Toronto Working Papers in Linguistics (TWPL), Volume 32
© 2010 B. Elan Dresher
Laboratory phonology:
Community or cult?
B. Elan Dresher University of Toronto
Editors’ Note: This is the original version of the column for Glot International 6,1, January 2002. It was deemed to be too controversial at the time it was written, and was revised to
“Invisible Laboratories.” We now present, here, for the first time, the original version.
What is laboratory phonology? According to the Acknowledgements to Kingston and Beckman 1990, the term was coined by Janet Pierrehumbert for a 1987 conference whose theme was the relationship between phonology and phonetics. That conference was the first of a successful series that still continues, and has given rise to a number of volumes under the name Papers in Laboratory Phonology.
Despite the success of the series and its increasing familiarity, the conjunction of the terms
“laboratory” and “phonology” is still somewhat incongruous. In conventional usage, phonology is the study of how speech sounds pattern in languages, and is a part of the grammar of a language.
Phonetics is the study of the physical, articulatory, and acoustic aspects of sounds. Phonetics has always needed a laboratory if it was to advance beyond impressionistic description of sound. But there are no phonology labs just as there are no syntax or semantics labs. This is not to say that phonology should not or has not taken into account the results of phonetic research. For that matter, many distinguished researchers have been both phonologists and phoneticians. But until recently, what phonologists did when they entered a lab was phonetics.
So, apart from designating a series of conferences and volumes, what is laboratory phonology? Is it a meeting place for phonologists and phoneticians to jointly study matters of mutual interest? Or is it more than that, a research paradigm that takes a particular approach to phonological theory itself? A look through the various articles collected in the Laboratory Phonology series shows a healthy diversity of views on this topic. If we read through the successive introductions to the volumes in order, we find both conceptions of what laboratory phonology is, to varying degrees. This is partly due to the differing outlooks of the individual editors (whose views may not have changed over time). But one can also trace the gradual development of the idea that laboratory phonology is a new approach to phonology.
In their introduction to the first volume (Kingston and Beckman 1990), Beckman and Kingston (1990) state that the papers in the volume address “the relationship between the phonological component and the phonetic component.” They observe that phonetics and phonology began as a single discipline that dealt with the physical and grammatical aspects of speech, but drifted apart as each of these subdisciplines developed in different directions. Progress in phonetics was associated with technological innovations, while phonology developed sophisticated formal models as part of linguistic theory. Some phonologists have questioned the relevance of phonetics to phonology, a view symbolized by the slogan “phonetics is to phonology as numismatics is to economics.” On the other side, some phoneticians have questioned the reality of phonology, as in the slogan “phonology is to phonetics as astrology is to astronomy.” The aim of the laboratory phonology conferences was to bring phoneticians and phonologists together to address phenomena that fall at the boundaries of the two fields.
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The introduction to the second volume (Docherty and Ladd 1992a) again points to diverse views on the relation between phonology and phonetics. It may be significant that quotes are used to refer to the phonology-phonetics “interface,” perhaps a hint that the editors might be in sympathy with the view of Ohala 1990, that there is no interface between phonetics and phonology, presumably because phonology has no content apart from phonetics. Thus, the editors ask: “To what extent is assimilation the result of a phonological ‘rule’ rather than a phenomenon emerging from the organization and coordination of articulator variables in the execution of an utterance?” (Docherty and Ladd 1992b: 4).
In the third volume (Keating 1994a), Keating (1994b) considers how Laboratory Phonology has been progressing. She gives two versions of what Laboratory Phonology means. The weaker version is that “phonologists might sometimes benefit from collecting their data in a laboratory, and that phoneticians might sometimes enjoy testing the phonetic consequences of phonological hypotheses” (Keating 1994b: 3). The “bolder version” is that “quality work in linguistic phonetics requires nontrivial knowledge of phonology, and vice-versa; that results from one field might determine analyses in the other; and that all ‘ph’-linguists should think of themselves as Laboratory Phonologists at least some of the time.” Both of Keating’s formulations maintain a fine balance between phonology and phonetics, and adhere to the “meeting ground” idea announced in the first volume. In subsequent volumes, however, the tone shifts.
In volume IV (Connell and Arvaniti 1995a), Connell and Arvaniti (1995b) observe that laboratory-based phonology papers had appeared in journals such as Language and Speech, Journal of Phonetics, Phonetica, and Phonology. They note that, with the exception of Phonology, these are all phonetics journals, which might suggest that in the rapprochement between phonetics and phonology it is mainly phoneticians who have been incorporating more phonology. This may be their impression, but there is no doubt that phonetics is playing a more central role in phonology as well.
This trend is exemplified by the latest issue of Phonology (vol. 18,1, 2001), whose theme is
“phonetics in phonology.”
The introduction to volume V (Broe and Pierrehumbert 2000a) by Broe and Pierrehumbert (2000b) coincides with the appearance of a longer article by Pierrehumbert, Beckman and Ladd (2000). Together, the two can serve as a manifesto for Laboratory Phonology as a new way of doing phonology. Pierrehumbert, Beckman and Ladd (2000) propose that, in contrast to generative phonology, laboratory phonology is not a framework but a scientific community. This community, according to the authors, shares common methods and approaches to science in general and to phonology in particular. In brief, laboratory phonology is more like a real science than generative phonology. Laboratory phonologists are pragmatic (not ideological), cooperative (not factionalists), believe in the continuity of science (rather than in post-modern Kuhnian paradigm shifts), draw upon diverse empirical methods and sources of evidence (rather than just “internal reconstruction” and
“armchair impressions”), and incorporate continuous mathematics and statistics into their models (rather than logic and hot air).
With respect to the balance between phonetics and phonology, Pierrehumbert, Beckman and Ladd (2000: 285) write that the “cutting edge of research” has moved beyond the idea that phonetics and phonology are separate modules. According to Broe and Pierrehumbert (2000b), phonetics is no longer a “handmaiden” to phonological theory. The work published in the Laboratory Phonology series has “turned the tables;” now it is phonetics that is making inroads into phonological theory, putting demands on it and setting its boundaries.
Though they present these views as a developing consensus of the laboratory phonology community, many contributions that have been published in the series proceed from different assumptions. This diversity has indeed been one of the strengths of the series. Though the position of Broe and Pierrehumbert (2000b) and Pierrehumbert, Beckman and Ladd (2000) comes a bit too close to the “generative phonology = astrology” slogan for my comfort, they make a forceful and
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challenging case that the phonology of the future should look a lot more like the phonetics of the present.
Of course, there is always another side of the story. In the interest of balance, I present the following cautionary tale. I came across it on the internet. Is it true? You be the judge.
* * *
“Chuck’s” Story
I am a phonology student at a well-known linguistics department. I will call myself “Chuck.”
Two years ago while walking on campus somebody gave me an invitation to a “phonology party.” I had never been to a phonology party—we didn’t have that many parties in our department, and none of them were phonology parties—so I decided to go see what it was about. The people there were really friendly and seemed to take a keen interest in me and my work. I asked them what kind of phonologists they were and how come I never saw them around the department. They said they were Laboratory Phonologists, and that they spent most of their time in the lab and at parties and picnics. I expressed surprise that phonologists had laboratories.
“Do you mean like a phonetics lab?” I asked.
“No, no!” they all exclaimed, “it’s a phonology lab. We’re all phonologists, just like you.”
I was having such a good time that I didn’t think to question them further. So I readily agreed to join them at a weekend retreat where they would show me all the neat stuff they had in their lab.
When I showed up at the retreat my new friends—Bob, Janet, Mary, Michael, and others that I saw at the party—ran over to greet me, and pulled me out to play volleyball. After the game, we went to a sort of classroom to talk about my work. I was pleased that they were so interested and wanted to help me. I told them I was working on voicing assimiliation and its relation to underspecification.
“You mean VOT,” said Bob.
“Pardon me?” I asked?
“VOT,” Mary repeated, “We don’t use the terms “voiced” and “voiceless,” we talk about milliseconds of VOT. It’s just like the terms you use, but it’s more accurate.”
“Would you like to see what your ‘voicing assimilation’ looks like on a spectogram?”
Michael asked.
We went to one of the labs where they showed me spectograms of VOT and other acoustic parameters. They were explaining about high-pass and low-pass filters and sampling rates and other technical stuff. I was having trouble following it all, and I realized that I hadn’t eaten or slept since I’d arrived. My head was spinning, and I struggled to remember what my research was about.
“This is all really neat,” I said, “but aren’t we talking about acoustic phonetics?”
“Not at all,” Gerard replied. “We’re doing phonology. If you have a hypothesis about VOT, we have to test it scientifically, don’t we?”
I couldn’t think straight, and said that I thought I should get something to eat, or maybe catch some sleep. At that moment Janet came running in.
“Anyone for badminton? Come on, Chuck, we know you love to play! You’ll be able to eat and sleep all you want later.”
After the badminton, there was a bonfire with folk singing, and then another discussion, this time about assimilation. Louis showed us all the different degrees to which “gestures,” as they called them, could come to be like each other, and how a coronal gesture could be lurking covertly, hidden by a labial gesture. They volunteered to show me how to take EPG measurements to reveal what the gestures were.
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Looking back at it, I can see it was the lack of food and sleep that must have influenced my decision to stay on past the weekend. In exchange for room and board, my new friends said I could stay with the “community,” help out in the lab, and make myself useful mailing out flyers and doing other odd jobs around the office.
The next few weeks are just a blur. I spent the time plotting pitch tracks, measuring bursts and formant transitions, and learning to work the machines in the lab. I also attended seminars where I learned the principles of Laboratory Phonology.
One day Bob showed me the community’s library. On the walls were portraits of leading phonologists that the community looked up to. Bob pointed out Gunnar Fant, Lisker and Abramson, Dennis Klatt, Björn Lindblom, Peter Ladefoged, and John Ohala.
Some of these names rang a bell, but I was sure we didn’t call them any kind of -ologists.
What did we call them? It was on the tip of my tongue: electricians? dieticians?
Just then Janet and Mary and some others burst in and dragged us off to play frisbee. Later that night there was an intense meeting of the whole community. It was then that they explained to me that Laboratory Phonology was, in fact, different from regular phonology.
“Look, Chuck,” Janet said, “the kind of phonology you used to do, it’s not that it’s wrong, exactly, though it is that—it’s more that it was incomplete. Laboratory Phonology is what phonology should have been all along.”
Soon, the whole community was encouraging me to make the decision to accept Laboratory Phonology as the only way to do phonology. I was so inspired, I resolved right there to dedicate myself to bring the good news about Laboratory Phonology to my former friends.
And that is how, some months later, I found myself staffing a LabPhon table at a regional phonology workshop somewhere in Iowa, from where I was snatched away by a team of deprogrammers hired by my department. Things were rough for a while, but eventually I came back to my senses and was able to resume work on my phonology thesis. And I’ve even begun spending some time in the phonetics lab, applying the techniques I learned during my stay with the Laboratory Phonologists.
References
Beckman, Mary E. and John Kingston. 1990. Introduction. In Kingston and Beckman 1990, 1–16.
Broe, Michael B. and Janet B. Pierrehumbert (eds.). 2000a. Papers in Laboratory Phonology V: Acquisition and the Lexicon. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Broe, Michael B. and Janet B. Pierrehumbert. 2000b. Introduction. In Broe and Pierrehumbert 2000a, 1–7.
Connell, Bruce and Amalia Arvaniti (eds.). 1995a. Phonology and Phonetic Evidence: Papers in Laboratory Phonology IV. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Connell, Bruce and Amalia Arvaniti. 1995b. Introduction. In Connell and Arvaniti 1995a, 1–3.
Docherty, Gerard J. and D. Robert Ladd (eds.). 1992ª. Papers in Laboratory Phonology II: Gesture, Segment, Prosody. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Docherty, Gerard J. and D. Robert Ladd. 1992b. Introduction. In Docherty and Ladd 1992, 1–4.
Keating, Patricia A. (ed.). 1994a. Phonological Structure and Phonetic Form: Papers in Laboratory Phonology III.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Keating, Patricia A. 1994b. Introduction. In Keating 1994a, 1–4.
Kingston, John and Mary E. Beckman (eds.). 1990. Papers in Laboratory Phonology I: Between the Grammar and Physics of Speech. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Ohala, John J. 1990. There is no interface between phonetics and phonology: a personal view. Journal of Phonetics 18, 153–171.
Pierrehumbert, Janet, Mary E. Beckman and D. R. Ladd. 2000. Conceptual foundations of phonology as a laboratory science. In Noel Burton-Roberts, Philip Carr and Gerard Docherty (eds.), Phonological Knowledge:
Conceptual and Empirical Issues, 273–303. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
