Simon Roessig

né Ritter

I am a researcher working in the fields of phonetics and phonology. My research interests include prosody, the relationship between phonetics and phonology, or more generally, the relationship between discrete and continuous aspects of cognition, as well as gestural models of speech production. I use a combination of (interactive) empirical and computational methods to investigate the intergration of prosodic categories and phonetic realizations. More recently, I have become interested in the multi-dimensionality of prosody, the interaction of relative, global and local prosodic highlighting patterns, and the implementation of prosodic phenomena in gestural models of speech production. In 2020, I completed my dissertation on a dynamical modelling approach to categorical and continuous modulations in the prosodic expression of information structure, supervised by Doris Mücke and Martine Grice. I currently work as a postdoctoral researcher in the CRC 'Prominence in Language' at the University of Cologne. In August 2022, I will join the Department of Linguistics at Cornell University for two years.

Contact me at simon.roessig [at] uni-koeln.de, find me on Google Scholar, Researchgate or ORCID.

News

April 2022: I was granted a Walter Benjamin postdoctoral fellowship by the German Research Foundation to conduct a research program on prosodic prominence in the task dynamics framework at the Department of Linguistics of the Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, USA, from summer 2022 to summer 2024.
November 2021: I received the Offermann-Hergarten Prize of the Faculty of Arts and Humanities of the University of Cologne for my book Categoriality and continuity in prosodic prominence.

Short bio

Work

From August 2022: Postdoctoral researcher at Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA
Currently: Postdoctoral researcher at the University of Cologne
2017-2020: Doctoral researcher at the University of Cologne
2015-2016: Software developer for scientific libraries

Education

2017-2020: PhD in Phonetics, summa cum laude
2012-2014: MA in Linguistics
2009-2012: BA in Information Processing and Linguistics & Phonetics

Awards & Grants

2022: Walter Benjamin post doc fellowship of the German Research Foundation (2 years)
2021: Offermann-Hergarten Prize of the University of Cologne
2018: Best Student Paper Award, 16th Conference of the Association for Laboratory Phonology
2013: Best Student Paper Award, 6th Conference on Phonetics and Phonology in Iberia

Publications

Note: prior to 2019 I published under my former name Ritter

Roessig, S., B. Winter & D. Mücke (2022). Tracing the phonetic space of prosodic focus marking. Frontiers in Artificial Intelligence 5. DOI: 10.3389/frai.2022.842546. link to article

Roessig, S., L. Pagel & D. Mücke (2022). Speaking loudly reduces flexibility and variability in the prosodic marking of focus types. Proceedings of Speech Prosody 2022. DOI: 10.21437/SpeechProsody.2022-102. link to article

Lorenzen, J., S. Roessig, S. Baumann (2022). Information status and tonal context jointly modulate prosodic prominence relations in German. Proceedings of Speech Prosody 2022. DOI: 10.21437/SpeechProsody.2022-2. link to article

Pagel, L., S. Roessig, & D. Mücke (2021). Modifications of tongue body kinematics as a focus marking strategy in German. Proceedings of the 12th ISSP. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.5081658. link to article

Roessig, S. (2021). Categoriality and continuity in prosodic prominence (Studies in Laboratory Phonology). Berlin: Language Science Press. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.4121875. link to book

Roessig, S., D. Mücke & L. Pagel (2019). Dimensions of prosodic prominence in an attractor model. Proceedings of Interspeech 2019. DOI: 10.21437/Interspeech.2019-2227. link to article

Roessig, S. & D. Mücke (2019). Modeling Dimensions of Prosodic Prominence. Frontiers in Communication 4(44). DOI: 10.3389/fcomm.2019.00044. link to article

Roessig S., D. Mücke, M. Grice (2019). The dynamics of intonation: Categorical and continuous variation in an attractor-based model. PLoS ONE 14(5). DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0216859. link to article

Grice, M., S. Ritter, H. Niemann & T. B. Roettger (2017). Integrating the discreteness and continuity of intonational categories. Journal of Phonetics 64. 90-107. DOI: 10.1016/j.wocn.2017.03.003. link to article

Ritter, S. & M. Grice (2015). The Role of Tonal Onglides in German Nuclear Pitch Accents. Language and Speech 58(1). 114-128. DOI: 10.1177/0023830914565688. link to article

Kügler, F., B. Smolibocki, D. Arnold, S. Baumann, B. Braun, M. Grice, S. Jannedy, J. Michalsky, O. Niebuhr, J. Peters, S. Ritter, C. Röhr, A. Schweitzer, K. Schweitzer & P. Wagner (2015). DIMA – Annotation guidelines for German intonation. Proceedings of the 18th International Congress of Phonetic Sciences. link to article

Ritter, S. & T. B. Roettger (2014). Speakers modulate noise-induced pitch according to intonational context. Proceedings of the 7th International Conference on Speech Prosody. DOI: 10.21437/SpeechProsody.2014-166. link to article

Presentations

Note: presentations prior to May 2019 as Simon Ritter

Upcoming

Pagel, L., S. Roessig & D. Mücke (accepted). Articulatory encoding of prominence in habitual and loud speech. Accepted as oral presentation at the 3rd International Conference Prominence in Language, Cologne

Roessig, S., J. Lorenzen & S. Baumann (accepted). Evidence for a prosodic prominence budget in German utterances. Accepted as oral presentation at the 3rd International Conference Prominence in Language, Cologne

Roessig, S., B. Winter & D. Mücke (accepted). Exploring the phonetic space of focus. Accepted as poster presentation at LabPhon 18, online.

Lorenzen, J., S. Roessig & S. Baumann (accepted). Syntagmatic and paradigmatic effects of information status on prosodic prominence relations in German – an online production task. Accepted as poster presentation at LabPhon 18, online.

Conferences and workshops

Roessig, S., L. Pagel & D. Mücke (2022). Speaking loudly reduces flexibility and variability in the prosodic marking of focus types. Accepted as oral presentation at Speech Prosody 2022, Lisbon, Portugal.

Lorenzen, J., S. Roessig & S. Baumann (2022). Information status and tonal context jointly modulate prosodic prominence relations in German. Accepted as oral presentation at Speech Prosody 2022, Lisbon, Portugal.

Pagel, L., S. Roessig, D. Mücke (2021). Prominence relations and articulatory modifications in habitual and loud speech. Oral presentation at PaPE, June 21-23 2021, Barcelona, Spain.

Pagel, L., S. Roessig, D. Mücke (2020). Modifications of tongue body kinematics as a focus marking strategy in German. Poster presentation at 12th International Seminar on Speech Production, December 14–18 2020, Rhode Island, USA.

Pagel, L., S. Roessig & D. Mücke (2019). Prosodic strengthening in German: an investigation of tongue body kinematics. Talk at 15. Phonetik und Phonologie Tagung, September 27 2019, Düsseldorf, Germany.

Roessig, S., D. Mücke & L. Pagel (2019). Dimensions of prosodic prominence in an attractor model. Talk at Interspeech, September 15-19 2019, Graz, Austria.

Roessig, S., D. Mücke (2019). Prosodic variation in a multi-dimensional dynamic system. Talk at Phonetics and Phonology in Europe, June 17-19 2019, Lecce, Italy.

Ritter, S. & D. Mücke (2018). Continuity and categoriality in prosodic prominence – the case of focus marking. Talk at the 2nd International Conference “Prominence in Language”, July 11-13 2018, Cologne, Germany.

Ritter, S. & D. Mücke (2018). The phonetics and phonology of focus marking – an integrated account. Poster presentation at 16th Conference on Laboratory Phonology, June 19-22 2018, Lisbon, Portugal.

Ritter, S. & T.B. Roettger (2014). Speakers modulate noise-induced pitch according to intonational context. Poster presentation at the 7th International Conference on Speech Prosody, May 20-23 2014, Dublin.

Ritter, S. & M. Grice (2013). Tonal Onglides of Nuclear Pitch Accents in German. Talk at Nijmegen-Cologne Prosody Meeting, July 1 2013, Cologne, Germany.

Ritter, S. & M. Grice (2013). The Role of Tonal Onglides in German Nuclear Pitch Accents. Talk at Phonetics and Phonology in Iberia, June 25-26 2013, Lisbon, Portugal.

Ritter, S., M. Krüger, Mücke, D. & M. Grice (2012). Production and Perception of Contrast: Tonal Onglides and Oral Gestures. Poster presentation at the final symposium of the DFG Priority programme 1234, July 26 2012, Stuttgart, Germany.

Grice, M., Mücke, D. & S. Ritter (2012). Focus Marking: Tonal Onglides and Oral Gestures. Talk at Workshop: Dynamic Modeling of Articulation and Prosodic Structure, May 7 2012, Cologne, Germany.

Ritter, S., Riester, A. & M. Grice (2012). Onglides von Nuklearakzenten: Brauchen wir Leading Tones? Talk at Workshop: Deutsche Intonation - Annotation und Modellierung, March 21-22 2012, Konstanz, Germany.

Invited talks

Roessig, S. (2022). Two dimensions of prominence relations: prosodic focus marking in habitual and loud speech. Invited talk at IPS Munich, May 11 2022.

Roessig, S. (2022). Prominence relations on two axes: evidence from focus marking in habitual and loud speech. Invited talk at the University of Bielefeld, work group phonetics an phonology, April 5 2022.

Roessig, S. & D. Mücke (2020). Prosodic prominence: discreteness, gradience, and a dynamical systems account. Invited talk at the University of Bielefeld, work group phonetics and phonology, January 8 2020.

Ritter, S. & D. Mücke (2019). Prosodic variation from a dynamical perspective. Invited talk at the University Hamburg, Institut für Romanistik, Jan 8 2019.

Ritter, S. & D. Mücke (2018). Prosody in a dynamic systems account. Invited talk at the University Potsdam, Linguistics Department, Nov 14 2018.

Ressources

ema2wav – an open source software package I am developing in collaboration with Philipp Buech. It converts data from electromagnetic articulography (EMA) into the wav-format. The resulting files can be displayed and analyzed in programs like Praat: https://github.com/phbuech/ema2wav
Code and data accompanying my book 'Categoriality and continuity in prosodic prominence', including MATLAB code demonstrating all dynamical systems reviewed in chapter 3: https://osf.io/4g6s2/.
GToBI training materials for the transcription of German intonation (joint work with Martine Grice, Stefan Baumann, and Christine Röhr): http://www.gtobi.uni-koeln.de/