Explore the fundamentals of speech processing and Speech Language Models (SpeechLMs), from traditional ASR and TTS pipelines to advanced tokenization and paralinguistic understanding. Gain a solid grounding in speech acoustics, phonetics, and the core differences between SpeechLMs and TextLMs.

This course introduces the essential concepts and architectures underlying modern speech processing systems. Learners will examine the evolution from traditional speech pipelines to SpeechLMs, understanding their advantages in latency, information retention, and paralinguistic feature capture. The curriculum covers foundational topics such as speech acoustics, spectrograms, MFCCs, phonetics, and cross-modal alignment, equipping learners with the knowledge to analyze and process speech data effectively. The course blends theoretical explanations with practical coding examples and real-world scenarios, enabling learners to connect foundational speech concepts with modern SpeechLM techniques. Learners progress through interactive readings, video lectures, and quizzes to build a comprehensive understanding of speech processing and SpeechLM fundamentals. This course is part one of a three-course Specialization designed to build a complete and cohesive understanding of the subject. While it offers valuable skills on its own, you'll gain the most benefit by progressing through all three courses as a structured learning journey. This course is based on Speech Language Models Architecture, Training, and Applications for Modern Voice AI, by Vinit Kumar Singh. Copyright © 2025 Vinit Kumar Singh All rights reserved. No part of this course may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embedded in critical articles or reviews. Packt is one of the world's most prolific publishers of cutting-edge technical content. For over two decades we've made it our mission to curate and publish the knowledge of only the very best technical experts. We focus on real-world courses that help our customers get the job done, with coverage that extends across a wide range of established and cutting-edge technical topics. If you're an individual or an organisation that embraces learning by doing, Packt is the perfect fit for you.