Focus and intonation in japanese : does focus trigger pitch reset?

This paper discusses how focus change s prosodic structure in Tokyo Japanese. It is generally believed that focus blocks the intonational process of downstep and causes a pitch reset. This paper presents experimental evidence against this traditional view by looking at the prosodic behavior of Wh words, which receive focus lexically in Japanese as in other languages. It is demonstrated, specifically, that the focused Wh element does not block downstep although it receives a much higher pitch than its preceding element. This suggests that presence of lexical focus does not trigger pitch reset in Japanese

Organisation of Japanese prosody

This thesis is an experimental phonological study of pitch in Tokyo Japanese. It comprises five chapters all discussing prosodic processes and phenomena relating to accent, tone or intonation on the basis of experimental evidence. The discussion in each chapter is developed essentially in the following three steps: (i) a critical review or overview of the past work on the subject discussed in the chapter or section; (ii) presentation of new evidence mostly from instrumental experiments; (iii) a discussion of the experimental evidence in theoretical contexts. After outlining the nature and function of word accent in Chapter One, I discuss in Chapter Two the prosodic compound formation process which has traditionally been described as an accent (re)assignment process. I analyze the linguistic structures of those compounds which are not subject to the compound accent rules, and propose several factors which constrain the prosodic compound formation process, defining them as the linguistic conditions on the process. Chapters Three through Five deal with word accent in a wider context of speech, discussing its roles, behavior and phonetic realization in phrase or sentence perspective. Chapter Three discusses the phonetics and phonology of 'accentual fall, ' 'accentual boost' and 'accent clash, ' for each of which the fallacies underlying the impressionistic descriptions in the literature are demonstrated. Four discusses various problems relating to intonational phrases and phrasing. The first part of the chapter focuses on the definition of the two intonational phrases, 'major phrase' and 'minor phrase' while the second part of the chapter explores the linguistic conditions on 'minor phrase formation, ' the intonational phrasing process whereby two or more syntactic/morphological units are combined to form one minor intonational phrase. Chapter Five examines the linguistic structure of 'downtrend, ' the phenomenon whereby pitch declines during the course of utterances. It is shown in the first part of the chapter that Poser's 'catathesis' (downstep) model is a largely adequate model of the intonational phenomenon. After confirming that the trigger of the downtrend phenomenon is largely attributable to accent, it is shown in the second part of the chapter that this accent-triggered process varies considerably depending on the syntactic structure of the phrase or sentence involved, or, in other words, that the configuration of downstep serves to disambiguate otherwise ambiguous syntactic structures. In the course of discussing the specific topics just mentioned, several more general theoretical issues are addressed, including the following four topics: the relation between syntactic structure and phonological structure; the organization of rhythmic structure; the abstractness of phonological (tonal) representation; and the nature of phonetic realization rules

Accentuation in Southern and Central Kikaijima

National Institute for Japanese Language and LinguisticsFirst Published: August 15, 2011 (in Japanese

Neutralizations in vowel length and word accent in Japanese

National Institute for Japanese Language and Linguistic

語形成と音韻構造 : 短縮語形成のメカニズム

国立国語研究所National Institute for Japanese Language and Linguistics「ストライキ」から「スト」,「テレビジョン」から「テレビ」というように,多くの外来語が2～4モーラの長さに短縮される。この短縮語形成についてはこれまでもいくつか出力条件(制約)が考えられてきたが,一つの入力に対して唯一の出力を予測するまでには至っていない。本稿は「短縮語は短いほど良い(the shorter, the better)」という前提に基づく従来の分析に対し,単語分節という全く別の観点からの分析を提案する。この分析では,5モーラ以上の長さの単純語は音韻的には実は複合語(疑似複合語)であり,その後半部分が削除されることにより短縮形が生成されると分析する。この分析により,長い単純語の短縮パターンが説明できるだけでなく,単純語の短縮と複合語の短縮(携帯電話 → ケータイ)を同一のプロセスとして一般化できる。さらには,4モーラと5モーラの境界が関与する他の言語現象と短縮語形成の共通性もとらえられるようになる。Word truncation or clipping is a very productive word-formation process in Japanese by which many long words, especially loanwords and compound nouns, are shortened. Most analyses proposed in the past assumed that the truncated forms should be better as they are shorter and, thus, posited various minimality constraints to account for the output forms. This paper proposes an entirely different approach to the issue, arguing that truncation is a process closely related to word segmentation. Specifically, it assumes that five-mora or longer words are phonologically complex, i.e. pseudo-compounds, even if they are morphologically simplex and that truncation has a function of turning phonological compound forms into simplex ones by deleting the second half of the input. This analysis has many advantages over the previous analyses, enabling us to generalize loanword truncation with the truncation of compound nouns

〈共同研究プロジェクト紹介〉基幹型 : 日本語レキシコンの音韻特性 「ピッチアクセント体系」の多様性

国立国語研究所理論・構造研究系日本語諸方言のアクセント体系が高さ(ピッチ)にもとづく「ピッチアクセント体系」であることは日本語音声研究の中で常識とされていることであるが,日本語以外の言語から見ると必ずしも自明のこととは言えない。実際,「ピッチアクセント体系(言語)」という類型概念そのものを否定する研究者も数多い。本稿は,2010年に本プロジェクトが主催した国際シンポジウムISAT 2010の成果(Lingua 122特集号)の一部を報告する形で,日本語の研究が一般言語学や言語類型論に貢献できる可能性を指摘する。It is taken for granted in the studies of Japanese phonology and prosody that standard Tokyo Japanese and other dialects of the language have \u27pitch-accent systems.\u27 However, the notion of pitch accent as a typological category is not widely accepted in general linguistics or in typological studies of language. In fact, quite a few phonologists have expressed their concerns about the idea that \u27pitch accent\u27 constitutes an independent prosodic category. Challenging this new criticism in phonological studies, this article reports on the output of the ISAT 2010, an international conference that this project organized in 2010, and thereby explores how the prosodic studies of Japanese dialects can shed new light on the development of general linguistics and typological studies of language

〈共同研究プロジェクト紹介〉 理論・構造研究系の共同研究プロジェクト

国立国語研究所 理論・構造研究

〈共同研究プロジェクト紹介〉日本語レキシコンの音韻特性 日本語の促音とアクセント

国立国語研究所 理論・構造研究系Department of Linguistic Theory and Structure, NINJAL2009年10月に始まった共同研究プロジェクト「日本語レキシコンの音韻特性」の中間報告を行う。このプロジェクトは,促音とアクセントを中心に日本語の音声・音韻構造を考察し,世界の言語の中における日本語の特徴を明らかにしようとするものである。促音については,主に外来語に促音が生起する条件およびその音声学・音韻論的要因を明らかにすることにより,日本語のリズム構造,日本語話者の知覚メカニズムを解明することを目指している。アクセントについては,韓国語,中国語をはじめとする他の言語との比較対照を基調に,日本語諸方言が持つ多様なアクセント体系を世界の声調,アクセント言語の中で位置づけることを目指している。本論文では本プロジェクトが明らかにしようとする問題点と近年の研究成果を総括する。This paper reports on the progress of the collaborative research project \u27Phonological characteristics of the Japanese lexicon\u27, which was initiated in October 2009. This project investigates the phonetic and phonological aspects of Japanese with main focus on sokuon (geminate obstruents) and accent, with a view to clarifying the main characteristics of the language in comparison with other languages of the world. Regarding sokuon, the project attempts to illuminate the rhythmic structure of Japanese and the perceptual strategies that its native speakers employ, by revealing the linguistic conditions on sokuon in loanwords and their phonetic/phonological basis. Research on accent, on the other hand, studies the prosodic systems of a variety of Japanese dialects in comparison with those of other accent and tone languages in the world such as Korean and Chinese. This paper summarizes the main questions that this project aims to solve as well as some results of the recent research on the two topics

Research Report on the Kikaijima Dialects : General Study for Research and Conservation of Endangered Dialects in Japan

National Institute for Japanese Language and LinguisticsNational Institute for Japanese Language and LinguisticsOkinawa International UniversityUniversity of AucklandNational Institute for Japanese Language and LinguisticsFirst Published: August 15, 2011 (in Japanese

Testing an acoustic model of the P-center in English and Japanese

The notion of the “perceptual center” or the “P-center” has been put forward to account for the repeated finding that acoustic and perceived syllable onsets do not necessarily coincide, at least in the perception of simple monosyllables or disyllables. The magnitude of the discrepancy between acoustics and perception—the location of the P-center in the speech signal— has proven difficult to estimate, though acoustic models of the effect do exist. The present study asks if the P-center effect can be documented in natural connected speech of English and Japanese and examines if an acoustic model that defines the P-center as the moment of the fastest energy change in a syllabic amplitude envelope adequately reflects the P-center in the two languages. A sensorimotor synchronization paradigm was deployed to address the research questions. The results provide evidence for the existence of the P-center effect in speech of both languages while the acoustic P-center model is found to be less applicable to Japanese. Sensorimotor synchronization patterns further suggest that the P-center may reflect perceptual anticipation of a vowel onset.</p