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The intonational system and the prosodic hierarchy of Embosi (Bantu, C25)

Annie Rialland&

Martial Embanga Aborobongui

Laboratoire de Phonétique et Phonologie, CNRS/Sorbonne-Nouvelle, Paris, France

Phonology/syntax Interface Workshop January, 18th 2012

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Embosi, a Bantu language (C 25) spoken in Congo (Brazzaville)

The estimated number of speakers is 108.000 in the

cuvette Region.

(Ethnologue)

There are also Embosi speakers in Brazzaville and in the diaspora.

Part of Congo-Brazzaville (from Ethnologue)

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Overview• 1) Tonology of Embosi, a 2T language without downstep

Tonal rules associated with hiatus reductions• 2) Intonation of Embosi

– Prosodic Phrases?• Domain for register determination

– Intonational Phrases (Intermediate IPs and IPs)• « superimposed » boundary tones

a dual register model to account for the relationship between tones and boundary tones

a prosodic hierarchy without Phonological Phrase

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Tonology

• Hiatus reduction• Tonal rules associated to hiatus reduction,

which are the main tonal rules in Embosi

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Hiatus reductions (1)– Hiatus reductions occur both within and between Phonological

Words. Rules vary slightly depending upon the domains. – We will consider rules occurring between Phonological Words:

• Coalescence when a is followed by i : a + i => e/ ɛ1. (nga) ω + (i -lémbi) ω (ngélémbi) IP 1sg SM1sg. REC- get lost “I got lost”

• Loss of the first vowel in other contexts :

2. (o -yulu)ω + (a -kɔsi) ω (oyulakɔsi) IP cl 1-woman SM cl 1.REC – get wounded   “The woman got wounded.”

3. (ɔ- saβili) ω + ( a -ndɔrɔ )ω (ɔsaβilandɔrɔ) IP cl 1-interpret cl 6 -dream “The one who interprets dreams”

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Hiatus reductions (2)Hiatus reduction between PW applies anywhere within a a clause (or a sentence?), when there is no pause:

4. ( taalaaβelootulamwana) IP (mɛ ngoadimwanoβelootul ɛɛ) IP (taa) ω ( laaβela) ω (otula) ω (mwana) ω ( mɛ )ω (ngoo) ω (adi) ω the father can deny a child but the mother AUX (mwana) ω (oβela) ω (otula ɛɛ )ω child can (inf) negate NEG “ A father can deny a child but a mother cannot deny a child.”

5. (nɔsaa loopfuβoboso miilara liikanda) IP (nɔ ) ω (ɔ-saa ) ω (loo-pfuβa ) ω (o-boso) ω (miilara) ω you do before with washing before dressing ( lii-kanda ) ω with clothes

« You wash before you dress."

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Tonal rules associated with hiatus reduction

• L+L -> L• 13 (ɛ -bɛlɛ )ω+ (e-kulu) ω (ɛbɛlekulu) IP

cl7. thigh – cl7. short

“A short thigh“

• H+H -> H• 14 (gnɔsi) ω + (a-bɔɔ) ω (gnɔsabɔɔ) IP

cl 1-bird SM.cl 1. PAST- get rotten

“The bird got rotten.”

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*No contour on a mora (1)

• H + L L (stem) H + L

• 15 (gnɔsi) ω + (a-di) ω + (βa) (gnɔsadiβa) IP

cl 1.bird SM cl 1- be there

“The bird is there.”

The avoidance of HL on a mora is triggered by OCP (L + L L).

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*No contour on a mora (2)

• L + H H (stem) L + H

• 16. (ngɔlɔ) ω + (a-sEmbi) ω (ngɔlasEmbi) IP

L + H-H L-H

cl.1.silure – SM. cl 1.REC -ferment

“The silure fermented”

The avoidance of LH on a mora is triggered by OCP (H+ H H)

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*No contour on a mora (3)when OCP cannot apply (a).

• H + L H (stem) H + L + H

μ μ μ

All moras are kept.

17 (e-dunu) ω + (o-yulu) ω (edunooyulu) IP

H + L-H HL-H

cl.7. old – cl.1. woman “the old woman”

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*No contour on a mora (5)when OCP cannot apply (b).

• L + H L (stem) H + LThe LH contour on a mora is avoided and reduced to H.

• 18 ( mwa na) ω + ( a-pasi) ω + ( ɛ -bɔli) ω (mwa napasɛbɔli) IP

L H L H H L

cl 1. child SM cl 1.REC- tear lips

“The child had his lips torn”

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Intonation & prosodic constituents

• Prosodic Phrases ? – Determination of the register

• Intermediate Intonational Phrases -«Superimposed» H% boundary tones.

• Intonational Phrases

-«Superimposed» boundary tones.

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Corpora 1) a read corpus of 90 utterances, designed in order to

study relatives and read by the second author (Corpus: “Relatives”)

2) A 10 minutes-interview (with 150 IPs), about a family problem, recorded by the second author in Brazzaville (Corpus: “Ambara”). The interviewee (in his sixties) is bilingual (Embosi/French).

3) A 8 minutes-interview about traditional songs and their composition, recorded by the second author in Brazzaville(Corpus: “songs”). The interviewee (in her fifties) is basically monolingual in Embosi with some knowledge of French.

4) 30 isolated utterances, recorded by the second author

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Prosody of a one-clause-sentence

No downstep, L % superimposed on H -> last H is realised very low

-> penultimate H plateau is lowered

( Read corpus: « Relatives »)

The girls are playing near the riverIP

L%

lowering H pen

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Prosody of a sentence with a relative clause

(realised as a single IP)

(Read corpus: « Relatives »)

The girls who can swim are playing near the river

lowering H pen.

L%

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Prosody of a cleft sentence(realised with a register lowering on the relative

clause)

( Read corpus: « Relatives »)

It is the girls who are playing drums

Register lowering on PP

L%

PP IP

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Prosody of a sentence involving 2 Intermediate IPs

(corpus interview: Ambara)

[You have] no reason or you have no right to organize the burying of this person

L%

InIP IntIP IP

H% superimposed

on the last H of the IP

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Prosody of a sentence with a topic(realised with an Intermediate IPs)

(corpus interview: Ambara)

now and the-in-laws form an entityTOPIC

the mother’s father

PP IntIP IP

H% superimposed on the last H of the IP

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Prosody of a sentence with 2 PP

Register expansion and raising

In the dialog, « Mbosi of Boundji » is contrasted with Teke, Kukuya…

PP

It is me as I am Mbosi of Boundji

As Mbosi of Boundji

(corpus interview: song)

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«Prosodic phrases»:

• Characteristics: register domains• Role : expressing the

«focus/givenness» dimension

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Are «Prosodic phrases» constituents or not?

• A similar question have been asked about constrastive focus in Japanese which is signaled by register expansion with two answers:

– 1) Focus, post-focus... form prosodic constituents (Intermediate IPs in a recursive structure) as proposed by Kubozono (2007)

– 2) Focus does not form a prosodic constituent• Freeing focus from prosodic phrasing

– Ishihara (2005)

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Intermediate Intonational Phrases, Intonational Phrases and «superimposed» Boundary Tones

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Boundary tones and tones:a dual-register organisation

There is no downstep or register modification triggered by the H/L tonal alternation.– The register is determined at the level of PP.

– Boundary tones are superimposed at the level of IP • Boundary tones are realised higher or lower than

tones, which results in a dual register organisation:

H%

H

L

L%

PP IP

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Scalings of T%

• L% are realized at the bottom of the speaker’s register, as in English (Maeda 1976) and many other languages.

• H%– H% are realised higher than any tone in a given

utterance or at the same level as tones realised on an « emphatic » register.

– H% are realised at the top of a speaker’s pitch range in a given utterance.

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• Local superimposition in Shekgalagari, Hyman & Monaka (2008, TIE3)

• Superimposition over a domain« The interaction of tone and intonation in Jita yes/no questions » Downing

1989– In Jita polar questions, all the tones are raised until the last H tone:

H B H B H B B B

Various relationships between « boundary tones » and tones in Bantu languages

L% is associated to the 2nd mora of 00 and HH words

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« Linearised » boundary tones in a Bantu language: the case of Chichewa

Myers S., 1996, Boundary tones and the phonetic implementation of tone in Chichewa, Studies in African Linguistics, vol. 25.1

L%

H%

L% et H% are added at the end of the utterance, after the tonal realisation.

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Distribution of Boundary tones

• Intermediate Intonational Phrases• H% at the end of topics• H% at the end of non final clauses (similar role as

continuation rises)

• Intonational Phrases• H% at the end of yes/no question utterances• L% at the end of assertive utterances and -wh

questions • as in Sotho (Zerbian 2006), IPs are aligned with the

right edge of Inflexional Syntactic Phrases (basically the root clause).

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No phonological phrase• Hiatus reduction occurs between any Phonological Word

in a clause (or utterance) if the context of the rule is met (no pause).

• There is no penultimate lengthening and no grouping of the kind which can be found in Chichewa, for example:

• (a) (Subj) (VP) – Kanerva (1990: 102, fig (112))

(fíisi]) (a-na-dyá m-káango])

cl1.hyena 1subj-pst1-eat cl3-lion

‘The hyena ate the lion.’

(b) (Subj) (VP) (Top) – (Kanerva 1990: 107, fig (123b)) (mwaána]) (a-na-m-pézá kú-dáambo])

(gaálu]) cl1.child 1subj-pst1-1obj-find Loc-cl5.swamp cl1.dog

• Another Bantu languages has been analysed without PhP : Northern Sotho (Zerbian 2006)..

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Conclusion

In Embosi, a 2 tone language without downstep, we propose an analysis with:

• No Phonological Phrases (as in Sotho)• Prosodic Phrases (focus/givenness dimension).• Intermediate Intonational Phrases and Intonational

Phrases with « superimposed » boundary tones .

- a dual-register-model to account for the relationship between tones and boundary tones.

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• This research is part of a French-German cooperative project:« Syntax/phonology interface in Bantu languages »

(« SymPhonI » or « BantuPSyn »).Directed by L. Downing & A. RiallandFunded by the French ANR and the

German DFG.

involving:- ZAS (Berlin)- Laboratory of Phonetics & Phonology

(CNRS/3 Paris) - Dynamique du langage

(CNRS/Lyon 2)

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Thank you for your attention