Review of Klaus J. Kohler, Communicative Functions and Linguistic Forms in Speech Interaction, Cambridge Studies in Linguistics 156, Cambridge University Press, 2018

Abstract

This book is timely in many ways. At the biographical level, it is a diamond jubilee publication, presenting for discussion, for the first time in one place, many of Klaus Kohler’s (K.K.’s) views and theories that have crystallized over his 60 very active and productive years in phonetics. It is also a strong missionary statement for, and practical demonstration of, a new speech and language research paradigm which goes beyond the descriptive formalisms that have stimulated and given direction to speech and language research since the late 1950s, but which have ultimately limited its scope. The book argues vigorously for a speech and language science which places the communicative functions of human interaction at its center (hence the book’s title) and relates all formal manifestations of this interaction to them, at whatever level (articulatory/ gestural, acoustic/auditory, and lexical/syntactic) with no hierarchy. All formal aspects have an equal potential to carry a communicative function. So, nothing against formalization, but it should be recognized as the means, not mistaken for the end! K.K.’s work is therefore eminently relevant to anyone interested in the forms and structures of speech and language function in interpersonal communication. This covers linguists of any hyphenated specialization, but also speech and language engineers seeking to go beyond automatic recognition and synthesis towards comprehension and expression. A shift of goalposts is disturbing to players who are used to an established playing field. Hard evidence for this kind of change is necessary. K.K. presents his case carefully and in detail within the general domain of speech prosody, providing extensive discussion of the scientific background, including his own and colleagues’ experimental results. He compares the performance of different approaches and, since it is not generally known, presents the Kiel System of Prosodic Labelling (PROLAB). Graphic (Praat-based) representations of speech signals and acoustic examples (.wav files, available at www.cambridge.org/ Received: June 29, 2019 Accepted: October 30, 2019 Published online: December 18, 2019