Voice DeCal — the art and science of the human voice

The Art and Science of the Human Voice

Fall 2026

Welcome to Berkeley’s voice DeCal, The Art and Science of the Human Voice (LINGUIS 198)!

We’re excited to have you here! The class meets Mondays 6:00–7:30 PM in Dwinelle 187.

Syllabus Join the Discord Course Interest Form

Course Schedule

Subject to change. Please refer to in-class announcements for weekly slides, homework assignments, and office hours.

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WkDateTopicAssignmentSupplemental Readings
1 9/14 Introduction to Voice slides, recording
  • Course policies and vocal goals
  • Intro to voice
  • Vocal warm-ups and vocal health
 Describing your voice NHS SOVTEs Guide
2 9/21 Anatomy Basics slides, recording
  • Vocal tract anatomy
  • Phonation types and vocal qualities
  • Articulation basics
 Anatomy self-observation exercises (breathing, laryngeal position, articulation) larynx 2D diagrams
larynx 3D model
NIH voice and speech overview
Pink Trombone
3 9/28 Intro to Vocal Acoustics slides, recording
  • Sound waves, DSP
  • Source-filter theory
  • Spectrograms!
  • Demos in Praat/Braat, DAW stuff
 Acoustic analysis practice Daniel Russel's Acoustics Animations
Real-time spectrogram
Braat
Takayuki Arai - Vocal Models
4 10/5 Vocal Acoustics, Perceptual Qualities and Gender slides
  • Acoustics cont. (open quotient, spectral rolloff)
  • Perceptual qualities
  • Perceptual quadrant and vocal gender
  • Slides, SDBD/BDSD, articulation
 Pitch and weight exercises (PIP, SDBD/BDSD, whisper and vowel slides)
Resonance exercises ("hello" exercise, word chart)		 Acoustic Gender Space Viewer
Selene's Voice Archive
Tom Scott: "Why are adverts so loud?"
Filtered Listening
5 10/12 Sociolinguistics of Voice slides
  • Vocal gender cont. (gendered speech traits)
  • Speaker identity
  • Accents, dialects, social judgments
 Accent and articulation exercise International Dialects of English Archive
UCLA Phonetics Lab Data
Speech Accent Archive (By Region)
glaswegian accent
6 10/19 Voice Modulation and Voicing Characters slides, cheatsheet
  • Characterization, pacing and coloring
  • Improv game
  • Different applications: narration, video games
 Character study/imitation Voice Acting (Fantasy Script Samples)
Voice reel scripts
Fox in Socks warm up
7 10/26 Voice Modulation II slides
  • Distortion
  • False chords
  • Epiglottal growl
  • Fry
 Practicing with distortion How to Fry Scream
8 11/2 Vocal Performance & Editing Workshop slides
  • Different applications: narration, video games
  • Audio and editing setup
  • Demo reels
 Practice with editing software voicereels.com/scripts
9 11/9 Voice in Tech
  • Speech synthesis
  • Biometric technology
  • Vocaloid
 Final project released Synthet: "the sound that everyone loves"
10 11/16 Guest Lecture (Jana)
  • Focus: vocal health, vocal gender, voice training
 Work on final project! Voice Disorders Simulations
adult pharynx 3D models
infant pharynx 3D model
11 11/23 Guest Lecture (Zach)
  • Focus: industry, voice acting
 Work on final project! —
12 11/30 Lab Tour or Guest Lecture
  • Focus: speech research
 Work on final project! —

Have a question? Ask in the course Discord, or come to office hours — see the Staff page.