Morphological Analysis for a German Text-to-Speech System

A c e n t r a l p r o b l e m in s p e e c h s y n t h e s i s w i t h u n r e s t r i c t e d v o c a b u l a r y i s t h e a u t o m a t i c d e r i v a t i o n of c o r r e c t p r o n u n c i a t i o n f rom t h e g r a p h e m i c form of a t ex t . The s o f t w a r e modu le GRAPHON w a s d e v e l o p e d to p e r f o r m t h i s c o n v e r s i o n f o r German a n d i s c u r r e n t l y b e i n g e x t e n d e d b y a m o r p h o l o g i c a l a n a l y s i s c o m p o n e n t . T h i s a n a l y s i s i s b a s e d on a m o r p h l ex i con a n d a so t o f r u l e ~ a n d s t r u c t u r a l d e s c r i p t i o n s f o r German w o r d f o r m s . I t p r o v i d e s e a c h t e x t i n p u t i t em w i t h an i n d i v i d u a l c h a r a c t e r i z a t i o n s u c h t h a t t h e phonolog ica l~ s y n t a c t i c , a n d p r o s o d i c c o m p o n e n t s may o p e r a t e u p o n i t . T h i s s y s t e m a t i c a p p r o a c h tht~s s e r v e s to minimize t h e n u m b e r of w r o n g t r a n s c r i p t i o n s a n d a t t h e same t ime l a y s t h e f o u n d a t i o n f o r t h e g e n e r a t i o n of s t r e s s a n d i n t o n a t i o n p a t t e r n s , y i e l d i n g more i n t e l l i g ib l e~ n a t u r a l s o u n d i n g , a n d g e n e r a l l y a c c e p t a b l e s y n t h e t i c