PEOPLE

Dani Byrd

Professor of Linguistics
Vice Dean of USC College

Contact Information
Office: ADM 304
Phone: (213)740-9091
E-mail: dbyrd@college.usc.edu

LINKS
Curriculum Vitae
Faculty Profile on Departmental Website
Personal Website
Course Information
USC Phonetics and Phonology Group
USC Phonetics Laboratory Research
Speech Production and Articulation kNowledge Group (SPAN)
 

Education

  • B.A. Linguistics, Yale University, 5/1990
  • M.A. Linguistics, Yale University, 5/1990
  • Ph.D. Linguistics, University of California, Los Angeles, 5/1994

Academic Appointment, Affiliation, and Employment History

  • Professor, University of Southern California, 2/2008-  
  • Research Affiliate, Haskins Laboratories, 1/1/1999-  
  • Associate Professor, University of Southern California, 6/1/2002-2/2008  
  • Assistant Professor, University of Southern California, 6/30/1999-6/1/2002  
  • Research Affiliate, Yale University, 1/1/1998-1/1/1999  
  • Senior Scientist, Haskins Laboratories, 1/1/1997-1/1/1999  
  • National Institutes of Health Training Grant Post-Doctoral Fellow, Haskins Laboratories, 7/1/1994-1/1/1997  
  • Lecturer, Yale University, 9/1/1996-12/31/1996  

Description of Research

Summary Statement of Research Interests

Professor Byrd's special interest is in speech production and articulation. She studies how the skilled, sound producing movements of the vocal tract are coordinated in time as a result of linguistic structuring, such as phrase and syllable structure. In order to study speech production, she uses cutting edge technology for tracking and imaging inside the mouth and throat during speech, including magnetometry and real-time MRI ( sail.usc.edu/span). Her research is supported by the NIH.

Spoken language relies on an elegant and complex acoustic structure to support communication between speakers and listeners. Consideration of the orchestration of articulatory activity that produces this acoustic signal is a necessary element in understanding the process of human communication. The complex messages and emotions of spoken language must be communicated by precise choreography of the jaw, tongue, lips, larynx, and respiratory system. This choreography is shaped by the structure of the language being spoken but is constrained by the shared biology of the human organism producing the linguistic message.

Phonetics is an interdisciplinary area of research, which in addition to requiring an understanding of linguistics, incorporates elements of cognitive science, motor control, acoustics, engineering, physiology, and psychology. Professor Byrd considers her work in speech production to be part of the growing interdisciplinary research effort in cognitive science, adopting the view that the study of language is one of the cornerstones of this effort as it is a special human ability that makes possible the richness of human intellect, relationships, culture, and technology.

Professor Byrd recently received the 2003 R. Bruce Lindsay Award from the Acoustical Society of America at the Spring meeting of the Society. This award is for a member under age 35 from the Society's 7000 members who has contributed substantially to the advancement of theoretical or applied acoustics. She is the first winner from the Speech Communication Technical Area in 17 years.

A longer research summary is here: www-rcf.usc.edu/~dbyrd/dbyrd_research.html.

Affiliations with Research Centers, Labs, and Other Institutions

  • USC Phonetics Laboratory,http://www-rcf.usc.edu/~dbyrd/
  • USC Speech Production and Articulation kNowledge Group (SPAN),http://sail.usc.edu/span
  • Research Affiliate at Haskins Laboratories,http://haskins.yale.edu

Publications

Book Chapter
  • Byrd, D. (2006). Relating prosody and dynamic events: Commentary on the papers by Cho, Navas, and Smiljanic´. (Vol. 549-561). Papers in Laboratory Phonology 8/Mouton de Gruyter.
  • Goldstein, L., Byrd, D., Saltzman, E. (2006). The role of vocal tract gestural action units in understanding the evolution of phonology. pp. p. 215-249. Cambridge, UK: Action to Language via the Mirror Neuron System/Cambridge University Press.
  • Byrd, D., Saltzman, E. (2003). Speech production. pp. p. 1072-1076.. The Handbook of Brain Theory and Neural Networks. 2nd Edition./The MIT Press.
Journal Article
  • Goldstein, L., Pouplier, M., Chen, L., Saltzman, E., Byrd, D. (2007). Gestural action units slip in speech production errors. Cognition/Elsevier. Vol. 103 (3), pp. p. 386-412.
  • Lee, S., Byrd, D., Krivokapic, J. (2006). Functional data analysis of prosodic effects on articulatory timing. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America/ASA through the American Institute of Physics. pp. p. 1666-1671.
  • Byrd, D., Krivokapic, J., Lee, S. (2006). How far, how long: On the temporal scope of phrase boundary effects. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America/ASA through the American Institute of Physics. pp. p. 1589-1599.
  • Byrd, D., Kreiman, J. (2006). Peter Nielsen Ladefoged • 1925-2006. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America/ASA through the American Institute of Physics. pp. p. 2555.
  • Byrd, D., Lee, S., Riggs, D., Adams, J. (2005). Interacting effects of syllable and phrase position on consonant articulation. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America/ASA through the American Institute of Physics. Vol. 118(6), pp. p. 3860-3873.
  • Fukaya, T., Byrd, D. (2005). An articulatory examination of word-final flapping at phrase-edges and interiors. Journal of the International Phonetic Association/Cambridge University Press. Vol. 35(1), pp. p. 45-58.
  • Narayanan, S., Nayak, K., Lee, S., Sethy, A., Byrd, D. (2004). An approach to real-time magnetic resonance imaging for speech production. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America/ASA through the American Institute of Physics. Vol. 115, pp. p. 1771-1776.
  • Byrd, D., Saltzman, E. (2003). The elastic phrase: Dynamics of boundary-adjacent lengthening. Journal of Phonetics/Academic Press. Vol. 31(2), pp. p. 149-180.
  • Byrd, D. (2000). Articulatory vowel lengthening and coordination at phrasal junctures. Phonetica/Karger. Vol. 57(1), pp. p. 3-16.
  • Saltzman, E., Byrd, D. (2000). Task-dynamics of gestural timing: Phase windows and multifrequency rhythms. Human Movement Science/Elsevier Science. Vol. 19(4), pp. p. 499-526.
  • Narayanan, S., Byrd, D., Kaun, A. R. (1999). Geometry, kinematics, and acoustics of Tamil liquid consonants. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America/ASA through the American Institute of Physics. Vol. 106(4), pp. p. 1993-2007.
  • Byrd, D., Saltzman, E. (1998). Intragestural dynamics of multiple phrasal boundaries. Journal of Phonetics/Academic Press. Vol. 26, pp. p. 173-199.
  • Saltzman, E., Byrd, D. (1998). Tending the garden or the plant?. Bulletin de la Communication Parlée/Institut de la Communication Parlée. Vol. 4, pp. p. 79-83.
  • Byrd, D., Tan, C. C. (1996). Saying consonant clusters quickly. Journal of Phonetics/Academic Press. Vol. 24(2), pp. p. 263-282.
  • Byrd, D. (1996). Influences on articulatory timing in consonant sequences. Journal of Phonetics/Academic Press. Vol. 24(2), pp. p. 209-244.
  • Byrd, D. (1996). A phase window framework for articulatory timing. Phonology/Cambridge University Press. Vol. 13(2), pp. p. 139-169.
  • Pugh, K. R., Shaywitz, B. A., Shaywitz, S. E., Fullbright, R. K., Byrd, D., Skudlarski, P., Shankweiler, D. P., Katz, L., Constable, R. T., Fletcher, J. (1996). Auditory selective attention: An fMRI investigation. Neuroimage/Academic Press. Vol. 4, pp. p. 159-173.
  • Byrd, D. (1995). C-Centers revisited. Phonetica/Karger. Vol. 52, pp. p. 263-282.
  • Byrd, D. (1995). Palatogram reading as a phonetic skill: The answer to issue 24(1)’s EPG “mystery” sentence. Journal of the International Phonetic Association/Cambridge University Press. Vol. 25(2), pp. p. 65-70.
  • Byrd, D., Flemming, E., Mueller, C. A., Tan, C. C. (1995). Using regions and indices in EPG data reduction. Journal of Speech and Hearing Research/American Speech-Language-Hearing Association. Vol. 38, pp. p. 821-827.
  • Byrd, D. (1994). Palatogram reading as a phonetic skill: A short tutorial. Journal of the International Phonetic Association/Cambridge University Press. Vol. 24, pp. p. 21-34.
  • Keating, P., Byrd, D., Flemming, E., Todaka, Y. (1994). Phonetic analyses of word and segment variation using the TIMIT corpus of American English. Speech Communication/Elsevier Science. Vol. 14, pp. p. 131-142.
  • Byrd, D. (1994). Relations of sex and dialect to reduction. Speech Communication/Elsevier Science. Vol. 15, pp. p. 39-54.
  • Byrd, D. (1992). Perception of assimilation in consonant clusters. Phonetica/Karger. Vol. 49, pp. p. 1-24.
  • Byrd, D. (1992). Pitch and duration of yes-no questions in Nchufie. Journal of the International Phonetic Association/Cambridge University Press. Vol. 22, pp. p. 12-26.
Magazine/Trade Publication
  • Bresch, E., Kim, Y., Nayak, K., Byrd, D., Narayanan, S. IEEE Signal Processing Magazine.
Proceedings
  • Byrd, D. (2003). Frontiers and challenges in Articulatory Phonology. pp. p. 89-92. Proceedings of the 15th International Congress of Phonetic Sciences..
  • Chitoran, I., Goldstein, L., Byrd, D. (2002). Articulatory evidence from Georgian. pp. p. 419-448. Laboratory Phonology 7/Mouton de Gruyter.
  • Shin, J., Narayanan, S., Gerber, L., Kazemzadeh, E., Byrd, D. (2002). Analysis of user behavior under error conditions in spoken dialogs. Proceedings of the Seventh International Conference on Spoken Language Processing.
  • Arunachalam, S., Gould, D., Andersen, E., Byrd, D., Narayanan, S. (2001). Politeness and frustration language in child-machine interactions. pp. p. 2675-2678. Proceedings of Eurospeech.
  • Byrd, D., Kaun, A. R., Narayanan, S., Saltzman, E. (2000). Phrasal signatures in articulation. pp. p. 1993-2007. Cambridge, UK. Papers in Laboratory Phonology V/Cambridge University Press.
  • Byrd, D. (1993). Marshallese suffixal reduplication. pp. p. 61-77. The Proceedings of the Eleventh West Coast Conference on Formal Linguistics/Center for the Study of Language and Information.

Honors and Awards

  • Fellow, Acoustical Society of America, citation: "For research on the relation of linguistic structures to the temoral realization of speech.", 2008-  
  • Recipient of National or International Prize in Discipline, R. Bruce Lindsay Award, Acoustical Society of America, 2003  
  • USC Zumberge Research and Innovation Fund Award, James H. Zumberge Interdisciplinary Grant, 2002  
  • USC Zumberge Research and Innovation Fund Award, James H. Zumberge Individual Research Grant, 2000  

Service to the University

Administrative Appointments
  • Vice Dean for Faculty & Research, USC College of Letters, Arts & Sciences, 2008-2009   
  • Vice Dean, Research Advancement, USC College of Letters, Arts & Sciences, 2007-2008   
Review Panels
  • NIH NIDCD, LCOM Review Panel Ad-hoc Member, 2007  
  • NSF, ad hoc Panel member, 2005-2006   
  • NIH NIDCD, ad hoc reviewer, 2005-2006   

Service to the Profession

Editorships and Editorial Boards
  • Associate Editor, Journal of Phonetics, 9/15/2006-9/14/2008  
  • Editorial Board Member, Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 1996-2006  
Professional Memberships
  • Acoustical Society of America, Full Member, 1994-2007  
  • International Phonetic Association, 1994-2007  
Review Panels
  • NIH NIDCD, LCOM Review Panel Ad-hoc Member, 2007  
  • NSF, ad hoc Panel member, 2005-2006   
  • NIH NIDCD, ad hoc reviewer, 2005-2006   
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