ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book describes a wide range of languages and areas of research. It presents a survey of methods for visualizing the shapes and movements of the vocal tract during speech in real time. The book also describes the use of state-of-the art archival research methods to document the phonetic properties of endangered and under-researched languages. It examines the phonetics of voice, including the vibrations of the vocal folds and their acoustic and perceptual consequences, as well as the use of voice properties to form phonological and lexical contrasts. The book reviews the cortical structures that are enlisted during the auditory and audiovisual perception of speech. It considers the role of vowel-inherent spectral change in vowel identification and theories of talker normalization, the mechanism by which listeners accommodate to changes in the acoustic properties when the same vowel is spoken by different talkers.
