Contribution of the tongue tip retraction in the articulation of high vowels

Abstract

This study shows that the retraction of the tongue tip contributes to the raising of the tongue body in the articulation of high vowels /i/ and /u/ by using qualitative simulations of tongue deformation by using a biomechanical 3D tongue model of Artisynth (Lloyd et al. 2012) and the analysis of tongue configuration in X-ray microbeam data (Westbury 1994). The simulations qualitatively replicated the tongue shapes at the temporal mid-point of /i/ and /u/ in rtMRI data by manipulating the activation values of tongue muscles in Artisynth. The results show that the tongue tip retraction helps to raise the tongue body higher in both /i/ and /u/. In the simulations of /i/, the tongue tip retraction raises the tongue body even without moving the tongue body. The results of x-ray microbeam analysis confirm those findings of simulations. The mixed linear regression model of tongue configurations in the tasks of sentence and paragraph production shows that more tongue tip retraction (a shorter horizontal distance between two anterior tongue pellets) significantly correlates with a higher position of the tongue body (higher one between two posterior tongue pellets) in both /i/ and /u/ and the correlation is stronger in /i/ than in /u/.

Variation in the articulation of Russian stressed vowels and the mechanics of palatalization in consonants

“…These properties of the GGp partially explain its role in maintaining airway patency for breathing, since it has the ability to pull the tongue root away from the posterior pharyngeal wall without fatiguing, even when lying supine (e.g., while sleeping). A further consequence of tongue root advancement, however, is tongue dorsum advancement, as demonstrated by Jang (2018) and Buchaillard et al (2009) using biomechanical models of the tongue. Tongue dorsum advancement during GGp activation is a consequence of the fact that the tongue is a muscular hydrostat and must preserve its total volume (Gilbert et al 2007).…”