Pitch-accent language
[14] Larry Hyman argues that tone is made up of a variety of different typological features, which can be mixed and matched with some independence from each other.
[30] An alternative analysis is to see Luganda and Ancient Greek as belonging to the type of languages where there is a choice of different contours on an accented syllable.
In some pitch-accent languages, the high pitch of the accent can be anticipated in the preceding syllable or syllables, for example, Japanese atámá ga "head", Basque lagúnén amúma "the friend's grandmother", Turkish sínírlénmeyecektiniz "you would not get angry",[5] Belgrade Serbian pápríka "pepper",[31] Ancient Greek ápáítéì "it demands".
Sometimes the sequence HHHH then becomes LLLH, so that in the related language Zulu, the equivalent of these words is ukúhleka and ukuhlekísana with an accent shifted to the antepenultimate syllable.
[36] In Western Basque and Luganda, the default high tones automatically added to accentless words can spread in a continuous plateau through the phrase as far as the first accent, for example, in Basque Jonén lágúnén ámúma "John's friend's grandmother",[37] Luganda abántú mú kíbúga "people in the city".
[30] Similarly in Luganda, in bimoraic syllables a contrast is possible between a level and falling accent: Bugáńda "Buganda (region)", vs. Abagânda "Baganda (people)".
[39] The theoretical proto-language Proto-Indo-European, the putative ancestor of most European, Iranian and North Indian languages, is usually reconstructed to have been a free pitch-accent system.
In the tradition represented by the Rigveda, a collection of hymns, the highest point of the accent appears not to have been reached until the beginning of the svarita syllable.
For example, the "acute" accent is falling in Lithuanian but a high level tone in Latvian and is presumed to have been rising in Old Prussian and Classical Greek.
Kortlandt contends that broken tone in Latvian and Žemaitian is a reflex of a now disappeared glottal stop in Balto-Slavic not preserved in Aukštaitian (Standard Lithuanian) or Slavic languages and not a recent development of acute.
Pitch can serve as the only distinguishing characteristic for minimal pairs that are otherwise orthographically identical, e.g., kar̃tų 'time:gen.pl' vs. kártų 'hang:irr.3' (rising and falling tone indicated by a tilde and an acute accent respectively.
)[55] In Latvian, long segments (the same criteria as in Lithuanian) can take on one of three pitches (intonācijas or more specifically zilbes intonācijas) either stiepta ("level"), lauzta ("broken") or krītoša ("falling") indicated by Latvian linguists with a tilde, circumflex or a grave accent respectively[56] (in IPA, however, the tilde is replaced by a macron because the former is already reserved to denote nasalized vowels.)
[57] Although the (Indo-European) Latvian and (Uralic) Livonian are phylogenetically unrelated (being from different language families) both have influenced each other heavily in terms of phonology.
In Danish (except for some southern dialects), the pitch accent of Swedish and Norwegian corresponds to the glottalization phenomenon known as stød.
[citation needed] A pitch accent is found in the following Rhinelandic languages or dialects: Limburgish, Ripuarian and Moselle Franconian (excluding Luxembourgish).
[62] Adam Wrede's influential dictionary[63] of the Cologne dialect also treats accent 2 as indistinct; the above examples zɛɪ1 "sieve" and zɛɪ2 "she," "they" are transcribed (zeiː) and (zei) respectively.
[66] In Slovenian, there are two concurrent standard accentual systems: the older, tonal, with three "pitch accents", and the younger, dynamic (i.e., stress-based), with louder and longer syllables.
In practice, however, even the stress-based accentual system is just an abstract ideal, and speakers generally retain their own dialect even when they try to speak Standard Slovenian.
For example, speakers of urban dialects in the west of Slovenia without distinctive length fail to introduce a quantitative opposition when they speak the standard language.
Accent can be mobile throughout the inflectional paradigm: dȃr — darȗ, góra — gorẹ́ — goràm, bràt — bráta — o brȃtu, kráva — krȃv, vóda — vodọ̑ — na vọ̑do).
[2] According to an analysis first suggested by J.R. Hualde,[67] Northern Bizkaian has most nouns accentless in their absolutive singular form, but they have a default high tone (shown by underlining below), which continues throughout the word except for the first syllable.
[72] Turkish word-accent is found especially in geographical names (İstanbul, Ankara, Yunanistan "Greece", Adana), foreign borrowings (salata "salad", lokanta "restaurant"), some proper names (Erdoğan, Kenedi), compound words (başkent "capital city"), some words referring to relatives (anne "mother"), and certain adverbs (şimdi "now", yalnız "only").
For example, in trisyllabic words, there are four possible tone patterns:[81] The Shanghai dialect of Wu Chinese is marginally tonal, with characteristics of a pitch accent.
Not counting closed syllables (those with a final glottal stop), a monosyllabic Shanghainese may carry one of three tones: high, mid, low.
Proto-Bantu is believed to have had two tones: H and L.[82][83] However, it does not appear to have had a pitch-accent system, as defined above, since words with such forms as HL, HH, LH, and LL were all found: *káda "charcoal", *cómbá "fish", *nyangá "horn" and *tope "mud".
[84] However, in the course of time, processes such as Meeussen's Rule, by which sequences such as HHH became HLL, LHL, or LLH, tended to eliminate all but one tone in a word in many Bantu languages, making them more accent-like.
For example, in Chitumbuka, every phonological phrase is accented with a falling tone on the penultimate: ti-ku-phika sî:ma "we are cooking porridge".
Thus, in a word like *mukíla "tail", most other Bantu languages have a high tone on the second syllable, but Chiluba has mukìla and Ruund has mukìl, with a low-toned accent.
Disyllabic words may have the tone pattern H-o (clóckwise), H-H (sómetímes), o-H (creáte), where "o" stands for tonelessness.
Trisyllabic words receive any one of seven possible tone assignments H-H-H (kángároo), H-H-o (hándwríting), H-o-H (róundabóut), H-o-o (thréátening), o-H-H (abóut-túrn), o-H-o (esséntial), o-o-H (recomménd).
