Acoustic Characteristics of Greek Vowels

Abstract

Five male speakers produced the vowels of Greek at slow and fast tempo, in lexically stressed and unstressed syllables, and in lexically stressed syllables of words appearing in focus position. Duration, fundamental frequency (F(0)), amplitude, and the frequencies of the first (F(1)) and second formant (F(2)) were measured. The effects on these variables of the phonemic category of the vowel, tempo, stress, and focus were examined. The results indicated that the vowel system of Greek follows universal tendencies in terms of duration but not in terms of F(0) and amplitude. Vowels in focus position, when plotted by their F(1) and F(2) frequencies, defined a vowel space larger than that defined by vowels in any other condition.