7.475, Sum: Intonation in English of Cantonese and Mandarin speakers

Fri Mar 29 00:49:04 UTC 1996

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LINGUIST List:  Vol-7-475. Thu Mar 28 1996. ISSN: 1068-4875. Lines:  119

Subject: 7.475, Sum: Intonation in English of Cantonese and Mandarin speakers

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1)
Date:  Wed, 27 Mar 1996 20:44:42 GMT
From:  r.g.badger at stir.ac.uk (Richard Badger {CELT})
Subject:  Intonation in English of Cantonese and

---------------------------------Messages------------------------------------
1)
Date:  Wed, 27 Mar 1996 20:44:42 GMT
From:  r.g.badger at stir.ac.uk (Richard Badger {CELT})
Subject:  Intonation in English of Cantonese and

Some time ago I posted a question on the use of intonation in English
with particular reference to speakers of Cantonese and Mandarin. I
received some very useful comments from the following people

"Karen S. Chung" ,  karchung at ccms.ntu.edu.tw>
David Deterding
Ken N o s t a l g i a   kenjiro at ue.ipc.hiroshima-u.ac.jp>
Malcolm Ross Department of Linguistics, Research School of Pacific and
     Asian Studies, Australian National University
Julia McGory   beauty.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu
Lucy Elliott.       Morse at grove.ufl.EDU
Su-Hsun Tsai   teemsht at ioe.ac.uk
Hosakah        hosakah at icluna.kobe-u.ac.jp

The first part of my query related to intonation and so I will
summarize the model of intonation I am using.

The model with which I am working was devised by the late David Brazil
of Birmingham University.  In this description intonation is used to
mark a piece of information as either given by the use of a referring
tone, or new, by the use of a proclaiming tone.  A referring tone is
normally a fall-rise but, if marked, can be a simple rise. A
proclaiming tone is usually a simple fall but can, if marked, be
signalled by a rise-fall.

This model is not that widely known. The impression that I get from
the messages I received is that there are several broadly similar
descriptions of the intonation in use in different parts of the
world. As a result of this the list of references with which I was
provided was very wide and there were many names that I did not
know. This was extremely useful. I am still at the stage of gathering
references but at first sight it seems that there is quite a lot of
overlap between the different models.  I have listed
 the references relating to the description of intonation below.

The following references are to do with general descriptions of
intonation in English. They come mainly from my correspondents and not
all have been checked.

Bolinger, D. (1985) _Intonation and its parts_ London: Edward Arnold
Brazil, D. (1989)  _The Communicative Value of Intonation in English_
Birmingham: English Language Research (University of Birmingham)
Brazil, D., M.Coulthard & C.Johns (1990) _Discourse, intonation and Language
Teaching_  London:Longman
Dalton, C, & Seidlhoffer B  (1994)  _Pronunciation_ Oxford: Oxford
     University Press
Gilbert, J. (1984) _Clear Speech_ Cambridge: CUP.

The second part of my inquiry related to the use of intonation by
speakers of Cantonese and Mandarin.  Several correspondents provided
interesting information from their own experience and there were also
some useful references.

Backman, N. (1979) *Intonation errors in the second language pronunication
     of eight Spanish speaking adults learning English. _Interlanguage
     Studies Bulletin_ 4:239-66
Beckman, M. & J. Pierrehumbert (1986) *Intonational structure in Japanese
and English*. _Phonology Yearbook_ 3: 15-70
Chiang T. (1979) *Some interference of EnglishIntonation with Chinese
     Tones *_IRAL_ 17(3) 245-250.
Deterding, D. (1994) *The Intonation of Singapore English* Journal of the
     International Phonetic Association - forthcoming
Clancy, P.  (1995)   "Psycholinguistics, language acquisition and Japanese
     discourse."  _Japanese Discourse_, 1.  Rutgers University Japanese
     Language  Publications.  35-45.
Hewings, M. 1995 *The Englsh Intonation of Native speakers and Indonesion
     Learners: A Comparative Study _RELC Journal_ 26(1) 27-43
Pierrehumbert, J. & J.Hirshberg (1990) *The meaning of intonational contours
in discourse* in  P.Cohen, J.Morgan & M.Pollack (eds) _Intentions in
Communication_ Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Wennerstrong, A (1994) Intonational Meaning in English Discourse _Applied
     Linguistics_ 399-420.
Willems, N. (1982) _English Intonation from a Dutch Point of View_
     Dordrecht: Foris Publications.

I was also referred to the following authors but have no more details:

Best C.,
Werker & Tees,
Strange
Polka

Many thanks to all who replied to my initial   inquiry.

I am now in the process of collecting data and will post a summary of
my findings in due course.
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