query: checked/entering tone

[Zev Handel]

Hi Kristine,

  I think Graham has this right. I'll give you my impressions of usage, though they may not be completely accurate.

  "Entering tone" is a proper name for one of the four tones of Middle Chinese; the term is a calque from the native Chinese designation for this tone. Because this tone was associated with stop endings in Middle Chinese, the term is used analogously by Chinese linguists to talk about tones that co-occur with stop endings, not only in Chinese dialects but also in Chinese minority languages.  Moreover, for East Asian tone systems that are notably similar to the Middle Chinese four-tone system (Thai, Vietnamese, Hmong-Mien, etc.), in which there are three tones found on open or nasal-ending syllables and one tone found on stop-ending syllables, linguists coming out of a Chinese or East-Asian-comparative tradition will sometimes apply the term "entering tone" by analogy with Chinese.  (This is the tone that is also seen designated as tone "D" or tone "4"/"IV".)

  Since "checked" is a term used by linguists to describe a syllable type (contrasted e.g. with "open" or "live" syllables), it is available metonymically to designate a tone that is found co-occurring with such syllables in any language. What I don't know is to what degree the term "checked tone" in fact occurs in descriptions of other languages.  Many of the responses you have received have noted the existence of tone categories associated with glottal stop endings in various languages, but they haven't been very explicit about whether those are commonly referred to as "checked tones" in the relevant literature.

Zev


On Sep 22, 2012, at 7:34 AM, Thurgood, Graham wrote:

> Kristine,
> 
> Additional note: entering tone is only used to name a particular tone in Chinese; checked is a more general designation that can be applied to other languages.
> 
> Graham
> 
> 
> On 9/20/12 4:47 PM, "Kristine Hildebrandt" <khildeb at SIUE.EDU> wrote:
> 
> Dear colleagues,
> 
> In the process of compiling some tone and tone-related entries for a forthcoming dictionary, I was asked whether the 'checked/entering tone' which is frequently discussed with respect to Chinese dialects is a concept invoked for other languages (possibly other Sino-Tibetan, but even more, for other languages outside of the family altogether). My basic journal/literature/even Google searches have not been very fruitful. Can anyone help me with this?
> 
> Thank you,
> 
> 
> Graham Thurgood
> English Department
> CSU Chico
> Chico, CA 95929
> 
> http://www.csuchico.edu/%7Egt18/GWT_Homepage.html

_____________________
Zev Handel        http://faculty.washington.edu/zhandel/

Associate Professor of Chinese Language and Linguistics
Department of Asian Languages and Literature, Box 353521
University of Washington
Seattle, WA  98195-3521 (206) 543-4863
http://depts.washington.edu/asianll/
Guidelines for requesting letters of recommendation: http://faculty.washington.edu/zhandel/recommendation.html