Computer resources for linguists
Phonetics
Phonetics Lab
Facilities
- The phonetics lab is located in Samuel Alexander W.318. The main room contains PC and Macintosh workstations, equipped with word-processing and phonetic analysis software, that are available for use by LEL students and staff. Dr Yuni Kim is the staff member with overall responsibility and Michael Ramsammy is lab assistant.
- The lab's back room and sound-attenuated chamber can be used for conducting phonetic experiments and making high-quality recordings. Please email michael.ramsammy-2@postgrad.manchester.ac.uk to book these spaces. You can provide your own recording equipment or use the lab's.
Borrowing equipment
- The lab owns several portable audio recorders and microphones that can be loaned out for off-site recording. Priority is given to postgraduate and undergraduate dissertation research. Please contact Michael Ramsammy to find out about equipment available.
Phonetics software
- Praat
Free acoustic analysis software for creating, analysing and manipulating spectrograms, pitch tracks, and much more.
- WaveSurfer
Another free program for acoustic analysis.
- Phonology Assistant
"Phonology Assistant creates consonant and vowel inventory charts and assists the user in searching through the data corpus to do phonetics and phonology." (Link courtesy of Dan Paul.)
- For information on IPA fonts, please see the Word processing resources page.
Making recordings
[to be added]
Phonetics links
- Interactive IPA chart (University of Victoria)
Plays the relevant sounds when characters are clicked.
- Interactive vocal tract
Customize positions of the tongue, lips, and other articulators to see what the vocal tract looks like during the production of different speech sounds.
- UCLA Phonetics Lab Archive
Audio recordings (many with transcriptions) of hundreds of languages. Wordlists as well as spontaneous speech.
- Make your own vowel resonators! (Mark Huckvale, UCL)
Shows how to synthesize vowel sounds with plastic and foam tubes.
- Online phonetics resources (Dr Jennifer Smith, University of North Carolina)
Online tutorials and audiovisual material for acoustic and articulatory phonetics.