A Fresh Look at the ParadoxicalA Fresh Look at the ParadoxicalNature of Chinese Contour Nature of Chinese Contour

TonesTones

Te-hsin LiuDepartment of Linguistics

Paris 8 Universitytehsinl@yahoo.com.tw

Program of presentationProgram of presentation1. Assumptions of current tonal theories and

problems2. How do our model resolve these problems?

a. The CVCV theory of Lowenstamm (1996)b. Hypothesis of a HLHL tonal skeleton (Carvalho 2002)

and its implications3. Arguments for the existence of a tonal skeleton4. Tone sandhi in Mandarin Chinese and in Tianjin5. Theoretical advantages & conclusion

Assumptions of present tonal Assumptions of present tonal theories (1)theories (1)

-Tonal markedness-Tonal markednessContour tones are more marked than level tones.

They are more “complicated”, or more difficult to produce and perceive (Yip 2002, Zhang 2002)

Being more complicated, contour tones need more time to be implemented (Gordon 1998, Zhang 2002)

Problems Why are there Chinese dialects having only contour tones? Why is there no tonal system with only level tones in Chinese dialects? Why, in Chinese, the duration of level tones is similar to that of

contour tones?

Assumptions of present tonal Assumptions of present tonal theories (2)theories (2)

The autosegmental nature of tone The syllable is a base occupying a portion of time; The tones are

autosegments linked to this syllabic base through a tonal node (or a tonal root).

Does the register imply a specific tonal prime?

How do our model resolve these How do our model resolve these problems?problems?

Introduction of the CVCV theory of Lowenstamm (1996)

CV is the only syllable type All closed syllables, geminate consonants, and long vowels must

be reanalyzed in terms of light open syllables.

Implications:Surface [CVC ] and [CCV ] are certainly marked structures

because of the empty positions

Hypothesis of a HLHL tonal Hypothesis of a HLHL tonal skeletonskeleton

There is a universal tonal periodic skeleton HLHL (Carvalho 2002), analogous to the syllabic skeleton CVCV (Lowenstamm 1996)

Chinese tones are constrained by a portion of this periodic skeleton: a tonal template HLHL.

Chinese contour tones can be analyzed as a succession of level tones defined by an intratonal government relationship H/L encoding the notion of register.

Hypothesis of a HLHL tonal Hypothesis of a HLHL tonal skeletonskeleton

The vertical line indicates the tonal head. The register is low if and only if the head is low; it is

high if and only if the head is high. The four citation tones in Mandarin:

Implications of the present Implications of the present hypothesis (1)hypothesis (1) Level tone is long, since it constitutes a contour just as a long vowel or a geminate

consonant, associated to two positions. Level tone is not intrinsically shorter than the other three tones, especially the

contour tone HL. Phonetic argument (Kratochvil 1968, Xu 2004):

Tone 1 is longer than tone 4 when pronounced in isolation

Figure (1): Mandarin four tones

pronounced in isolation (Xu 2004)

Phonological argument: Template Satisfaction Condition (McCarthy&Prince 1986) Languages tend to fill in empty positions; The long duration of level tones suggests not only the existence of a tonal skeleton, but

also that of a tonal template.

Implications of the present hypothesis Implications of the present hypothesis (2)(2)

-Tonal markedness-Tonal markedness Analogy between tones and syllables: Just as CV is unmarked compared with .VC., the falling tone HL is

unmarked by comparison with the rising tone LH, because the latter one supposes two empty positions on its right and left sides.

Typological argument: In a statistics on 187 tonal languages, Zhang (2002) noticed that 37

languages have a falling tone without the rising one. Only three languages have a rising tone without the falling one: Margi, Lealao Chinantec and Zengcheng.

Argument from language acquisition: The low falling tone is acquired by 2;9 by Cantonese speaking children, and

the low rising tone is learned at 3 years old (A. Tse 1992).

Implications of the present Implications of the present hypothesis (2)hypothesis (2)

-Tonal markedness-Tonal markedness Level tones are more marked than contour tones:

Their lexical representation involves not only two empty tones just as the rising tone, but also a median empty tone.

Their existence should imply the presence of contour tones, but the opposite is false.

Typological argument: A language can have only contour tones without level

tones, as in Chengtu, Shanghai, Zhenhai, Pingyao and Wuxi.

No Chinese dialect has only level tones.

Arguments for the existence of a tonal Arguments for the existence of a tonal skeletonskeleton

- Fanquie Languages- Fanquie Languages Fanquie (reverse cut) was a philological way to introduce the

pronunciation of a new word with two familiar characters:

Insertion of segmental melodies but the tonal template remains unchanged.

Just like /keepi/ -> /piike/, where we transpose segmental melodies and the syllabic template is conserved.

Reduplication acts on skeletal units. Now, fanqie involves tonal reduplication. Therefore, tones are skeletal units 

Arguments for the existence of Arguments for the existence of a tonal skeletona tonal skeleton

In Chinese, there's no phonemic vowel length, which is currently encoded by timing slots or moras. In Mandarin, most syllables keep their underlying tones while in

Shanghai the initial syllable determines the tonal pattern of a mutlisyllablic domain.Ex: HL.HL -> HL.O -> H.L

LH.LH -> LH.O -> L.H Duanmu (1994) posits that the two dialects differ in syllable structure:

all syllables are bimoraic in Mandarin, and all syllables are monomoraic in Shanghai.

Objection: there is no vocalic and syllabic contrasts in Chinese. The function of mora, for Duanmu, consists of explaining the capacity or incapacity of carrying a contour tone. It lost its temporal basis.

Our suggestion: if complex tones, and only tones, do require length, they should be viewed as playing the role of timing units by themselves.

Arguments for the existence of a tonal Arguments for the existence of a tonal skeleton:skeleton:

- morphological justifications- morphological justificationsCantonese:

The perfective marker is often suppressed in the familiar conversation, but the tone remains and replaces the tone of the verbe (Bai 1989):

Syllables look for a skeletal base, which is of a tonal nature.

The paradoxal nature of Chinese The paradoxal nature of Chinese contour tonescontour tones

There are two positions concerning the nature of contour tones:

1. they are a concatenation of two level tones just as in African languages: HL=H+L; LH=L+H

2. a dual nature: they are decomposable into discrete pitch levels, and form a structural unity.

Ex: the unitary character of contour tones in TianjinHL.HLL.HL LH.LHH.LH L+L LH.L

H+H → H.H

Application of OCP (Chen 2000,Yip 2002)

unchanged

The paradoxal nature of Chinese The paradoxal nature of Chinese contour tonescontour tones

Objection: Why these sequences are not subject to tone sandhi in Mandarin?

Ex: tone sandhi in Mandarin (right-dominant) HLH.H HL.H HLH.LH HL.LH

HLH.HL HL.HLHLH.HLH LH.HLH

but HL.HL HL.HLLH.LH LH.LH

unchanged

Our suggestion: application of templatic constraints&elision and proper government

Tone sandhi in Mandarin Chinese Tone sandhi in Mandarin Chinese and proper governmentand proper government

Four lexical tones in Mandarin Chinese: H, LH, HLH, HL Two constraints to explain the difference of sandhi

behavior between Mandarin and Tianjin: Templatic constraints:

a. Mσ ≤ S + 1 : the number of modulations cannot be superior to the number of syllables + 1 ; b. Mσ1 ≤ 1 : no more than one modulation in the pretonic syllable.

Elision : The tail of the σ 1-contour tone falls if it has the same tone as the

head of the σ2-contour tone

Tone sandhi in Mandarin Tone sandhi in Mandarin Chinese Chinese

and proper governmentand proper governmentthe pretonic syllable isunable to carry a concave tone + elision

Proper government: A position is properly governed iff specific constraints are violated. The properly governed position is thus empty.

Mσ ≤ S + 1

Tone sandhi in TianjinTone sandhi in Tianjin Neither concave nor convex citation tones in Tianjin: H, L, HL, LH

Our proposal the number of modulations should be equal to that of syllables

Application of templatic constraints and proper government

Tone sandhi in TianjinTone sandhi in Tianjin Two questions remain:

Why L+L → LH.L ? Why H+H remains unchanged?

Our proposal: Just as the nucleus is the sonority peak (Sievers 1876, Jespersen 1912),

we posit that the high tone is the tonality peak because it is inherently more prominent than the low one from an acoustic point of view.

Just as V is structurally unmarked compared with C, H should be unmarked by comparison with L. The existence of low tones, structurally marked, implies the presence of high tones.

Typological argument: There is coexistence of the low level tone and the high level tone in

Contanese, Tianjin, and Taiwanese. In Mandarin, there is only the high level tone without its low counterpart.

The high tone licenserThe high tone licenser In the domain of syllables, all governing

relations are ultimately derived from the nucleus:the nucleus governs the onset in the case of branching onset, it licenses the non-

head segment to govern its complement : ex: “patrie” in French

If the parallel syllable/tone skeletons is established , we might expect that the high tone plays the same role in Asian tonal languages.

Our proposal H should license L so that the latter one has the possibility to govern.

The high tone licenserThe high tone licenser Empirical consequences of our proposal:

In a right-dominant tonal language where there is a sequence of two successive L tones, the intertonal government relationship cannot be derived legally since there is no high tone licenser.

The high register is unmarked compared to the low register. Arguments from language acquisition:

The low rising contour 13 is more difficult for Cantonese speaking children than the high rising contour 35 (J. Tse 1978).

In Cantonese, the three tones with the high register 55, 35, 33 are learned earlier than those of the low register 22, 13, 21 (A. Tse 1992).

Morphological argument: In Wanrong and in Shang, the tone is used to mark the pronominal

plurality. The singular pronouns have all the high falling contour 53, and their plural counterparts have all the low falling contour 21. The numeral distinction is reduced to register: H marks singular, and L plural.

The primitive character of the high register

The high tone licenserThe high tone licenser Why L+L → LH.L?

The only way to authorize the intertonal government relationship is to insert an epenthetic H tone licensing L2 so that the latter one can assume its role of governor.

Why H1+H2 remain unchanged? H2 is itself the licenser; hence it can govern its melodic

counterpart.

ConclusionsConclusions&Theoretical advantages&Theoretical advantages

Our model gives rise to three asymmetries concerning tonal markedness, supported by the typology:HL vs. LHLevel tones vs. contour tonesH vs. L

There is no need to posit register primitives, such as [+upper] or [-upper], since the register is incorporated into the tonal representation: it is the tonal head.

HL+HL → L.HL and LH+LH →H.LH in Tianjin are not due to OCP, but due to templatic constraints and application of proper government.

Thank you for your attention!