

The overlap of other gestures can cause the sound produced by a given gesture to change (if you listen very carefully).

The difficulty we have in perceiving this is probably due to the fact that we perceive the underlying contrastive gestural units, not their context-dependent consequences.

 

"ten times" vs. "ten themes"

 

Overlap of two gestures that attempt to control the same constrictor causes blending of the two gestures.