Tone

by Moira Yip

Overview

The sounds of language can be divided into consonants, vowels, and tones—the use of pitch to convey meaning. Seventy percent of the world's languages use pitch in this way. Assuming little or no prior knowledge of the topic, this textbook provides a clearly organized introduction to tone and tonal phonology. Comprehensive in scope, it examines the main types of tonal systems found in Africa, the Americas, and Asia, using examples from the widest- possible range of tone languages.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780521773140
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	08/15/2002
Series:	Cambridge Textbooks in Linguistics
Pages:	376
Product dimensions:	5.98(w) x 9.02(h) x 0.98(d)

Table of Contents

1. Introduction; 2. Contrastive tone; 3. Tonal features; 4. The autosegmental nature of tone, and its analysis in Optimality Theory; 5. Tone in morphology and in syntax; 6. African languages; 7. Asian and Pacific languages; 8. The Americas; 9. Tone, stress, accent and intonation; 10. Perception and acquisition of tone.

Editorial Reviews

'… a clearly written introduction to tone that manages to address both needs … it explains the basics of the field in such a way that it is accessible to beginning students who have just had the rudiments of phonetics and phonology. But is is precise and scholarly enough that is serves also as an excellent review of the tone literature for practising linguists … even those who specialize in the study of tone will find themselves learning …'. Journal of Linguistics

'… a welcome addition to the line-up of the Cambridge Textbooks in Linguistics … a gem of a textbook …'. Journal of Phonology

From the Publisher