4th November 2022 12:20 PM

Phonetics Lab Meeting

We will discuss this reading on unsupervised phonological feature learning, available here.

4th November 2022 06:00 PM

The ASL Literature Series: The Flying Words Project performs at Kennedy Hall

The Cornell Linguistic Department's ASL/Deaf Studies Program is proud to sponsor a performance by The Flying Words Project  at Call Auditorium, Kennedy Hall on Friday, Nov 4 6-7:30PM. 

Flying Words consists of Peter Cook and Kenny Lerner.  Peter is the chairperson for the Deaf Studies/ASL-English Interpretation program at Columbia College in Chicago, IL. Kenny Lerner is a senior lecturer of history at the Rochester Institute of Technology/National Technical Institute for the deaf in Rochester, NY

Their performance is part of the Fall 2022 ASL Literature Series.  

Abstract:

The work of Peter Cook and Kenny Lerner is a beautiful and fascinating combination of American Sign Language (ASL), movement, visual theater, and above all, extraordinary poetry.

Deaf American Sign Language poet Peter Cook presents three dimensional imagery while collaborator Kenny Lerner’s spoken words allow the hearing portion of the audience to literally see the ASL image and become lost in the movement. Together they create a moving tapestry uniquely accessible to both deaf and hearing audiences.

Two of the pioneers of ASL poetry, they have been at the center of this radical cultural movement since it’s modern inception in the early 1980s. Performing all over the world for over 30 years, they have helped to establish not only an artistic form (Deaf Poetry in ASL) but also have contributed a new vision of poetry itself.

This collaboration commenced in 1984 when Cook and Lerner began performing poetry together. They soon established the only deaf poetry series in the U.S. at that time which culminated in the First National ASL Literature Conference in 1992. Flying Words has been featured at the Poetry Days Festival (Dzejas Dienas,) in the Latvian towns of Liepia and Riga. They have also performed at the 36th International Poetry Festival in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, Kent State University, the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, Harvard University, and last summer (2022) in the Annikki Poetry Festival, Tampere, Finland. In addition, in 2019, Flying Words was proud to present the keynote address at the American Literary Translators Association Conference in Rochester, NY.

Flying Words has been the recipients of grants from the New York State Council of the Arts, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Puffin Foundation and are the authors of four DVD anthologies.  

9th November 2022 12:20 PM

PhonDAWG - Phonetics Lab Data Analysis Working Group

Today we'll read Binna's conference abstract and provide feedback. Zoom will be live.

10th November 2022 04:30 PM

Linguistics Colloquium Speaker: Josef Fruehwald

The Department of Linguistics proudly presents Dr. Josef Fruehwald,  Assistant Professor of Linguistics at the University of Kentucky. 

 Dr. Fruehwald will speak on "Sound Change? Incrementation? Diffusion?".

Talk Abstract:

Many subfields of linguistics have an interest in "Sound Change" either as a topic in and of itself or as phenomenon to explore other phonetic, phonological, cognitive, or social questions.

While we do have a common vocabulary ("sound change", "actuation", "incrementation", "diffusion") and a common set of phenomena ("s-shaped curves"), these commonalities can obscure underlyingly incommensurate conceptualizations of *how* sound change happens.

One model, more common from phonetics or laboratory phonology, I'll call the "Uptake Model", whereby sound change spreads much like the uptake of other social or technological innovations, with "early adopters" and the gradual accumulation of new "users."

Another model, more common from sociolinguistics and sociophonetics, I'll call the Participation Model, whereby all members of a language community *participate* in a change. The Uptake Model, or versions of it, appears to be more commonly presupposed, and often form the underpinning of agent-based simulations of language change.

However, I'll argue, on the basis of quantitative analysis of a large diachronic speech corpus (the Philadelphia Neighborhood Corpus) that the Participation Model seems better supported by naturalistic data.

Bio:

Dr. Fruehwald is an Assistant Professor in the Linguistics Department at the University of Kentucky. His interests within linguistics are sociolinguistics, variation and change, phonetics, and phonology.