Intonation

Question 1

Cross-cultural variations in intonation

Answer 1

Zsiga claims universal aspects of intonation:
Low/falling pitch = finality, certainty ‘I’m a werewolf’
Higher pitch = non-finality, uncertainty ‘you’re a werewolf?’
Variations in how pitch is manipulated are lg specific (Thai- higher pitch for entire utterance; English rising at the end of an utterance)

Question 2

Questions in English

Answer 2

Y/N questions: rising ‘are you a werewolf?’
Tag questions:
Positive: rising ‘you’re not a werewolf, are you?
Negative: falling ‘you’re a werewolf, aren’t you?

Wh-questions: falling ‘why are you a werewolf?’

Question 3

2 approaches to studying tone/intonation

Answer 3

Non-compositional: the full intonational pattern is a unit in itself
Profile A: high then a fall
Profile B: rise (no fall)
Etc.
Compositional: intonational pattern is composed of a series of H and L tones- the combinations are what creates distinction
Allows intonation and tone to be different realizations of the same patterns and properties of pitch manipulations

Question 4

Pitch accents and boundary tones

Answer 4

Pitch accents: pitch prominence
Making a syllable ‘salient’ either for lexical contrast (pitch accent language) or for discourse contrast (intonational pitch accents)
Boundary tones: pitch contrast at phrase edges

Notation:
Pitch accents: H* L*
Boundary tones: H% L%

Question 5

Shifts in pitch accent = shifts in focus/prominence

Answer 5

H* L%

Marion bought me some flowers.
H* L%

Marion bought me some flowers.
H* L%

Marion bought me some flowers.

Question 6

Y/N questions

Answer 6

L* H%

You’re a werewolf?

  L*                                        H%

Marion mowed the lawn?

Question 7

Wh- vs. Y/N questions

Answer 7

Annotate the following with the appropriate pitch accent (L* or H*) and boundary tone (L% or H %) based on a broad focus reading (i.e. an unmarked reading):

               L*                H%         Are you a werewolf? 

                  H*           L% Why did she say that?

Question 8

Multiple pitch accents, multiple boundary tones

Answer 8

L* H- L* H- L* H%
They bought orange marmalade, lemon marmalade, and blueberry marmalade?

Question 9

More Examples

Answer 9

Tag question:

 H*        H*      L-   L*         H%     You’re not a werewolf,  are you? 

Single salient syllable:

 H*+L        L- H% A werewolf?  Compare the pitch accent of ‘were’ here with ‘you’re a werewolf?’

Question 10

What is intonation?

Answer 10

Intonation is the manipulation of pitch to create discursive (or pragmatic) meaning

Pitch accents mark focal words
Boundary tone marks the end of the phrase
Intermediate boundary tones may mark non-finality within a longer phrase (such as with listing)

All languages use intonation for pragmatic purposes, they way we do it is not necessarily universal