…It’s how you say it
Julia Hirschberg
CS 4706
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Intonation Features
• Intonational Contours
– Pitch accents (f0, intensity,duration)
– Phrasing (pause, f0, duration)
• Minor (intermediate) phrases
• Major (intonational) phrases/breath groups
• Other Pitch variation (f0)
– Pitch range
– Final lowering
• Intensity/loudness (rms,db)
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• Timing
– Speaking rate (syls per sec)
– Pausal duration
• Voice quality (degree/manner of glottal
closure)
– Hoarseness, breathiness
– Pressed, creaky, tense, harsh, whispery voice
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Intonation and Syntactic Structure
• PP attachment:
– You should buy the ticket with the discount coupon.
• Clause attachment
– If you need me when you get there call me.
• Modifier scope:
– This fare is restricted to retired politicians and civil
servants
• Relative clauses
– My friend who likes to cook came to visit.
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Acoustic/Prosodic Phenomena
• Phrasing
• Accent
• Speaking rate
We only suspected they all knew that a burglary
had been committed.
Simple complement
Parenthetical
Right node raising
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Intonation and Semantics
• Scope ambiguities
– Negation
You aren’t booked through Rome because of
the fare.
– Quantifiers
John only introduced Mary to Sue.
– Modals
Dogs must be carried.
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Acoustic/Prosodic Phenomena
• Accent
• Phrasing
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Intonation and Discourse
• Information status
– Given/new information
• S: Do you need a return ticket.
• U: No, thanks, I don’t need a return.
– Contrast (narrow focus)
• U: No, thanks, I don’t need a RETURN…. (I need a
time schedule, receipt,…)
• Discourse markers
Now what I’d like is a nice piece of pizza.
Whatever I said I’d like a pizza.
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• Reference resolution
– Strict/sloppy interpretations of ellipsis
People who live in Los Angeles adore it’s
beaches and so do people who live in New
York.
George likes his mother and so does Sue.
George did his homework and so did Sue.
• Speech acts (statements, questions,
requests)
That’ll be credit card
Can you open that window
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• Discourse/topic structure
I’m afraid we don’t have time to finish the
experiment today.
What a shame.
We can’t pay you the $10.
Can you come back tomorrow?
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Acoustic/Prosodic Phenomena
• Pitch range, final lowering
• Timing
• Intonational contour, phrasing, pitch
accent
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‘Paralinguistic’ Information
• Emotion (anger, happiness, love)
• Propositional attitude (uncertainty)
Did you feed the animals?
I fed the goldfish (Rise/Fall/Rise)
• Level of speaker engagement
Really
REALLY
• Personality
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How do these phenomena generalize?
• Across individuals and groups?
• Across languages?
• Across cultures?
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Prosodic Disambiguation of Syntactic and
Semantic Ambiguity
• Intonational disambiguation across
languages: Spanish, Italian and English
(w/Avesani & Prieto)
William isn’t drinking because he’s unhappy
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The Phenomenon
• Bill doesn’t drink because he’s unhappy.
• The presence of none of the professors
will embarrass her.
• He only wounded Anne.
• He even embraced the policeman.
• He managed to find the woman with the
binoculars.
• He had spoken to her quite clearly.
• The professor who loves jelly beans died
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in terrible agony.
The Issues
• Do speakers consistently disambiguate
potentially ambiguous utteranced
intonationally?
• Do native speakers of different languages
employ similar methods of disambiguation
for similar ambiguities?
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Studies
• Avesani et al 1995; Hirschberg&Avesani
1997
• Production studies comparing English,
Italian and Spanish speakers (4 per
language) and then English and Italian
• Potentially ambiguous utterances
embedded in contexts to disambiguate:
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English
I know William very well. Since his girlfriend left
him, he’s done nothing but drink. It’s been such a long
time since his separation, that he’s used to living
alone. Now, William doesn’t drink because he’s
unhappy. He drinks because he’s an alcoholic.
There’s something about William that puzzles me.
When he’s happy, he has a good time with his friends,
and certainly he doesn’t dislike drinking. I think I
understand what’s wrong. William doesn’t drink
because he’s unhappy.
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Spanish
Conozco a Guillermo muy bien. Desde que su novia le
dejo, no ha hecho nada mas que beber. Despues de
tanto tiempo de su separacion, se ha acostumbrado a
vivir solo. Ahora, Guillermo no bebe porque esta
triste. Simplement, porque es un alcoholico.
Ha algo de Guillermo que no me convence. Cuando le
veo feliz, se que se lo pasa, bien con sus amigos, y que
no le desagrada beber. Creo que se lo que le pasa.
Guillermo no bebe porque esta triste.
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Analysis
• Target utterances excised and labeled for
– Intonational contour
– Relative prominence of pitch accents
• Different ambiguity contexts compared
within languages to find common patterns
• Common patterns compared across
languages
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Results
• Scope of negation similarly disambiguated
between wide and narrow readings by
variation of intonational phrasing (one phrase
vs. two)
– Spanish and Italian speakers also varied nuclear
stress placement (on verb for wide)
– English speakers also used continuation rise for
wide, falling for narrow
Bill doesn’t drink because he’s unhappy.
• PP-attachment disambiguated by phrasing
variation (for Italian speakers)
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• Quantifier scope disambiguated by varying
nuclear stress placement and phrases (for
Italian, Spanish, 2 English subjects)
• Association with focus: only consistently
disambiguated by all three
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How do other languages use intonation to convey
information?
•
•
•
•
Syntactic ambiguity
Semantic ambiguity
Discourse phenomena
‘Paralinguistic’ information
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Next class
• Readings: Johnson, Chapters 1 and 2
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