Proposal

"FAU SPEAKS"
Student-Led Acoustic Laboratory Research Project

-        Desktop and laptop computers (laptops to enable students to conduct fieldwork on site)

-        Speech analysis software

-        Recording equipment (highly portable, enabling students to conduct on-site field work)

-        Airflow and pressure measurement

-        Speech synthesis and voice recognition equipment and software

-        Statistical analysis software

-        Two microphones

-        Two headsets

The laboratory/research hub is to be physically located in the Department of Languages, Linguistics, and Comparative Literature, inside CU 238. This is a small departmentally-allocated office space, and it is advantageously located because of its interior-hallway position, its distance from both building stairwells, and its reduced window footprint. All of these factors combined will mean less exposure to building vibration and ambient noise pollution.

The lab is intended for student use, both through formal class structures and through independent student research / community initiatives.

Use of the lab will be required for the following FAU courses:

(1) LIN 3010 "Introduction to Linguistics" (on average, 150 students a year take this course). Students are to use the lab in order to bring a real-life experiential/experimental dimension to phonetics and phonology as major subfields of the field of linguistics (the scientific study of human language).

(2) LIN 4326 "Contrastive Phonology" (on average, 30 students a year take this course). Students will use this lab to understand how linguists and cognitive scientists (including psychologists and speech pathologists) use equipment such as that contained in the laboratory to undertake phonetic and phonemic comparisons between different languages, between different dialects or versions of the same language, and between scientifically "pathological" speech (speech with notable defects) and "normal" speech. The latter is of particular relevance for ANY student who wishes to pursue a career in medical audiology, in speech pathology, or in elementary education.

(3) LIN 4930 and LIN 6938 "Phonetics and Phonology" (graduate and undergraduate levels; on average, 60 students a year will take these courses). Again, students will use the room both for purposes of becoming familiar with the scientific equipment used to record and document human speech sounds, and at the graduate level, for purposes of conducting more in-depth phonetic research through the collection of a significant audio data corpus.

Use of the lab will be highly recommended for students in the following FAU courses:

(1) LIN 2607, an IFP core course entitled "Global Perspectives on Language" (on average, 450 students per year take this course). The course explores the complex relationship between language and culture, and analyzes the differences between the multiple "Englishes" that exist across the globe today. It also examines the interplay between race, ethnicity, and media reception of language in the United States. The course is an ideal jumping-off point for an in-depth research project which would aim at collecting a wide variety of speech samples from FAU students, with further analysis of the variety and types of languages and speech variability reflected in the FAU, and in the wider South Florida, population.

(2) LIN 4600 "Sociolinguistics", a course that gives an introduction to the study of language and linguistic behavior as influenced by social and cultural factors. Also an ideal course for inspiring students to undertake FAU community research projects which would aim at collecting a wide variety of speech samples from FAU students, with further analysis of the variety and types of languages and speech variability reflected in the FAU, and in the wider South Florida, population. The voice-recording equipment in the lab (which is all portable) could be taken into the field easily by students, thus allowing them to conduct groundbreaking community outreach work in conjunction (for instance) with academic service learning or other outreach opportunities.

(3) LIN 4620 "Bilingualism", a course that focuses on language and cognition, language acquisition in the bilingual child, bilingual influences upon learning, and psychological aspects of bilingualism, especially in Spanish-speaking South Florida communities. Again, the voice-recording equipment in the lab (which is all portable) could be taken into the field easily by students, thus allowing them to conduct groundbreaking community work involving language, psycholinguistics, and neurocognition in the context of bilingualism.

Use of the lab will be highly encouraged for all GTAs involved in teaching language or articulatory phonetics, whether in the Department of Languages, Linguistics, and Comparative Literature (Arabic, Chinese, French, German, Hebrew, Italian, Japanese, or Spanish) or in another department or college.

Use of the lab will also be open to undergraduate students who are taking language courses and who wish to use scientific / experimental means to receive highly specific and directed feedback about their articulatory phonetics in order to improve their accent in the target language. In this context, the lab would be of special interest also to the Department of Theater and Dance and the Department of Music.

Three (3) Dell laptop computers (see price quote)
(Latitude E7440) (x3) = $5,231.70

Three (3) Dell desktop computers (see spec sheet for more details; also has price quote)
 (x5) = $6,000

One (1) Serial Response Box for recording sound and participant interviews / responses; portable for field work on site
(PST-100991) =  $550.00

LLCL will work with partners across the college and the university to build high visibility for the projects and student communities using this research/project hub space. LLCL is particularly interested in developing an FAU-specific database which will track the composition (acoustic, phonetic, and thus also socio-cultural) of the FAU student population over time to see how it changes, how those changes are reflected in phonetic/acoustic data, and what these changes in the FAU student population might tell us about larger population (or cultural) shifts taking place in South Florida in general.

The "FAU SPEAKS" project is keenly interested in working to reinforce the visibility of FAU in the local community and in South Florida, and in demonstrating the important role that student-led initiatives can have in creating this link.