Explaining the PENTA model: a reply to Arvaniti and Ladd

What is it about?

Parallel encoding and target approximation (PENTA) is a theory of how speech prosody is used to convey various communicative meanings, based on an articulatory-functional view of speech. In the theory, Target Approximation simulates the basic articulatory process; Parallel Encoding provides an operational scheme that enables simultaneous encoding of multiple communicative functions. This paper provides a detailed explanation of the PENTA theory, with the goal to clarify many of the misconceptions about it. We also offer a PENTA-based account of the Greek intonational patterns reported by Arvaniti and Ladd (2009), using one of the computational tools that implement PENTA.

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