The standard method of describing phonation for tone, vocal register, stress and other linguistic categories relies on the ' continuum hypothesis ' that linguistic sounds are produced by means of glottal states determined by the aperture between the arytenoid cartilages, the endpoints of the voiceless-voiced continuum being 'open glottis' and ' closed glottis '. This paper takes a different view, pointing out that many languages make use of a number of valves, and that these valves are not articulations on a glottal continuum but represent a synergistic and hierarchical system of laryngeal articulations. These valves constitute a principal source of phonological contrast, with an influence on how oral articulatory events are characterised.

BACKGROUNDVowels are usually described as lingually high or low and front or back. This conceptualization implies a model of lingual movement within the dimensions of a square space -four-cornered in two-dimensional terms -with the tongue moving up or down and from front to back. The tongue is usually represented in this model as the articulator responsible for changes in vowel quality along the high-low and front-back dimensions. This can be called the H-L-F-B model. The frameworks of the vowel quadrilateral, or the vowel triangle, have long represented auditory events in an articulatory way for graphic representational purposes. The image of the tongue moving high in the mouth or back in the mouth, however, does not conform with a growing body of articulatory evidence on pharyngeal phonetics. Neither is it as useful an image as it could be for understanding how sound quality is shaped by articulator movement, vocal tract postures, and resulting cavity resonances.

Recent laryngoscopic observations suggest that renewed discussion of pharyngeal articulations is warranted. The discussion involves issues of place of articulation — the nature of the category “epiglottal” — and of manner of articulation — whether pharyngeal manners of articulation go beyond approximant and fricative to include trill and stop. In essence, the question is still the old one of how those sounds which are labelled auditorily as “pharyngeal” are produced. The observations reported here suggest that “epiglottal” articulations can be treated as a category of pharyngeal manners of articulation; and that manners of pharyngeal articulation are more closely parallel to uvular manners of articulation than previously assumed. The nature of pharyngeal approximants and pharyngeal fricatives is reexamined, evidence of trilling accompanying friction is presented, and the nature of the pharyngeal (epiglottal) stop is described. It is suggested that all four of these categories share a common place of articulation, and that they can best be described as differing in manner of articulation. The motivation for elaborating the phonetic detail of these distinctions is to facilitate a more precise description of phonemes that have been identified as pharyngeal in the languages of the world, and to provide a clearer explanation of phonetic and phonological processes that may be related to pharyngeal articulations.

Voice quality settings can be used to characterize ESL students' accents and to help non-native speakers of English improve their pronunciation. The concept of voice quality settings is discussed, drawing from the descriptive phonetic methodology of Abercrombie, Laver, Honikman, and Esling. A broad model of the voice quality setting of one variety of English spoken in North America is described, and settings in other languages are identified. Finally, suggestions for making students aware of their own settings are presented.

Particular voice qualities are often associated in people's minds with particular languages. This is evident in the literature which has been covered and reviewed by Laver (1975: Ch. 2). These qualities have been variously referred to with such terms as ‘organic basis or basis of articulation’ (Sweet, 1906: 74), ‘articulatory setting’ (Honikman, 1964), ‘a quasi-permanent quality’ (Abercrombie, 1967: 91) and ‘voluntary long-term muscular settings of the larynx and vocal tract’ (Laver, 1970: 525).

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(2014). A study of laryngeal gestures in Mandarin citation tones using simultaneous laryngoscopy and laryngeal ultrasound (SLLUS) In this work, Mandarin tone production is examined using SIMULTANEOUS LARYNGOSCOPY AND LARYNGEAL ULTRASOUND (SLLUS). Laryngoscopy is used to obtain information about laryngeal state, and laryngeal ultrasound is used to quantify changes in larynx height. With this methodology, several observations are made concerning the production of Mandarin tone in citation form. Two production strategies are attested for low tone production: (i) larynx lowering and (ii) larynx raising with laryngeal constriction. Another finding is that the larynx rises continually during level tone production, which is interpreted as a means to compensate for declining subglottal pressure. In general, we argue that larynx height plays a supportive role in facilitating f0 change under circumstances where intrinsic mechanisms for f0 control are insufficient to reach tonal targets due to vocal fold inertia. Activation of the laryngeal constrictor can be used to achieve low tone targets through mechanical adjustment to vocal fold dynamics. We conclude that extra-glottal laryngeal mechanisms play important roles in facilitating the production of tone targets and should be integrated into the contemporary articulatory model of tone production.

While the history of interest in voice quality dates back at least as far as Henry Sweet (e.g. 1890), there was for many years little agreement on how to classify voice quality or how to transcribe it as part of a phonetic transcription. Indeed, there is not even agreement on precisely what the term covers in that it is often restricted to aspects of voice quality derived from vocal fold activity, rather than the fuller meaning which encompasses features derived from supralaryngeal settings of the articulators. Authors such as Nolan (1983) have used the phrase long-term quality as an alternative; however, in this article we will retain the traditional term but with a wide application to account for voice quality derived from airflow features, vocal fold activity, and supralaryngeal activity.