Given the highly structured nature of intonational phonology, we would expect that intonation could be described by a small set of phonetic parameters, and that inter-speaker variation would be constrained to a few specific parameters within this set. In order to characterise the range of inter-speaker phonetic variation in the realisation of a single phonological specification, it is necessary to refer to a model of the phonetics of intonation whose parameters correspond to tyhe dimensions along which speaker characteristics vary. We present a model of pitch contour generation, originally developed for speech synthesis applications, by which speakers' intonational behaviour can be reduced to just such a small set of phonetic parameters, and we illustrate the range of inter-speaker and intra-speaker variation which this model can produce. Problems with the interpretation of these parameters are also discussed.
Cite as: Monaghan, A.I.C., Ladd, D.R. (1990) Speaker-dependent and speaker-independent parameters in intonation. Proc. ESCA Workshop on Speaker Characterization in Speech Technology, 167-174
@inproceedings{monaghan90_scst,
author={Alex I. C. Monaghan and D. Robert Ladd},
title={{Speaker-dependent and speaker-independent parameters in intonation}},
year=1990,
booktitle={Proc. ESCA Workshop on Speaker Characterization in Speech Technology},
pages={167--174}
}