Cross-linguistic phonetics and morphology using a time-aligned multilingual reference corpus built from documentations of 50 languages: Big data on small languages

语速和停顿为我们提供了一个窗口，认知神经和生理发音基础的人类语言生产系统，但在这一领域的跨语言的变化仍然研究不足。该项目通过对50种不同语言的自发口语进行比较研究填补了这一空白。为此，我们创建了一个多语言参考语料库的语言文档数据（DoReCo），包括注释和相关的录音，这些录音存档在存储库，如语言档案（TLA），特别是从DOBES集合。DoReCo将建立在已经转录的数据基础上，翻译成一种主要语言，并在话语单元一级与音频文件进行时间对齐。在目前的项目中，这些数据将在音素级别上进行时间对齐。我们已经确定了至少50种语言，其中至少10，000个单词的语料库可以包含在DoReCo中，并且其中至少30个的子集已经另外注释了词素中断和词素注释。在DoReCo中，子语料库和注释被视为可引用的出版物，提供永久标识符并与CC BY 4.0许可证相关联。DoReCo将产生超出DoReCo项目具体研究目标的持久影响，作为一个平台，可以轻松访问来自50多种语言的超过100万字的注释语料库数据，用于口语的跨语言研究。这对有关全球语言多样性和文化遗产的开放、可复制科学做出了前所未有的贡献。DoReCo的两个具体研究目标都涉及到人类语言因全物种的发音和认知特性而受到限制的普遍性：第一、我们研究语音延长的模式，目的是在以下方面建立普遍的与特定语言的模式：（i）不同类型的语音片段在持续时间上发生变化的程度（如元音与不同类型的辅音）-反映发音和知觉的约束-和（ii）作为主要与次要韵律边界的指示词的最后延长-反映规划和潜在的信令话语单位的认知约束。其次，我们调查普遍与语言特定模式的词素的时间分布方面（一）信息率，每秒钟的词素和（ii）词素的停顿间单位的数量都反映了认知语言使用的限制。该项目将由一个跨学科团队开展，该团队汇集了文献语言学，语音学，类型学和定量语言学方面的专业知识，并得到了德国和法国两个领先研究中心的大力支持。

Speech rate and pauses provide us with a window into the cognitive-neural and physiological-articulatory bases of the human language production system, but crosslinguistic variation in this domain remain understudied. This project fills this gap by comparative studies of spontaneously spoken language in a diverse sample of 50 languages. For this purpose, we create a multilingual reference corpus of language documentation data (DoReCo) consisting of annotations and associated audio recordings that are archived at repositories such as The Language Archive (TLA), especially from the DOBES collection. DoReCo will be built from data that are already transcribed, translated into a major language, and time-aligned at the level of discourse units with audio files. Within the current project, these data will be time-aligned at the phoneme level. We have identified at least 50 languages, from which corpora of at least 10,000 words can be included in DoReCo, and a subset of at least 30 of these, which are additionally already annotated for morpheme breaks and morpheme glosses. In DoReCo, subcorpora and annotations are treated as citable publications, provided with a permanent identifier and associated with a CC BY 4.0 license. DoReCo will have a lasting effect beyond the specific research goals of the DoReCo project, as a platform for easy access to over one million words of annotated corpus data from over 50 languages for cross-linguistic research on spoken language. This represents an unprecedented contribution to open, reproducible science regarding global linguistic diversity and cultural heritage. Both of DoReCo’s two specific research goals address the universality of constraints on human language arising from species-wide articulatory and cognitive properties: Firstly, we investigate patterns of phonetic lengthening with the aim towards establishing universal vs. language-specific patterns in (i) the degree to which different types of phonological segments undergo variation in duration (e.g. vowels vs. different types of consonants)–reflecting articulatory and perceptual constraints–and (ii) word-final lengthening as indicative of major vs. minor prosodic boundaries–reflecting cognitive constraints on planning and potentially signalling discourse units. Secondly, we investigate universal vs. language-specific patterns in the temporal distribution of morphemes regarding (i) information rate in terms of morphemes per second and (ii) the number of morphemes in inter-pausal units–both reflecting cognitive constraints on language use. The project will be carried out by an interdisciplinary team bringing together expertise on documentary linguistics, phonetics, typology, and quantitative linguistics, with strong institutional support from two leading research centres in Germany and France.