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Department of Linguistics

Dr Felicity Cox

Research in Progress

My current research activities focus around five major projects:

1.   The Australian Ancestors Project. This research involves an acoustic phonetic analysis of historical speech data and continues to provide important insights into the history of Australian English and the nature of sound change in language generally. The extensive historical database generated by this project contains valuable material for the examination of current phonetic theories and through this work we are developing new methods and techniques in quantifying language change.

2.   The acoustic examination of Ethnocultural Varieties of Australian English: Through this project we are able to contribute to the discussions of new dialect development, ethnocultural varieties and the role of metrical structure in segmental articulation. We will additionally be able to provide data for forensic purposes as there are currently no extensive databases available for these diverse varieties of Australian English.

3.   The articulatory and acoustic examination of /l/ variation in Australian English: This research involves the investigation of velarised /l/, its coarticulatory effects and its realisation in super-heavy syllables. The use of electropalatography, electromagnetic articulography, ultrasound and standard acoustic analysis in the examination of /l/ will further enhance our understanding of the relationship between various hierarchical levels in speech production. The production of /l/ is interesting from a phonetic perspective because Australian English is progressive with respect to /l/ sandi. This project will shed new light on the processes by which syllables are constructed in different dialects.

4.   The Australian Voices Project. This work is based on our long term commitment to the sociophonetic analysis of Australian English and involves the examination of accent variation that occurs within Australia. The aim is to construct a model to accurately depict sociophonetic variation and ultimately a speech atlas for Australian English. Our research is paramount if we are to provide satisfactory current information on accent variation and differentiation in Australia.

5.   The relationship between production and perception in sound change. The aim of this project is to examine WHAT major sound changes have occurred in Australian English during the past century, explore WHY certain sound changes have occurred, and investigate HOW the observed sound changes have spread through the lexicon.

Research Grants Awarded

  • 2011 ARC Discovery Grant, $205,000 Phonological effects on the development of inflectional morphology, Demuth, Cox, & Shattuck-Hufnagel

  • 2010 ARC Linkage Infrastructure Equipment and Facilities Grant, $650,000 The Big Australian Speech Corpus:An Audio-Visual Speech Corpus of Australian English, Burnham, Cox, Butcher, Fletcher, Wagner, Epps, Ingram, Archiuli, Togneri, Rose, Kemp, Cutler, Dale, Kuratate, Powers, Cassidy, Grayden, Loakes, Bennamoun, Lewis, Goecke, Best, Bird, Ambikairajah, Hajek, Ishihara, Kinoshita, Tran, Chetty, Onslow

  • 2010 MQSIS Research Infrastructure Block Grant, $75,000 "A dual pulse magnetic stimulator for the study of brain excitation and inhibition in human movement studies" Sowman, Finkbeiner, Crain, Harrison, Cox, Brock, Savage, Johnson, Friedman, Mannell.

  • Macquarie University Research Development Grant $34289 The Sydney Accent: Regional and Social Variation, Cox & Palethorpe

  • 2009 Macquarie Strategic Infrastructure Scheme $40,039 MEG polygraphic equipment Coltheart, Crain, Thompson, Stevenson, Savage, McMahon, Mannell, Cox, Williams, Rich, Finkbeiner, Polermo, Johnson.
  • 2008 Linguistics Department Graduate Research Assistant Scheme $4,914 Cox
  • 2008 Macquarie Strategic Infrastructure Scheme – Research Infrastructure Block Grants. Kids' Science Club: A Children's Research Register at Macquarie University: $32,858, McArthur, Kohnen, Castles, Palermo, Warburton, Thornton, Crain, Jensen, Brock, Johnson, Bowes, Cupples, Rapee, Cox, Hudson, Lyneham, Porter, Robbins
  • 2007 Macquarie Research Infrastructure Block Grants. Ultrasound: Nickels, Finkbeiner, Coltheart, Palethorpe, Cox & Harrison, $62,000 plus $10,000 from Division.
  • Department of Linguistics Researcher Grant (2007) Frequency effects and short front vowel raising in Australian English, $10,000

  • Macquarie University Safety Net Grant (2006) An Acoustic Phonetic Study of Historical Sound Change in Australian English, F. Cox and S. Palethorpe, $20,000

  • Macquarie University Safety Net Grant (2005) Australian English Pronunciation in the 19th Century, F. Cox and S. Palethorpe, $19,000

  • Macquarie University New Staff Member Grant (2004) A Reconstruction of Australian English Vowel Pronunciation at Federation $18,000

  • Macquarie University Flagship Grant (2002) Phonetic and Phonological Teaching and Learning Resources for Phonetics, Speech Pathology, Applied Linguistics and Speech Technology, Hall, Mannell, Cox, Barker, Armstrong, Palethorpe, Tent, Knox, Carey. $40,000

  • ARC Seeding Grant Macquarie University (1998) Rural Australian English. F. Cox and S. Palethorpe. $20,000

  • Small ARC Grant (1998) A Comparison between Australian and New Zealand English. F Cox, J Harrington, C Watson. $10,000

 

 

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