PeopleofSuperintelligence

Researcher

Daniel Hirst

Also known as Daniel J. Hirst

Daniel Hirst is a linguist whose research on intonation includes software for automatic speech-prosody analysis. He completed a PhD in 1974, published Intonative Features in 1977, and completed a Habilitation thesis in 1987. He founded SProSIG in 2000, organized the first International Conference on Speech Prosody in 2002, and became an ISCA Fellow in 2013. His software includes MOMEL, INTSINT, and ProZed; he published Speech Prosody: From Acoustics to Interpretation in 2024 and coauthored a 2025 study of English pitch range. As of October 2026, he is a research director emeritus in LPL's Cross-disciplinary research group PROSODY.

Now at
Institut des Sciences Humaines et Sociales and Aix-Marseille Université
Works
275
Citations
2,209
h-index
21
Badges

Publication numbers from OpenAlex, as of 19 October 2026.

Timeline

  1. 1974

    A PhD

    He receives a PhD in 1974.

  2. 1977

    Intonative Features

    He publishes Intonative Features: A Syntactic Approach to English Intonation in 1977.

  3. 1987

    A Habilitation thesis

    He completes a Habilitation thesis in 1987.

  4. 2000–2002

    Building a prosody community

    He founds SProSIG in 2000 and organizes the first International Conference on Speech Prosody in Aix-en-Provence in 2002.

  5. 2013–2019

    ISCA fellowship and service

    He is elected an ISCA Fellow in 2013, becomes a member of the Permanent Council for the Organisation of ICPhS in 2014, and serves as an ISCA Distinguished Lecturer in 2018–2019.

  6. September 2024

    A book on speech prosody

    He publishes Speech Prosody: From Acoustics to Interpretation in September 2024.

  7. 2025

    Tools and a pitch study

    By 2025, his MOMEL, INTSINT, and ProZed tools support automatic speech-prosody analysis through freely available Praat plugins. In 2025, he coauthors a study comparing the pitch range of L2 English read by native speakers of Jordanian Arabic with that of L1 speakers of English and Arabic.

  8. As of October 2026

    Research director emeritus

    As of October 2026, he is a research director emeritus in LPL's Cross-disciplinary research group PROSODY.

Career

  1. Since 2000Institut des Sciences Humaines et SocialesResearch Director Emeritus
  2. From 2000Speech Prosody Special Interest GroupFounder
  3. 2000–2012Université de Provence Aix-Marseille I
  4. 2000–2025CNRS
  5. 2000–2025Aix-Marseille Université

From the biography and OpenAlex affiliations (the years of papers that list the organization), so some years are approximate.

Most-cited works

  1. Relevance: Communication and Cognition1989 · Mind & Language · 437 citations
  2. Levels of Representation and Levels of Analysis for the Description of Intonation Systems2000 · Text, speech and language technology · 175 citations
  3. Form and function in the representation of speech prosody2005 · Speech Communication · 171 citations
  4. The analysis by synthesis of speech melody2011 · Journal of Speech Sciences · 91 citations
  5. SPeech Phonetization Alignment and Syllabification (SPPAS): a tool for the automatic analysis of speech prosody2012 · Speech prosody · 87 citations

From OpenAlex, as of 19 October 2026.

  1. The company share of AI researchers’ top papers rose from 2% to 32%Includes Institut des Sciences Humaines et Sociales. We estimate where leading AI researchers worked when their most-cited papers appeared. The company share rose from 2% in 1975–1979 to 32% in 2020–2024.
  2. Google had the most people shaping AI every year from 2014 to 2025Includes CNRS. Our estimates of which organizations employed the most people shaping AI from 1961 to 2025, with a year-by-year chart.
  3. Google has the highest combined h-index among AI organizationsIncludes CNRS. Our estimates of combined and median h-index at AI organizations, using current affiliations and OpenAlex records.
  4. The United States employs an estimated 53% of people in our data with a known employment countryOur estimates of where AI careers are concentrated now and how countries’ shares of dated positions changed over time.

Colleagues

People with dated positions at the same organization in the same years.

Sources and credits

Photo: We have no published photo of Daniel Hirst yet. Send us a free-licensed photo.

  1. Developments in the modeling of speech prosody langsci-press.org. Checked 19 October 2026.
  2. Notice bibliographique: Intonative features catalogue.bnf.fr. Checked 19 October 2026.
  3. ISCA Fellow Program isca-speech.org. Checked 19 October 2026.
  4. Archive ouverte HAL: Daniel Hirst cv.hal.science. Checked 19 October 2026.
  5. HIRST Daniel | Laboratoire Parole et Langage lpl-aix.fr. Checked 19 October 2026.