An acoustic and electroglottographic study of breathy phonation in Gujarati.

While it has long been established that breathy and modal vowels in Gujarati can be reliably distinguished based on the H1‐H2 measure [Fischer‐Jorgensen (1967); Bickley (1982)], and that Gujarati listeners attend solely to H1‐H2 when distinguishing phonation types in Gujarati and in other languages [Bickley (1982); Esposito (2006)], new research [Khan and Thatte (2009)] suggests that in more casual speech styles, H1‐H2 may play a smaller role in distinguishing breathy‐modal minimal pairs. In such speech styles, additional acoustic measures (e.g., H1‐A3, CPP, and rms energy) are more effective in distinguishing breathy and modal vowels for some speakers. To more closely examine the phonetics of breathy vowels in casual speech, the current study examines both acoustic and electroglottographic data collected from naturalistic productions of breathy‐modal minimal pairs. Preliminary data suggest that while all speakers distinguish modal and breathy vowels, the strategies used by each speaker to produce the contrast vary considerably. [Work supported by NSF.]