Core 103 Human Speech
Weekly Schedule
Spring 2024
Weekly Schedule Subject to Change — Always check back for current status
Week 1
Lecture 1 January 9: Introductions and Course Overview
Read and bookmark: Syllabus and this Weekly Schedule [also bookmarked on our Slack channel]Review: Collection of USC Support ResourcesReading Due: DSWM Chapter 1;What is Correct Language" Ed Finegan;Prof Anne Curzan "What makes a word 'real'?"
Vocal Tract Anatomy
Reading Due: DSWM Chapter 2 Section 1 pp. 23-39Odyssey "Speech: Dances of the Vocal Tract" by Rubin & GoldsteinFun Website: [dissection videos] Slo-Mo Gargling; When Something Goes Down the "Wrong Tube" ; Tongue MusclesREMEMBER to fill out your required Lang Info Sheet. And find our Slack Channel.
Lecture 2 January 11: English Sounds
Reading Due: DSWM Chapter 2 Section 1 Fun Website: Real-time MRI IPA Chart collected here at USCTwo handouts for you to print and keep: mini IPA Chart for English Sounds; English Contrasts (These are combined into a single pdf here, albeit slightly smaller.)Weekly Discussion Meeting (Friday): Introductions
Items labeled "Fun" or "Optional" are optional, but encouraged time-allowing.
I recommend printing [or at least downloading] "Handouts" to bring to class on the day indicated and for later reference.
You will not necessarily be reminded regarding when homework is due; keeping up with this is your responsibility.
Week 2
January 15 Monday is a University Holiday
Lecture 1 January 16 Transcription
Reading Due: DSWM Chapter 2 Section 1 pp. 39-50Handouts: Bring handouts from Week 1Some sites for practicing English transcriptionLecture 2 January 18: Speech Acoustics: Waveforms and VOT
Reading Due: DSWM Chapter 2 Section 2 pp. 51-56Handout: Waveform Examples; And another handout that will will bring to class for youAfter lecture: A video on Voice Onset Time (in English) [note that "prevoicing" = "negative VOT"] from Matt Win (8:30 minutes)Optional Website (for after lecture and reading): Will Styler on MondegreensWeekly Discussion Meeting: Transcription of English Sounds
Assignment Released: HW1 Transcription Homework. This clickable IPA chart website might be very helpful for 'typing' (copy & paste) IPA symbols.Week 3
Jan 23 Optional Tuesday Night Activity (5-5:30 Freshmen; 5:30-6 all others): Intro Zoom Chats with Professor Byrd
Lecture 1 January 23: Speech Acoustics: Source Filter Theory
Reading Due: DSWM Chapter 2 Section 2 pp. 56-64Handout: Johnson Spectrum Handout (Print or download these to have in class for lecture); Source Filter Handout (courtesy of Louis Goldstein)A video recap of Source Filter Theory (from Matt Win)Fun Website: The Resonant BridgeLecture 2 January 25: Formants and Vowels
Reading Due: DSWM review Chap 2 Section 2Handout: A Course in Phonetics Vowel spectra handoutOptional Web Material: Kevin Russell's Acoustic Phonetics pagesFun Website: Make your own spectrogram (requires microphone access)Weekly Discussion Meeting: Waveforms and VOT, Downloading and Using Audacity
Assignment Due at beginning of section: HW1Assignment Released: HW2 Measuring Soundwaves
Week 4
Lecture 1 January 30: Spectrogram practice and Sounds of the World's Languages [SOWL]: Cs & Vs
Reading Due: DSWM Chapter 3 Section 1 pp. 72-82Handout (supplements to lecture rather than covered explicitly in lecture): Complete IPA Chart; Bruce Hayes's Spectrogram HandoutFun Websites: What are voiced and voiceless plosives (aka stops)?UCLA Language Index for Sounds of the World's Languages and Vowels and Consonants; Talking IPA Chart or IPA with real-time MRI video from USC Span (click on individual phonetician)Optional reading: Gibbs "Saving Dying Languages" Scientific American 2002Lecture 2 February 1: SOWL: Non-Pulmonic Consonants (Airstream Mechanisms)
Reading Due: A Course in Phonetics Ladefoged & Johnson pp. 144-159 (pdf) with accompanying language samplesFun Website: Find Indigenous Languages Around the GlobeWeekly Discussion Meeting Activity: Acoustics
Assignment Due: HW2Week 5
Lecture 1 February 6: SOWL: Phonation Type and Tone
Reading Due: DSWM Chapter 3 Section 1 pp. 83-88; Optional Reading: A Course in Phonetics Ladefoged & Johnson pp. 264-272 (pdf) with accompanying language samples"What it means to sound gay?" (pdf)--Washington Post July 28 2015Fun website: What is vocal fry?Optional Assignment Due Monday: Test Bank Question due. Please follow the requirements!
Lecture 2 February 8: Varieties of English
Reading Due: Three articles: NYT Everyone has an Accent; Smithsonian Mag on US Accents and, for a better account, on Vowel ShiftingJamila Lyiscott TedSalon 2014 "3 Ways to Speak English" (we plan to listen to this in class)
Optional: Linguists hear an accent begin (Scientific American, 5 min audio);NYTimes Newsletter: CELF (Clinical Evaluation of Language Fundamentals)-5 test and children who speak Black EnglishNicole Holliday's lecture "It's in the tone": how we make sociolinguistic judgments based on the acoustic properties of the voice and what language can tell us about identity and inequality. [28 min]Some terminology is in DSWM Chapter 3 Section 2 pp. 89-97
Fun websites: 22 Maps That Show How Americans Speak English Totally Differently From One Another; Your 'personal' dialect map; The Cambridge Online survey and its results; [may only work in Firefox or Explorer] Accents of English (JC Wells); The speech accent archive
Weekly Discussion Meeting Activity: Test Review
Assignment Released: HW3 English VarietyWeek 6
Lecture 1 February 13 Test 1 (material from Week 1 - Week 5 Lecture 1 only)
Lecture 2 February 15: Puzzles of the Speech Signal: Lack of Invariance & Lack of Segmentability
Reading Due: DSWM Chapter 5 Section 1 pp. 114-124Myers "From Sound to Meaning" Physics Today 2017Weekly Discussion Meeting Activity: Intro HW 3
Week 7
Monday Feb 19 is a USC Holiday
Lecture 1 February 20: Sine Wave Speech, McGurk Effect, and Word Segmentation
Reading Due: DSWM Chapter 5 Section 1 pp. 125-127 (and Videos below)Required Videos: Your Brain: Perception Deception Documentary NOVA PBS (53 minutes; pls watch at least to 40 min);Professor Pascal Wallisch "Neuroscientist Answers Illusion Questions" (22min)
Optional Reading after lecture: Does Sensory Modality Matter? Not for speech perception by L. Rosenblum
Lecture 2 February 22: Speech Perception: Categorical Perception
Reading Due: DSWM Chapter 5 Section 2-3 (pp. 127-149); HandoutRecommended Reading: Language Files File 9.4 [pdf starts @file p. 29]]Optional: Video Re-cap of Categorical Perception from Matt Win [just listen to 1:40-8:15]Weekly Discussion Meeting Activity: Categorical Perception Lab Introduced
Assignment Released: Categorical Perception Experiment released for Paper One
Week 8
Lecture 1 February 27: Speech Perception (cont.): Categorical Perception, Infant Language Acquisition
Reading Due: Finish reading DSWM Chapter 5 P. Eimas, "The Perception of Speech in Early Infancy" Scientific American [pdf]Two Videos to watch if you miss these in class today: (5 min) Janet Werker on the Conditioned Head Turn procedure(10 min) The Linguistic Genius of Babies--TED talk by Pat KuhlOptional reading: The Ins and Outs of Baby Talk – Linda Polka and Yufang Ruan; Language Files Chapter 8, Files 8.0-8.2 [only] starts at p. 30 of the pdfLecture 2 February 29: Speech Perception (cont.): Duplex Perception
Reading Due: Start DSW Chapter 7;Your mental dictionary is part of what makes you unique − here's how your brain stores and retrieves wordsOptional: Know your Brain: Mirror Neurons (Marc Dingman)
Optional Assignment Due: Test Bank Question due. Please follow the requirements!
Weekly Discussion Meeting Activity: Test Review, CP Assignment Help
Week 9
Lecture 1 March 5: Phonology
Reading: Finish both readings from Week 8 Lect 2 (DSW Chapter 7 and Your Mental Dictionary)Lecture 2 March 7: Test 2 on campus (material from Week 5 Lect 2 - Week 9)
NO SECTION MEETING — HAPPY SPRING BREAK
Spring Break March 11-15 !!
Week 10
Lecture 1 March 19: Bilingualism
Reading Due: Language Files 12 Chapter 8, File 8.5 (p. 345-348); "Bilingualism" by Gigi Luk (5 pages)Leon Panetta: Americans are losing out because so few speak a second language. 37 maps that explain how America is a nation of immigrants (Vox)Optional/Fun Readings: From the New Yorker on Hyperglots "The mystery of people who speak dozens of languages" ; "How the Finnish survive without small talk"; What language does your state speak; Washington Post Op-Ed: " Trudeau says he wants to tackle systemic racism. He should start with this policy" or [pdf]Random Fun Website: 20 awesomely 'untranslatable' words from around the world or YouTube: Otherwords "Foreign words we need in English"
Wednesday March 20: Assignment Due: Paper One Categorical Perception Experiment
Lecture 2 March 21: Bilingualism (cont.)
Reading Due: Being Bilingual Changes the Architecture of Your Brain (Wired Magazine)Optional: [What is executive function]; [But...The battle over bilingualism & exec functionFun Websites: Podcast on the benefits of bilingualism (28 min)Weekly Discussion Meeting Activity: Finding and choosing your research article for your paper and presentation
Assignment Released: Paper Two Self-Selected Research Article CritiqueOptional support reading for Paper 2: DSWM Chapter 4Week 11
Lecture 1 March 26: Heritage Language Speakers (Guest Speaker Professor Zuzanna Fuchs)
Reading due: Language induces an identity crisis for the children and grandchildren of Lati, Optional Reading: "Forgetting my first language" Jenny Liao, The New Yorker; Heritage languages and heritage speakers (book chapter) pdf pages 1-16, 22-28
Assignment Due on Wednesday: proposed Research Article Critique--submission of proposed article due to Prof Byrd's dropbox for approval
Lecture 2 March 28: Healthy Hearing
Reading Due: DSWM Chapter 2 Section 3 pp. 65-71; Chapter 11 (up to "Voice Disorders") pp. 266-276Required Videos: Audiologist Answers Hearing Questions;Optional: ASHA Websites on Hearing Loss and on Newborn Hearing Screening;
The beautiful, mysterious science of how you hear: Jim Hudspeth Ted talk (15 min)--we will watch part of this in classA pretty good online hearing test from Dr. Ir. Stéphane Pigeon -- need silence and headphones
Weekly Discussion Meeting Activity: Thinking about Experimental Methods and Design; Strengths & Pitfalls: What to look for in assessing a scientific article.
Week 12
Lecture 1 April 2: Hearing Loss and Hearing Technologies
Reading Due: Intro to Comm Disorders: Chapter 12 333-352;"This common habit can ruin your hearing and increase dementia"
Handout to print: Common Misconceptions About Hearing [website] [pdf]Required Video: How Technology has Changed What It's Like to be Deaf: Rebecca Knill Ted talk (14min)
Optional Reading: Bionic Hearing: When to get a cochlear implant. Experimental Brain-Controlled Hearing Aid Automatically Decodes, Identifies Who You Want to Hear;Optional Websites: NYT FDA clears path for hearing aids to be sold over the counter.
Lecture 2 April 4: Sign Languages
Reading Due: DSWM Chapter 9 pp. 224-234 only;Hickock, Bellugi, & Klima "Sign language in the brain" Scientific AmericanVariation in ASL: Signing Black in America - more about this project at www.talkingblackinamerica.orgOptional Websites: Do Sign Languages have Accents?; Sign Language Isn't Universal; Map of Sign Language Families;
Three Eng to ASL Video Dictionaries: Signing Savvy; Handspeak; Lifeprint Optional Reading: Helmuth "From the mouths (and hands) of babes" Science MagazineOptional reading: (somewhat technical): "The Remarkable Cochlear Implant and Possibilities for the Next Large Step Forward " Blake S. Wilson
Instead of Section this week, there is a movie for you to watch on your own (which has required 'pre'-reading). If you just can't do this assignment, please at least check out Knill's TED talk.
- Documentary MOVIE (2000, i.e., 20 yrs old): "Sound and Fury" (1hr 30m)
1 point HW EC for writing up three questions/observations about the movie; due to Dropbox Tues Apr 11.
- 2010: "The pediatric cochlear implant: Genocide or medical miracle?" (download link at left)
- 2018: NYT Op Ed "A clearer message on cochlear implants."
- 2020: How Technology has Changed What It's Like to be Deaf: Rebecca Knill TED talk (14min)
Week 13
Lecture 1 April 9: Speech and Voice Disorders
Reading Due: DSWM Chapter 11 remainder (pp. 276-281); Intro to Comm Disorders Chapter 8 225-235, Chapter 9 247-262Optional Reading: The Atlantic "What Joe Biden Can’t Bring Himself to Say";Washington Post: "What men should know about cancer that spreads through oral sex" [pdf]; NYT Illicit E-Cigarettes Flood Stores;When speech goes wrong: Evidence from aphasia (Sheila Blumstein)Optional website to review: This American Life: Act One Time Bandit (24min); American Speech and Hearing Association,
About Vaping: Vaping and Public Health; E-cigarettes: Facts, stats and regulations; What Vaping Does to the Body (YouTube Institute of Human Anatomy [includes dissection video])Resources for quitting vaping: KickIt CA, Truth Initiative, smokefree.gov
Optional documentary movie "When I Stutter" (director John Gomez; 1hr7min); required in order to do alternate HW 4.
Note that if you want to do the alternate HW 4 on Atypical Speech/Hearing (instead of the Text-to-Speech Synthesis HW4), you will need to watch both documentaries: "Sound & Fury" and "When I Stutter."Lecture 2 April 11: Speech Technologies: Hearing Aids, Synthesis, and Recognition
Reading Due: Speech Synthesis: Toward a "Voice" for All. H. Timothy Bunnell State of the art: WaveNet and Google try-it available here (scroll down a bit); and GoogleDeepMind EATS (end-to-end adversarial test-to-speechFun Websites: A collection of some speech synthesis sites ; Kid tries to train Google Home; Meet the Woman Behind Amazon Alexa; A commercial with Susan Bennett (the voice of Siri)Weekly Discussion Meeting Activity: Intro HW 4(s); presentation & paper workshopping
Assignment Released HW4 Two choices: HW4-choice 1 Online Speech Synthesis and Recognition Trials (Please wait until after Thursday lecture before starting this)OR HW4-choice 2: An Interview of someone with atypical speech or hearing (prereqs include watching both documentaries "Sound & Fury" and "When I Stutter")
Week 14
Optional Drop-in OFFICE HOUR with Haley on Monday 2-3:30 (GFS 337).
No Friday Sections; Haley OFFICE HOUR ONLY, FRIDAY 12-2 (GFS 337 or via zoom)
Oral Article Critique Presentations in class this week
Tuesday April 16: Class Oral Presentations (in person attendance required and recorded)
Questions on classmates' presentations due Friday.
Lecture April 18: Finish Presentations
Friday April 19: Assignment Due: Questions on classmates' presentations due to dropbox
Sunday April 21 WRITTEN ARTICLE CRITIQUE DUE BY MIDNIGHT: Research Article Written Critique [Word doc preferred, pdf accepted. No Google docs.]
Week 15
Lecture 1 April 23: Speech Technologies (continued)
Optional Reading: Markowitz on "Voice Biometrics", The Ethics of a Deepfake Anthony Bourdain Voice Helen Rosner Or "In the age of AI, do we have a right to die in peace"Fun Websites: "How computers parse the ambiguity of everyday language"; "Alexa, Siri, and Google Don’t Understand a Word You Say"For those with a deeper more technical interest:Keetan Doshi: Audio Deep Learning Made Simple: Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR), How it Works;1.5 hour high-level lecture by Preethi Jyothi on Automatic Speech Recognition
Lecture 2 April 25: Speech Errors; Class Conclusion and Evals
Reading: Your Mental Dictionary (repeated from Week 8 in case you didn't get to it)Optional Reading: Language Files Chapter 17 Practical Applications [of Linguistics]Weekly Section Meeting: Final meeting and Test Review
Optional Test Bank Question due Apr 27. Please follow the requirements
HW4 Due Wednesday May 1.
Test 3 (in final exam slot) (material Weeks 10-15 [only], i.e. not cumulative).
Wednesday May 8 2-4pm . This will be administered on Zoom (remote) in this time slot (only).