title: Uncovering the acoustic vowel space of a previously undescribed language: The vowels of Nambo.
abstract: This study presents the first acoustic description of the vowel space of a Papuan language-Nambo, spoken in southern Papua New Guinea-based on duration and first and second formant measurements from 19 adult male and female speakers across three age groups (young, middle-aged, senior). Phonemically, Nambo has six full vowels /i, e, æ, ɑ, o, u/ and a reduced vowel tentatively labeled /ə/. Unlike the full vowels, the quality of /ə/ showed great variation: seniors' and young females' realizations tended to be more open and retracted than those by young males, while middle-aged speakers' productions fell between these two variants.
authors.affiliation: Linguistics, School of Culture, History and Language, College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University, HC Coombs Building #9, Acton, Australian Capital Territory 2601, Australia.
authors.forename: Eri
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Kashima
authors.affiliation: Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language, Australian National University, HC Coombs Building #9, Acton, Australian Capital Territory 2601, Australia.
authors.forename: Daniel
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Williams
authors.affiliation: Linguistics, School of Culture, History and Language, College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University, HC Coombs Building #9, Acton, Australian Capital Territory 2601, Australia.
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Mark Ellison
authors.affiliation: Linguistics, School of Culture, History and Language, College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University, HC Coombs Building #9, Acton, Australian Capital Territory 2601, Australia.
authors.forename: Dineke
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Schokkin
authors.affiliation: The MARCS Institute for Brain, Behaviour and Development, Western Sydney University, Building 1, Bullecourt Avenue, Milperra, New South Wales 2214, Australiaeri.kashima@anu.edu.au, daniel.williams@uni-potsdam.de, m.ellison@anu.edu.au, dineke.schokkin@anu.edu.au, paola.escudero@westernsydney.edu.au.
authors.forename: Paola
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Escudero
mesh_terms: D000162:Acoustics; D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010219:Papua New Guinea; D010700:Phonetics; D012737:Sex Factors; D012815:Signal Processing, Computer-Assisted; D013018:Sound Spectrography; D013061:Speech Acoustics; D013068:Speech Production Measurement / Q000379:methods*; D013997:Time Factors; D055815:Young Adult