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Introducing Speech and Language Processing (Cambridge Introductions to Language and Linguistics) | 
 enlarge | Author: John Coleman
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Category: Book
List Price: $44.99
Buy New: $27.99
You Save: $17.00 (38%)
New (9) Used (9) from $27.99
Avg. Customer Rating:  3 reviews
Sales Rank: 101014
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 314
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.4
Dimensions (in): 9.6 x 6.8 x 0.9
ISBN: 0521530695
Dewey Decimal Number: 006.454
EAN: 9780521530699
ASIN: 0521530695
Publication Date: April 11, 2005
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
Assuming knowledge of only the very basics of linguistics, this major new textbook provides a concise and accessible introduction to speech and language processing. Students are introduced to topics such as digital signal processing, speech analysis and synthesis, finite-state machines, automatic speech recognition, parsing and probabilistic grammars, and are shown from a very elementary level how to work with two programming languages, C and Prolog.
Book Description
This major new textbook provides a clearly-written, concise and accessible introduction to speech and language processing. Assuming knowledge of only the very basics of linguistics and written specifically for students with no technical background, it is the perfect starting point for anyone beginning to study the discipline. Student s are shown from an elementary level how to use two programming languages, C and Prolog, and the accompanying CD-ROM contains all the software needed. Setting an invaluable foundation for further study, this is set to become the leading introduction to the field.
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| Customer Reviews:
 Unique and impressive contribution, but not bug-free January 22, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I've been using this as the textbook in my speech technology course at SJSU, with generally good results.
The book assumes that the reader is aquainted with basic acoustic and linguistic concepts such as glottal excitation, frequency spectra, fundamental frequency, and IPA transcription. The book is therefore not suitable on its own for a class of true beginners. For such an audience, instructors will want to supplement Coleman's book with a gentler introductory book such as Ladefoged (1996) or Johnson (2003).
By far the best feature of this book is its focus on concrete implementation, in source code, of the concepts discussed. If a picture is worth a thousand words, then a working C program is worth a thousand more. Coleman deserves our thanks for including actual speech processing code with his textbook.
The focus on explicit source code is one of a number of features that differentiate Coleman's textbook from the Jurafsky & Martin textbook that I use in other courses. Coleman's book is slimmer and less ambitious in its coverage of topics compared with Jurafsky & Martin's massive tome. Coleman's textbook also contains far fewer typos and other errors.
On the other hand, some parts of Coleman's book are frustratingly brief, incomplete, or opaque. An example is Section 4.2 on spectral analysis. The mechanics of the Hanning window are introduced, but without motivation---we never learn what the window is for, or why we need it. The results of the Fourier transform are displayed but no hint is offered as to how it works. Overall this section compares quite unfavorably to the masterful presentation of Fourier analysis in Chapter 10 of Ladefoged (1996).
Finally, it is important to note that there is a simple bug that infects most of the C programs supplied with the book. The variable "length", used to store the size of an input file, is declared as type "(int *)". This should be changed to type "int", so that memory is allocated to store the input size. Consequently, subsequent references to "*length" should be changed to "length", and "length" to "&length". Once this bug is fixed, the code compiles fine on any platform, not just on the compiler supplied with the book.
 One of a kind November 21, 2007
John Coleman is an expert in his field, and he has produced the only introduction to this area for beginners. Aimed at linguists with no real expetise in computing, this is a must for anybody wanting to familiarise themselves with computational linguistics.
higher that 5-star rating November 9, 2005
This is the best introduction into speech sciences for linguistic students, especially for phoneticians. I wish I had such a book when I first struggled with technical writings on speech processing. Material is organized perfectly, style is clear, easy read. after reading this book it is possible to take amore advanced and more technical ones, e.g. by Jurafsky and Martin. Students who feel overt to math enjoyed the curse based on this book and joyfully played with C programs to modify the results. No woner if the book becomes a compulsory textbook for an introductory course on computational linguistics or speech processing at linguistic departments. I feel obliged to the author for the book. It is not a 5-star rating, of course, it is definitely higher. Many thanks to the publisher for evaluation copy.
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