This article presents a model of a proficiency test for objectively evaluating the French pronunciation of advanced English-speaking students. A survey of different techniques is made. The specific techniques described allows for testing of phonemic, phonetic and prosodic competency. A sample correction grid is included. (CLK)

A study of the utterances of young children, aged 7 to 22 months, is described. These utterances, varying in length from one to 17 syllables, contain only suprasegmental information because the verbal content was incomprehensible to hearers who were not acquainted with the child and the situation in which the utterances occured. In the corpus,…

The tone-changing rules in Central (Standard) Thai are traditionally analyzed as having five contrasting tones--mid, low, high, falling, and rising. (Abramson's graph of the fundamental frequency variations for single vowel Thai syllables illustrates these five tones.) Theoretically, each tone may be part of any Thai syllable. Any Thai syllable…

One characteristic of Japanese pitch accent is that there is the so-called "flat" accent, which has no fall or nucleus. This type of accent exists not only in Standard Japanese but in many dialects, including Kyoto. But the flat types are different in the Tokyo and Kyoto dialects. In the Tokyo dialect, the first syllable always has a low…

Under the assumption that, with the exception of certain learned, retarded, and borrowed words, the bulk of any language undergoes sound changes that are regular over any given geographical area, over any given time span, and in any given sound environment, these sound changes have been reduced to logical terms and have been programmed to generate…

This annotated bibliography, which has been entered into the SOLAR Bibliography File, focuses on the phonetics and phonology of tone, including studies on the physiology of phonation and pitch control, pitch perception, inherent pitch of vowels, the interaction of tone with musical melody in tone languages, and other related issues. An attempt has…

This paper represents a preliminary attempt to determine universals of grammatical development in children. On the basis of language acquisition data, a limited number of findings are presented in the form of suggested developmental universals. These universals are grouped according to the psychological variables which may determine them, in the…

The protocol materials on phonology in black nonstandard dialects prepared for use by a group of elementary teacher trainees are described. The thirteen phonological concepts studied include: (1) free variation of sounds or full phonemes; (2) the loss of the /r/ phoneme, except in initial position in a syllable; (3) the omission of final single…

The 22 entries of this bibliography constitute a survey of linguistic literature published between 1914 and 1973 on forestress and afterstress in noun compounds and phrases in English. The bibliography is actually divided into three sections. In Part 1, the introductory remarks, a summary of the various approaches to the problem of compounds and…

Two experiments are reported which explore (1) into what categories do native listeners divide the perceived pitch contours of their language; (2) into what perceptual units can these overall contour structures be further broken down; and (3) what is the range of tolerance for each unit? (Author/RM)

This articles discusses intonation in terms of different kinds of contours and demonstrates the inadequacy of any approach to English intonation which treats contours as sequences of significant pitch levels. (NCR)

A report on a study in which twenty adults were tested for their ability to reproduce accurately the articulatory and prosodic features of three languages in which they had received instruction. The goals were to partially test the "critical period for language learning" and the acquisition of a nativelike accent. (AMH)

This study was conducted to evaluate prospective teachers of English as a Foreign Language in their command of suprasegmental features of the American English sound system. Also investigated were gender differences of teacher candidates at two Egyptian universities in performance on two linguistic measures. Results are discussed. (Author/MT)

Presents the phonological system of the Zhangpu dialect and the characteristics that differentiate it from the other Southern Min dialects. Notes that the phonological system of the Zhangpu dialect is close to the Zhangzhou dialect but that the aspirated affricate /+s'-/ in Zhangzhou is the voiceless fricative /s-/in Zhangpu. (SED)

A speech visualizer which provides a student with an immediate reinforcement in the form of a visual "feedback" of his own performance is vastly superior to other methods of teaching prosodic elements of speech in a second language, according to experiments carried out at the University of Toronto. (CFM)