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THE TONE TIER

 

 

We recognize three types of tonal events, pitch accents, phrase accents, and boundary tones, and two levels of phrasing, the intermediate phrase (ip) and the intonational phrase (IP).

 

Pitch Accents

A pitch accent is a melody that is phonologically associated with a metrically strong syllable. Phonetically, a pitch accent co-occurs (more or less) with the stressed syllable it is phonologically associated with. Pitch accents are "prominence cueing" (a term coined by Francis Nolan) in that they indicate that the syllable with which they co-occur is meant to be construed as being metrically prominent (i.e. stressed). In Greek there is typically one prominent syllable in each content word; its position is lexically specified. Most function words do not have prominent syllables (though they may carry orthographic accent), but some do, such as the word ka'ta when it means "against". In some cases, Greek words may carry two pitch accents: this happens when a word is stressed on the antepenult and is followed by an enclitic (e.g. [to afto'cini'to mu] "the car my"), or when a word is stressed on the penult and is followed by two enclitics (e.g. ['fere 'mu to] "bring me it"). In such cases, both stressed syllables can be accented; if there is only one accent, this falls on the rightmost stressed syllable of the entire group. Thus, in Greek we can distinguish between (i) unstressed syllables, such as [re] in ['fere 'mu to], (ii) stressed but unaccented syllables, such as [fe] in ['fere 'mu to] (with one pitch accent on [mu]), and (iii) stressed and accented syllables, such as [fe] and [mu] in ['fere 'mu to] (with pitch accents on [fe] and [mu]).

 

Our research suggests that in Greek we can distinguish five pitch accents: H*, L*, L*+H, L+H*, H* and H*+L. The typical distribution and phonetic realization of these accents is described below and shown in Figure 1, Figure 2, Figure 3, and Figure 4. Each utterance has at least one pitch accent, but typically more, since in Greek most stressed syllables are also accented. Thus, while an English phrase such as Mary loves John is most likely uttered without an accent on loves, in a similar Greek phrase, such as [i ma'ria mi'lai sto 'mano] "Maria is talking to Manos", all three content words are accented. The last accent of an utterance is called the nucleus. By default, the nucleus falls on the last content word of an utterance (if it is a declarative, but it may occur on an earlier word under narrow or contrastive focus. Changes in the position of the nucleus also obtain in questions and other types of utterances (on which more below).

 

  • H* is mostly used as a nuclear accent in declarative utterances and it contrasts with L+H*: a L+H* nuclear accent signals narrow or contrastive focus (Arvaniti et al. 2006, LgSp), whereas H* signals broad focus (Baltazani 2003). The H* accent lacks the initial dip associated with the L tone of the L+H* (Arvaniti et al. 2006, LgSp) and its peak is probably aligned earlier in the accented vowel, though quantitative data on this point are not yet available.

 

  • L* is realized as a low plateau. This accent appears in nuclear position before a "continuation rise" (Baltazani & Jun 1999), in yes-no questions (Arvaniti et al. 2006, SpeCom; Baltazani & Jun 1999; Baltazani 2007b), and in the "suspicious" calling contour (that is, when the vocative is to be interpreted as "is that you?")

 

  • L*+H is the default accent in pre-nuclear position; it may also occur in nuclear position in calls, imperatives, negative declaratives (Baltazani 2006c), and wh-questions (Arvaniti & Ladd 2009). Typically, the L tone is aligned at or slightly before the onset of the accented syllable, and the H tone is aligned at the beginning of the first post-accentual vowel (Arvaniti & Ladd, 1995; Arvaniti et al. 1998). The realization of L*+H is different in contexts showing tonal crowding (Arvaniti et al. 2000). In non-focal position, L+H* is used for metrical purposes (so it is used to highlight both new and old information).

 

  • L+H* signals narrow focus in declaratives and other types of utterance (Arvaniti et al. 2006, LgSp; Baltazani & Jun 1999). The realizational difference between L+H* and L*+H lies in the alignment of the H tone: the H tone of L+H* is well within the accented vowel, whereas the H tone of the L*+H aligns early in the first post-accentual vowel.

 

  • H*+L also contrasts with H* in nuclear position. The H* is manifested as a small rise on the accented syllable, while the H*+L is manifested as a fall throughout this syllable (see the last accent in Figure 9). In terms of meaning, the use of H*+L conveys a sense of "stating the obvious" that is, the implication that the addressee should have known or expected the answer (i.e. that the speaker considers the information they impart by their utterance to be part of the common ground).

 

  • Downstep: All accents can be downstepped, i.e. scaled lowered than typically expected; examples of downstepped accents can be found in Figure 2, Figure 5, Figure 8, and Figure 9. At this stage, it is not clear whether there is any particular meaning associated with downstep, or with particular downstepped accents.

 

Phrase Accents

GRToBI uses three phrase accents, H-, L- and !H-. As mentioned earlier, our analysis suggests that Greek has two levels of phrasing, the intermediate and intonational phrase (ip and IP respectively); it is further assumed here that phrase accents demarcate the right edge of intermediate phrases and boundary tones demarcate the right edge of intonational phrases.

 

This analysis is based on the following observations. Tones associated with ips typically show simple F0 movements, unlike those associated with IPs which can show complex pitch configurations. Further there is a difference in scaling between ips and IPs, in cases where both have similar pitch movements, with ip boundaries exhibiting less extreme F0 values than IP boundaries (i.e. a H- is scaled lower than a H-H% configuration). In addition, the pauses after IPs (even non-final ones) are longer and more frequent than those for ips. Recent research also suggests that left ip and IP boundaries are associated with prosodic strengthening manifested as lengthening of ip and IP initial consonants (Kastrinaki 2003). Non-final intermediate phrases typically have a H- or L-phrase accent at their right edge. !H-, on the other hand, is used only in certain types of stylized intonation and then only in utterance-final ips (i.e. it is always followed by a boundary tone).

 

 Arvaniti et al. (2006, SpeCom) have shown that the melody of Greek polar questions is difficult to accommodate with this inventory of phrase accents, and suggest that the phrase accent of these questions is a bitonal L+H-. In addition, this phrase accent does not always co-occur with the right edge of the intermediate phrase it is associated with; rather, when the nucleus of the polar question is on a non-final word, the L+H- phrase accent aligns with the last stressed syllable of the question. The two patterns of alignment of the L+H- used in Greek polar questions are illustrated in Figure 4.

 

Boundary Tones

GRToBI includes three boundary tones, H%, L%, and !H%. These boundary tones demarcate the right edges of intonational phrases. They combine with most phrase accents into configurations which are frequently interpreted in the ways shown below (the list is only indicative; the interpretation of a contour depends also on the utterance and the context in which it is used).

 

Possible combinations of phrase accent and boundary tone and their usages

 

 

 

 

 

L-L%:      declaratives, negative declaratives, imperatives, wh-questions

L-H%:     "involved" continuation rise, "suspicious" calls

H-L%:      yes-no questions, requesting calling contour

                (note: according to Arvaniti et al. 2006a this combination is L+H-L%)

H-H%:     continuation rise, questioning calling contour

L-!H%:    "involved" wh-questions, negative declaratives (showing reservation), requesting imperatives

H-!H%:   stylized continuation rise

!H-!H%:  stylized call, incredulous questions

!H-H%:   polite stylized call

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