Tone in Sherpa (Sino-Tibetan)

Joyce McDonoughJoyce McDonough1,1, Rebecca Baier Rebecca Baier22 and and Michelle GregoryMichelle Gregory33

11University of Rochester, University of Rochester, 22University of University of Maryland, Maryland, 33Pacific Northwest National Lab

Goal: To examine a claim about Sherpa tone.

An instrumental study of pitch contrasts in the Sherpa (Sino-Tibetan) spoken in the Solo-Khumbu valley in Nepal.

The data in this study is from the upper Khumbu valley, in the high altitude villages below the Everest range.

While tonal contrasts in Sherpa have been observed, characterizing the tonal patterns in Sherpa has been elusive, known to be confounded by the complex interaction of several factors including:

•intonation•stress•accent

In a recent monograph, Kelly (2004) states that tone is contrastive in Sherpa:

a word level contrast between two falling tones, one which begins higher than the other, overlaid with a stress system.

Goal of this study is to find instrumental support for this observation.

We used Kelly’s word list of the tonal contrasts

in mono- and bi-syllabic words.

Note: Kelly’s study was done in the lower Solo-Khumbu valley. We expect differences.

DATA:4 native speakers (3 male, 1 female) (a 5th speaker’s data was not used)

isolated words in citation forms (4 speakers) short conversational utterances (1 speaker (female))

we recorded citation forms from native speakers by working with a Sherpa consultant who facilitated the elicitation of the contrasts (ser meaning ‘cloud’, versus ser meaning ‘cough’)

short descriptions of activities that included particular lexical items were elicited (How do you make chang?)

We found evidence for two contrastive pitch contours in citation forms showing a clear bimodal distribution pattern- even in a speaker with a very narrow pitch range (Sp3). Both contours were falling, one beginning

higher than the other, as Kelly noted.

• This bi-modal pattern was the same in both mono- and bi-syllabic citation forms.

• The two forms show slightly different timing patterns, indicating the tone target was aligned to the syllable.

• Indicating the domain of the fall was larger than word level.

• Additionally, the fall was not present in utterance medial position.

We also found evidence for canonical intonational marking, a fall and a rise, which interacted with the tonal patterns.

Contrast between H and L toned marked words in citation forms.

The forms exhibit the falling contour reported by Kelly (2003):

• H starts higher than the L toned words.

• It’s a word level phenomena.

Both mono- and bi- syllabic tokens showed the same pitch contours:

• falling over the course of the word • H tone associated to the 1st syllable• L drop at end• timing differences between mono- and

bi- syllablic tokens indicate a syllable affiliation of tone

Note the pitch contour for the 1st syllable of a L toned word [lola] ‘wall’

[ß´rwa] ‘sherpa’ vs ‘blind’

The same bi-modal distribution pattern was present in all speakers, even in Sp3 who had a rising rather than falling pattern and a narrow pitch range.

Note that the rising pattern in Sp3 was a rise to the H level of this H tone words.

Sp2 Sp3

Sp 4 produced words in citation forms and in short utterances.

She had the same bi-model distribution patterns on the accented syllable with a falling contour in citation forms.

However, the falling pitch contour was not always present.

Sp4 produced H tone forms within sentences. In these forms there was no fall.

Sp4 also produced rises, like Sp3.

Sp4: pitch contours of [ß´rwå]

The force of the pattern is apparent in these graphs of tokens showing the contrast between a H and L tone marked [s´r].

As before, Sp4 tokens are taken from both isolation and citation forms, the two patterns are present.

Sp3 has three tokens, two H tone, one L (blue), in citation forms.

Sp4

Sp3

[s´r] : H vs L

L

Black: /dˆ lo`la/ “This is a wall”

Red: /tßore lo` måln/ “How old are you?”

H

Blue: /˜a lo’ jeno/ “I have a cough”

Sp4: [lo] contrast in utterances

H

We see a rise to the H tone /lo/ then a drop vs a falling contour of utterances with the L tone /lo/.

This suggests a pitch accent type system.

Words are marked for accent or not.Those with an accent have a H pitch target.

*[ lo ] vs [ lo ]

H/L contrast in utterances

Two intonation patterns are present in the data:

a standard fall and a continuation rise

These intonation patterns are perturbed by the presence of a H tone target in accented words.

H*

˜a lo j´no

tßore lo` måln L%

L%

the final fall and rise arguably due to boundary tones….

We suggest that the H tone target is aligned to a stressed syllable in an accented word.

*

«ß´rwå vs «ß´rwå‘Sherpa’ ‘blind’

However, we have yet to determine the relationship between stress and accent. It is not clear whether every stressed syllable has an accent by default, or whether there is a 4-way contrast.

Q: can Sherpa have stressed syllables without accent (tone target)?

Pre-summary: We suggest that Sherpa has a pitch accent system with: contrast between accented and unaccented words. • the system assigns a H tone target to a accented syllable.

However this interacts with stress• the relationship between accent and stress is yet to be determined.

Pitch

Stress

yes no

yes H ??no ---- default

These ex’s show the first confound: between accent and stress in bisyllables:

In all 3 forms: audible stress on the second syllable of accented /tsi«rup/.

*[t߈`«rup] ‘squeeze’

Note contrast between citation and IP medial contours

The stress distinction is also lexical.

Gordon et. al. identify a ‘high rising contour’, contrasting with a ‘low rising contour’. as well as high & low falling contours.

The tokens differ in the alignment/realization of the H tone target: cit vs medial.

‘High rising contour’

[ t߈ «rup]* 3x Sp4

citation (L%) medial

nga la chang tsirup gano

L% L%

This data suggests an interaction of stress and pitch accent with intonation. Pitch accent hypothesis: Sherpa

*• Word stress « Word accent «• In bisyllables: 1st or 2nd syllable may carry stress• Stressed syllables attract accent.

Suggested word typology :*

««High fall Low fall

(intonational)

««««

High fall high rise low fall low rise

( intonational)

H L-L%

*

nga la chang tsi « rup gano

H L-L% *

tsˆ«rup

citation

utterance medial

H H-H% *

«ß´rwå

H fall H rise

Alignment of accent determined by position in utterance, stress and intonational specification.

intonation:ToBI notation

Best handled by a theory that incorporates temporal (alignment of target) information into representation.

• The falling contours (‘high falling’) of /tsirup/ in citation are due to the presence of L boundary tones.• All examples of ‘high rising’ will be IP medial.• The data we collected were not set up to examine this

phenomena.

Further study of Sherpa might best include the development of a set of elicitation materials to examine accent, stress and intonation in a broad set of carefully controlled lexical and prosodic contexts.

Modeling to support these hypotheses.

With extension to the examination of natural speech in dialogue/storytelling and the development of spoken language corpora.