Intonational  Cues  to  Interrogative  Intentin  African  American  English

Cybelle  SmithLSA  Annual  MeetingJanuary  6th,  2012

How  do  you  know  it’s  a  question?

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Interrogative  Cues

• Question  Words  (what,who,  Japanese  “ka”)

• Syntactic  Cues• Intonational  Cues• Facial  Expression,Gestures

• Context  /  Pragmatic  Cues

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Interrogative  CuesAcross  Languages

Differences• Syntactic  andlexical  markers

• Differentintonational  tunes(nuclear  accent,boundary  tones)

Proposed  (near)-­Universals

• Tendency  towardshigh  pitch

• Syntactic/LexicalTrade-­‐off  withIntonation

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Syntax-­‐Intonation  Trade-­‐Off

+Intonation

+Inversion+What+Intonation +Inversion

+Intonation

What  are  you  eating?

Are  you  eating  pizza?

You’re  eating  pizza?

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AAE  Syntactic  Cues• Less  auxiliary  inversion  than  SAE

– only  ~39%  of  yes-­‐no  questions  explicitly  inverted(Melnick  and  Rickford  2011)

• Copula  deletion  and  regularization  of  3rd-­‐singular  leads  to  syntactic  ambiguity:– Them boys still bad

• (Are) them boys still bad?• Them boys (are) still bad.

– She live around here• (Does)  she  live  around  here?• She  live(s)  around  here.

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AAE  Intonational  Cues

• Less  likely  to  have  rising  pitch  on  finalsyllable  of  yes-­‐no  questions  than  SAE– Tarone  (1973)– Jun  and  Foreman  (1996)

• more  variable  boundary  tones  in  AAE  than  SAEduring  role-­‐playing

– Green  (2002)• flat  final  syllable  (SW  Louisiana  teens  and  adults)

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Questions

• How  are  AAE  speakers  marking  yes-­‐noquestions?– Different  intonational  cues  from  SAE?– Cues  outside  of  intonation  and  syntax?

• Does  the  syntax-­‐intonation  trade-­‐offapply  to  AAE?

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Claims

• AAE  speakers  mark  yes-­‐no  questionsintonationally  using  an  early  slow  rise  in  pitch

• When  SAE  speakers  exaggerate  L*H,        AAE  speakers  exaggerate  early  rise      (confirming  questions)• Syntax-­‐intonation  trade-­‐off  does  apply:

– Inversion  correlates  with  final  syllable  pitch  slope  inmale  AAE  speakers

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Methods

• Corpus  analysis:– CALLFRIEND  American  English  (Southernand  Non-­‐Southern  Dialect)

– East  Palo  Alto  Sociolinguistic  Interview  withFoxy  Boston  (name  of  main  interviewee)

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CALLFRIEND• 30  min.  phone  conversations• “Southern”  or  “non-­‐southern”  dialectbased  on  vowel  phonology

• All  AAE  speakers  =  “southern  dialect”,regardless  of  geography

• No  ethnic  data  on  individual  speakers  -­‐-­‐How  do  I  know  this  is  AAE?

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AAE  Identification• First:  picked  speakers  from  northern  cities  in  the  Southern  Dialect

corpus• Next:  verified  speakers  were  using  other  AAE  features:

– zero  copula– doesn’t  -­‐>  don’t– consonant  cluster  simplification  (e.g.  talked  -­‐>  talk,  slipped  -­‐>  slip)– other  sound  changes  (e.g  ð.  -­‐>  d)

• Additional  evidence:– Lexical  items  (brother,  sister)– Use  of  falsetto  by  one  of  the  male  speakers

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Data  Collection:  SpeakersSpeaker

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

Corpus

Cal

lfrien

dSoci

olin

g

Inte

rvie

w

Gender

Male(4)

Female(8)

Place

East Palo Alto(4)

New York(2)

Michigan(2)

Pennsylvania(4)

Variety

AAVE-influenced HE (1)

SAE (1)

AAVE (1)

SAE (1)

AAVE(2)

SAE(2)

AAVE(4)

7  AAE4  SAE1  HE

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Data  Collection:  Tokens

• Questions  identified  and  screened  forpragmatic  intent  based  on  Bolinger  (1957)– Information-­‐Seeking  (IS)– Information-­‐Confirming  (IC) More  on  this  later!

•No  tag  questions  or  particles•No  “back-­‐channeling”•Tokens  with  bad  sound  quality  dropped

End  Result:  125  yes-­no  questions

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publica

publications

Quantitative  Metrics

Getting  any  publications?Whole  QuestionFinal  Word

Final  Syllable

Final  Stressed  Syllable  (FSS)

Syllable  Before  FSS

First  Syllable  of  Final  Word

tions

Example  Question  from  CALLFRIEND:

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Pitch  slope  from  minimumto  maximum

Pitch  slope  fromstart  to  end

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Motivation  for  Features

Results

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Final  Syllable  Pitch  Slope• AAE  speakers  more  likely  to  have  level  or  falling  final  syllable

pitch  slopeThe  Pennsylvania  Males:

N  =  40,  p  =  .035N  =  40,  p  =  .038AAE SAE AAE

(Start  to  End) (Min  to  Max)

SAE

Pitch  Slope  (Hz/s)

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Influence  of  Stress• Dialectal  difference  greater  when  last  twosyllables  “unstressed  stressed”

The  Pennsylvania  Males

n  =  40,  p  =  .035 n  =  15,  p  =  .039AAE AAE SAESAE

Pitch  Slope  (Hz/s)

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Whole  Question  Pitch  Slope• Pitch  slope  over  the  question  as  a  whole  is  surprisingly  similar

The  Pennsylvania  Males

AAE SAE AAE SAE

(Start  to  End) (Min  to  Max)

Pitch  Slope  (Hz/s)

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Question  Riseby  Different  Means

19-­‐year-­‐old  Female  SAE  Speaker  from  NY

40-­‐year-­‐oldMale  AAESpeakerfrom  PA

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Implications

• Liu  and  Xu  (2007)– Yes-­‐no  questions  diverge  from  declaratives  atstressed  syllable  of  first  content  word

– Post-­‐focus  syllable  pitch  range  compressed  andraised  in  questions,  compressed  and  lowered  instatements

• Could  AAE  speakers  be  using  this  early  rise  as  aprimary  intonational  cue  to  interrogativity?

Functional  Sensitivity

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Information  Seeking  vs.Confirming  Questions

• Information  seeking:A  question  to  which  you  don’t  know  the  answer:– Are  your  parents  around?

• Confirming:– Foxy:    Well-­‐  I  don't  know  hardly  about  nothing  go  on  cause  I'm  newthere.  I  just  started.

– Interviewer:    That's  right.  In  September  huh?– Foxy:    Um  mm,  I  started  in  October.– Interviewer:    Oh  in  October.  So  you  didn't  start  at  the  beginning  of  theyear?

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Higher  Terminal  Pitchin  Confirming  Questions

• Across  speaker  groups  Info-­‐Confirming(IC)  Questions  showed:– greater  pitch  range  on  the  final  syllable– higher  maximum  pitch  on  the  final  syllable

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Higher  Terminal  Pitchin  Confirming  Questions

• Unexpected  find:– Venditti  et  al.  (2006)  found  Info-­Seeking  (IS)questions  had  a  higher  F0  at  the  nuclear  accent  andboundary  tone  than  Info-­Con/irming  (IC)  questionsin  student-­‐tutor  dialogs

• Possible  explanations:– Different  setting:  Maybe  confirming  questionscorrelate  with  surprise/excitement  in  phoneconversations,  but  not  in  an  educational  setting?

– Elimination  of  “back-­‐channeling”  questions

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What  happens  if  youexaggerate  this  cue?

L*H

Early,  Gradual  Rise

HigherHigh

LowerLow

HigherHigh

HigherLow

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Dialectal  Differences

• AAE  males  raise  minimum  pitch  on  last  syllable,  pitchrange  increase  not  significant

• SAE  females  lower  minimum  pitch  on  last  syllable,  pitchrange  significantly  larger

L*H

Early,  Gradual  Rise

HigherHigh

LowerLowHigherHigh

HigherLow

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Interesting  Parallel• AAE  and  SAE  speakers  use  different  contours  to  express  interrogativity

BUT  the  correlation  between– ConJirming  information  and– Exaggerated  intonational  cues  to  interrogativity

in  this  dataset  remains  the  same

• Open  Question:• How  generalizable  is  this  trend?• Can  this  trend  be  found  in  other  corpora  of  natural  casual  dialogue,  with

unrestricted  topics  of  conversation?

Sensitivity  to  Syntax

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Syntax-­‐Intonation  Trade-­‐Off

+Intonation

+Inversion+What+Intonation +Inversion

+Intonation

What  are  you  eating?

Are  you  eating  pizza?

You’re  eating  pizza?

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HigherRise

Syntax-­‐Intonation  Trade-­‐Off

Grabe  2004

Decl.

Wh  QInvertedYes-­‐No  Q

Non-­‐InvertedYes-­‐No  Q

%  Final  Rise  in  F0+Lex+Syn +Syn

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Inversion  and  Pitch  Slope• Large  effect  for  AAE  males,  nonsig.correlation  for  everyone  else

p  <  .01

• Not  due  to  acorrelationbetweeninversion  and  q.function

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Summary• AAE  speakers  DO  use  a  reliable  intonational  cue  tomark  interrogativity:  gradual  early  rise  in  F0

• Confirming  questions  showed  exaggeration  ofintonational  cues  even  when  cues  were  different

• AAE  showed  sensitivity  to  syntactic  structure:– Final  syllable  pitch  slope  increased  in  absence  of  syntactic  cues

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Thank  you!• Meghan  Sumner,  advisor• John  Rickford,  lots  of  helpful  advice,  allowed  use  of  EPANeighborhood  Survey

• Additional  people  I  should  thank:Kathryn  Potts,  Arto  Antilla,  Christopher  Potts,  RobertPodesva,  Tyler  Kendall,  Sun-­‐Ah  Jun,  Lisa  Green,  MarisaTice,  Marie-­‐Catherine  de  Marneffe,  Jason  Grafmiller,David  Clausen,  Mark  Linsey

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ReferencesBolinger,  Dwight.  (1957).  Interrogative  structures  of  American  English.  Publications  of  the

American  Dialect  Society,  28.  University,  Alabama:  University  of  Alabama  Press.Grabe,  E.  (2004).  Intonational  variation  in  urban  dialects  of  English  spoken  in  the  British  Isles.  In

Gilles,  P.  and  Peters,  J.  (eds.),  Regional  Variation  in  Intonation.  Linguistische  Arbeiten,Tuebingen,  Niemeyer,  9-­‐31.

Green,  Lisa  J.  (2002).  African  American  English:  A  Linguistic  Introduction,  Cambridge:  CambridgeUniversity  Press.

Haan,  Judith  (2001).  Speaking  of  Questions.  An  Exploration  of  Dutch  Question  Intonation.Dissertation,  Netherlands  Graduate  School  of  Linguistics  (LOT).

Jun,  Sun-­‐Ah  and  Christina  Foreman.  (1996).  Boundary  tones  and  focus  realization  in  AfricanAmerican  English  Intonation.    Abstract.  Third  Joint  Meeting  of  ASA  and  ASJ.  Hawaii.  Fall.

Liu,  F.  and  Xu,  Y.  (2007).  Question  intonation  as  affected  by  word  stress  and  focus  in  English.In  Proceedings  of  The  16th  International  Congress  of  Phonetic  Sciences,  Saarbrucken.  August,2007.  1189-­‐1192.

Melnick,  R.  and  J.  Rickford.  (2011).  Processing  constraints  and  socio-­‐variation  interact  in  creolequestion  formation.  Poster  presented  at  the  24th  Annual  Conference  on  Human  SentenceProcessing  (CUNY).  Stanford,  CA.

Tarone,  Elaine  E.  (1973).  Aspects  of  intonation  in  Black  English.  American  Speech.    Duke  UniversityPress.  48-­‐1/2,  29-­‐36.

Venditti,  Jeffifer  J.,  Hirshberg,  Julia  and  Liscombe,  Jackson.  (2006).  Intonational  Cues  to  StudentQuestions  in  Tutoring  Dialogs.  Proc.  Interspeech,  Pittsburgh,  1-­‐4.

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Final  Syllable  Pitch  RangeFemales

p  =  .618 p  =  .015*

Males

Information  Confirming

Information  Seeking

p  =  .901 p  =  .351

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Final  Syllable  Maximum  PitchFemales Males

Information  Confirming

Information  Seeking

p  =  .718 p  =  .059 p  =  .010** p  =  .783

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Final  Syllable  Minimum  PitchFemales Males

Information  Confirming

Information  Seeking

p  =  .308 p  =  .597 p  =  .005** p  =  .723

40

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AAE  Contour  SimilarityOver  Age,  Distance,  GenderFoxy  Boston,  Female,  Age  13,  1986,  East  Palo  Alto

CFM40PA,  Male,  Age  40,  c.1996,  Grew  up  in  PA

Was  it  fun?

Going  to  school?