acoustic phonetics - LingoDigest

The Science of Phonaesthetics

6 min read

Why does “cellar door” sound so beautiful to English speakers, regardless of its meaning? This is the central question of phonaesthetics, the fascinating but little-known field that studies the inherent beauty of sound. We explore how the interplay of phonetics, psychology, and culture makes some words a symphony for the ears, while others are just noise.

Reading Speech: Secrets of the Spectrogram

6 min read

What if you could see your own voice? Spectrograms, or “voiceprints,” are powerful tools that turn the fleeting sounds of speech into detailed visual maps. By learning to read these images, linguists can decode the hidden physical patterns in every word we speak, from analyzing accents to helping solve crimes.