Speech

Speech is a human activity by which thoughts and feelings are communicated through sound. Speech communication has two main components, the production of sound and the perception of sound. The relationship between speech production and speech perception is intricate. In the process of learning to speak a language, we simultaneously learn how to understand it when we hear it. To appreciate the complexity of speech perception, it helps to know how speech is produced.

Next: Speech Production

Humans are capable of producing a great variety of distinct speech sounds. The approximately 5,000 languages that humans speak use over 850 different sounds. The capability of humans to produce such a variety of vocal sounds, far more than any other animal, is a result of the unique structure of the human vocal tract, which ...

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