Phonetic characteristics such as duration, pitch and loudness are cues to phonological quantity. I am interested in how speakers process these messy and gradient phonetic cues as tidy phonological representations. In particular, I have looked at the relationship between vowel height and duration. I have also tried to understand what the differences are between quantity systems in different languages. I have spent lots of time trying to understand the ternary consonant duration distinction in Inari Saami. I’ve also struggled with the complementary quantity system of Swedish. Again, I have collaborated with various people on these topics; for example, Patrik Bye, Elin Sagulin, Roxana-Maria Barbu and Adam Stone.
2019. Detecting foreign accents in song. With Marly Mageau, Can Mekik, and Ashley Sokalski. Phonetica 76 (6): 429–447. Pre-final version available here.
2019. The phonetics of code-switched vowels. With Kasia Muldner, Leah Hoiting, Leyna Sanger and Lev Blumenfeld. International Journal of Bilingualism 23(1): 37-52.
2015. The production and perception of intrinsic vowel duration. With Adam Stone. Talk given at the University of Edinburgh and the University of Oxford.
pdf
2015. Language mixing and the phonetics of vowels. With Marilou Guillemette, Leah Hoiting, Eric Iacono, and Kasia Muldner. Talk given at CUNY Phonology Forum
2014. Vowel height and duration. With Lev Blumenfeld, Andrea Gormley, Leah Hoiting, John Logan, Nalini Ramlakhan
and Adam Stone. Proceedings of WCCFL 32.
pdf
2012. Systems of Phonological Quantity. Talk given at the s International Conference of Nordic and General Linguistics, Freiburg.
pdf.
2009. Phonetic duration, phonological quantity and prosodic structure in Inari Saami. With Patrik Bye and Elin Sagulin. Phonetica 66(4): 199–121.
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2007. Saami Linguistics. Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 288. Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins. With Diane Nelson.
Book website
Student work:
Adam Stone explored vowel height and duration in his Master’s thesis The production and perception of vowel height and duration (2015). He conducted a psycholinguistic experiment on the perception of vowel duration. His results suggest that high vowels are perceived as being shorter even when they are not.
Marly Mageau’s Master’s thesis Foreign accents in song and speech (2016) also focusses on the phonetics of vowels.