Core 103 Human Speech

Weekly Schedule

Spring 2026 -- Schedule under development

Spring 2026

Weekly Schedule Subject to Change — Always check back for current status

DSWM readings support material primarily covered in lecture, and will rarely introduce additional or new material.
Readings from Intro to Comm Disorders will be provided as pdfs.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.DSWM = textbook Discovering Speech, Words, and Mind Byrd & Mintz (associated website); also available electronically from the Libraries.
You will not necessarily be reminded regarding when homework is due; keeping up with this is your responsibility.

Week 1

Lecture 1 January 13: Introductions and Course Overview

Read and bookmark: Syllabus and this Weekly Schedule [also bookmarked on our Slack channel]Review: Collection of USC Support Resources
Reading 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 Muscles

Please install Slack and fill out info sheet linked there on the class channel (which you should automatically be a member of).

Lecture 2 January 15: 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

Week 2

January 15 Monday is a University Holiday

Lecture 1 January 20 Transcription

Reading Due: DSWM Chapter 2 Section 1 pp. 39-50Handouts: Bring handouts from Week 1Some sites for practicing English transcription

Lecture 2 January 22: 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 Mondegreens

Weekly 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 27: 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 Bridge

Lecture 2 January 29 Formants, Vowels, and Spectrograms

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: HW1
Assignment Released: HW2 Measuring Soundwaves

Week 4

Lecture 1 February 3: 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 2002

Lecture 2 February 5: 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 Globe

Weekly Discussion Meeting Activity: Acoustics

Assignment Due: HW2

Week 5

Lecture 1 February 10: 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 12: Varieties of English

Reading Due: Three articles: NYT Everyone has an Accent; Smithsonian Mag on US Accents (and for a better account, on Vowel Shifting), Californian Spoken Here [pdf] (altaonline)
Optional: Linguists hear an accent begin (Scientific American, 5 min audio);Nicole Holliday's lecture "It's in the tone": how we make sociolinguistic judgments based on voice and language. [28 min]Some terminology is in DSWM Chapter 3 Section 2 pp. 89-97.
Jamila Lyiscott TedSalon 2014 "3 Ways to Speak English" (we plan to listen to this in class)
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 Variety

Week 6 (Monday holiday)

Lecture 1 February 17 Test 1 (material from Week 1 - Week 5 Lecture 1 only)

Lecture 2 February 19: 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 2017

Weekly Discussion Meeting Activity: Intro HW 3

Week 7

Lecture 1 February 24: 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 26: 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

Assignment Due: HW3

Week 8

Lecture 1 March 3: 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 pdf

Lecture 2 March 5: 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 10: Phonology and Speech Errors

Reading: Finish both readings from Week 8 Lect 2 (DSW Chapter 7 and Your Mental Dictionary)

Lecture 2 March 12: Test 2 on campus (material from Week 5 Lect 2 - Week 9)

NO SECTION MEETING — HAPPY SPRING BREAK

Spring Break March 15-22 !!

Week 10

Lecture 1 March 24: 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)Washington Post Global Opinions Op-Ed 2020 on Canada's Official Languages Act [pdf].
Optional: 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
Optional Readings on Heritage Language speakers: Language induces an identity crisis for the children and grandchildren of Lati, "Forgetting my first language" Jenny Liao, The New Yorker
Random Fun Website: 20 awesomely 'untranslatable' words from around the world

Wednesday March 25: Assignment Due: Paper One Categorical Perception Experiment

Lecture 2 March 26: Bilingualism (cont.)

Reading Due: Being Bilingual Changes the Architecture of Your Brain (Wired Magazine)BBC Scotland Dr. Thomas Bak Podcast on the benefits of bilingualism (28 min, pls listen at least to 18min)
Optional: [What is executive function]; [But...The battle over bilingualism & exec function

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 4

Week 11

Lecture 1 March 31: Heritage Language Speakers (Guest Speaker Professor Zuzanna Fuchs)
Reading due: "Many second- and third-generation Latinos feel insecure about their Spanish-speaking abilities", 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 April 2: 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 OR the Apple iPodsPro and the newest iOS

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 7: Deafness, 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"; Cochlear Implants can bring the experience of sound [The Conversation]
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 implantOptional Websites: NYT FDA clears path for hearing aids to be sold over the counter.

Lecture 2 April 9: Sign Languages

Reading Due: DSWM Chapter 9 pp. 224-234 only
Optional Websites: Do Sign Languages have Accents?; Sign Language Isn't Universal; Map of Sign Language Families;
Three English to ASL Video Dictionaries: Signing Savvy; Handspeak; Lifeprint Optional Video: Variation in ASL: www.talkingblackinamerica.org 27 minOptional Reading: Helmuth "From the mouths (and hands) of babes" Science Magazine (2 pages)

Between Friday and Monday: Choose one of these two award-winning documentary movies to watch (of course, if you want, you can watch both). Movie A is about deafness and the emergence of the cochlear implant 20 years ago; Movie B is about stuttering.
Extra Credit for writing up three questions/observations about the movie; due via email.

Documentary A: "Sound and Fury" (1hr 30m) from 2000

Required brief pre-reading/watching BEFORE movie (note the differing dates for each of these materials, as these ideas have matured over time):

2010: "The pediatric cochlear implant: Genocide or medical miracle?" (download link at left)
2018: NYT Op Ed "A clearer message on cochlear implants."

Documentary B: "When I Stutter" (director John Gomez; 1hr7min)

Week 13

Lecture 1 April 14: Speech Disorders: Stuttering, Cleft Palate, Degenerative Neuromotor Disorders

Reading Due: DSWM Chapter 11 remainder (pp. 276-281); Intro to Comm Disorders Chapter 8 225-235, 243-246Video: In a short (8 min) documentary, John Hendrickson describes the frustration of having a stutter (New York Times)Informational website: American Speech and Hearing Association,
Optional Readings: The Atlantic "What Joe Biden Can’t Bring Himself to Say"When speech goes wrong: Evidence from aphasia (Sheila Blumstein)Audio performance: This American Life: Act One Time Bandit SCROLL DOWN to find this item (24min)

Lecture 2 April 16: Voice Disorders: Laryngeal dysfunction, oropharyngeal cancer and remediations

Reading Due: Intro to Comm Disorders Chapter 9 247-261Washington Post: "What men should know about cancer that spreads through oral sex" [pdf]We have a vaccine for six cancers; why are less than half of kids getting it?
Info 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

Weekly Discussion Meeting Activity: Intro HW 4(s); presentation & paper workshopping

Assignment Released HW4: An Interview of someone with atypical speech or hearing

Week 14

Optional Drop-in OFFICE HOUR on Monday TIME (GFS 337).

No Friday Sections; OFFICE HOUR ONLY, FRIDAY TIME (GFS 337 or via zoom)

Oral Article Critique Presentations in class this week

Tuesday April 21: Class Oral Presentations (in person attendance required and recorded)
Questions on classmates' presentations due Friday.

Lecture April 23: Finish Presentations

Friday April 24: Assignment Due: Questions on classmates' presentations due to dropbox

Sunday April 26 WRITTEN ARTICLE CRITIQUE DUE BY MIDNIGHT: Research Article Written Critique [Word doc preferred, pdf accepted. No Google docs.]

Week 15

Lecture 1 April 28: Speech Technologies

Reading due: Markowitz on "Voice Biometrics", The Ethics of a Deepfake Anthony Bourdain Voice Helen Rosner; Speech Synthesis: Toward a "Voice" for All. H. Timothy Bunnell Fun Websites: "How computers parse the ambiguity of everyday language"; "Alexa, Siri, and Google Don’t Understand a Word You Say", Kid tries to train Google Home; Meet the Woman Behind Amazon Alexa; A commercial with Susan Bennett (the voice of Siri)
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 30: finish speech tech; Class Conclusion and Evals

Weekly Section Meeting: Final meeting and Test Review

Optional Test Bank Question due Apr 27. Please follow the requirements

HW4 Due Wednesday May 6.

Test 3 (in final exam slot) (material Weeks 10-15 [only], i.e. not cumulative).

DATE FORTHCOMING ???Tues May 12 11-1 or Wed May 14 2-4??? . This will be administered on Zoom (remote) in this time slot (only).

May 15 Commencement

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Date Last Modified: Feb 2025Art Credit: Lena Foellmer

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