Intonation (linguistics)
Encyclopedia
In linguistics
, intonation is variation of pitch
while speaking which is not used to distinguish words. It contrasts with tone
, in which pitch variation does distinguish words. Intonation, rhythm, and stress
are the three main elements of linguistic prosody
. Intonation patterns in some languages, such as Swedish
and Swiss German
, can lead to conspicuous fluctuations in pitch, giving speech a sing-song quality.
Fluctuations in pitch either involve a rising pitch or a falling pitch. Intonation is found in every language and even in tonal languages, but the realisation and function are seemingly different. It is used in non-tonal languages to add attitudes to words (attitudinal function) and to differentiate between wh-questions, yes-no question
s, declarative statements, commands, requests, etc.
Intonation can also be used for discourse analysis where new information is realised by means of intonation. It can also be used for emphatic/contrastive purposes.
All languages use pitch pragmatically as intonation — for instance for emphasis, to convey surprise or irony
, or to pose a question. Tonal languages such as Chinese
and Hausa
use pitch for distinguishing words in addition to providing intonation.
Generally speaking, the following intonations are distinguished:
Those with congenital amusia
show impaired ability to discriminate, identify and imitate the intonation of the final words in sentences.
, global rising and falling intonation are marked with a diagonal arrow rising left-to-right [↗] and falling left-to-right [↘], respectively. These may be written as part of a syllable, or separated with a space when they have a broader scope:
Here the rising pitch on street indicates that the question hinges on that word, on where he found it, not whether he found it.
Here, as is common with wh- questions, there is a rising intonation on the question word, and a falling intonation at the end of the question.
More detailed transcription systems for intonation have also been developed, such as ToBI
(Tones and Break Indices), RaP
(Rhythm and Pitch), and INTSINT
.
According to some accounts, American English
pitch has four levels: low (1), middle (2), high (3), and very high (4). Normal conversation is usually at middle or high pitch; low pitch occurs at the end of utterances other than yes-no questions, while high pitch occurs at the end of yes-no questions. Very high pitch is for strong emotion or emphasis. Pitch can indicate attitude: for example, Great uttered in isolation can indicate weak emotion (with pitch starting medium and dropping to low), enthusiasm (with pitch starting very high and ending low), or sarcasm (with pitch starting and remaining low).
Declarative sentences show a 2-3-1 pitch pattern. If the last syllable is prominent the final decline in pitch is a glide. For example, in This is fun, this is is at pitch 2, and fun starts at level 3 and glides down to level 1. But if the last prominent syllable is not the last syllable of the utterance, the pitch fall-off is a step. For example, in That can be frustrating, That can be has pitch 2, frus- has level 3, and both syllables of -trating have pitch 1. Wh-question
s work the same way, as in Who (2) will (2) help (3↘1)? and Who (2) did (3) it (1)?
But if something is left unsaid, the final pitch level 1 is replaced by pitch 2. Thus in John's (2) sick (3↘2) ..., with the speaker indicating more to come, John's has pitch 2 while sick starts at pitch 3 and drops only to pitch 2.
Yes-no questions with a 2↗3 intonation pattern usually have subject-verb inversion, as in Have (2) you (2) got (2) a (2) minute (3, 3)? (Here a 2↗4 contour would show more emotion, while a 1↗2 contour would show uncertainly.) Another example is Has (2) the (2) plane (3) left (3) already (3, 3, 3)?, which, depending on the word to be emphasized, could move the location of the rise, as in Has (2) the (2) plane (2) left (3) already (3, 3, 3)? or Has (2) the (2) plane (2) left (2) already (2, 3, 3)? And for example the latter question could also be framed without subject-verb inversion but with the same pitch contour: The (2) plane (2) has (2) left (2) already (2, 3, 3)?
Tag question
s with declarative intent at the end of a declarative statement follow a 3↘1 contour rather than a rising contour, since they are not actually intended as yes-no questions, as in We (2) should (2) visit (3, 1) him (1), shouldn't (3, 1) we (1)? But tag questions exhibiting uncertainty, which are interrogatory in nature, have the usual 2↗3 contour, as in We (2) should (2) visit (3, 1) him (1), shouldn't (3, 3) we (3)?
Questions with or can be ambiguous in English writing with regard to whether they are either-or questions or yes-no questions. But intonation in speech eliminates the ambiguity. For example, Would (2) you (2) like (2) juice (3) or (2) soda (3, 1)? emphasizes juice and soda separately and equally and ends with a decline in pitch, thus indicating that this is not a yes-no question but rather a choice question equivalent to Which would you like: juice or soda? In contrast, Would (2) you (2) like (2) juice (3) or (3) soda (3, 3)? has yes-no intonation and thus is equivalent to Would you like something to drink (such as juice or soda)?
Thus the two basic sentence pitch contours are rising-falling and rising. However, other within-sentence rises and falls result from the placement of prominence on the stressed syllables of certain words.
Note that for declaratives or wh-questions with a final decline, the decline is located as a step-down to the syllable after the last prominently stressed syllable, or as a down-glide on the last syllable itself if it is prominently stressed. But for final rising pitch on yes-no questions, the rise always occurs as an upward step to the last stressed syllable, and the high (3) pitch is retained through the rest of the sentence.
Pitch also plays a role in distinguishing acronyms that might otherwise be mistaken for common words. For example, in the phrase "Nike asks that you —Participate in the Lives of America's Youth", the acronym may be pronounced with a high tone to distinguish it from the verb 'play', which would also make sense in this context. Alternatively, each letter could be said individually, so might become "P-L-A-Y" or "P.L.A.Y.". However, the high tone is only employed for disambiguation and is therefore contrastive intonation rather than true lexical tone.
Dialects of British and Irish English vary substantially, with rises on many statements in urban Belfast, and falls on most questions in urban Leeds.
intonation differs substantially from that of English. There are four primary patterns.
, place stress
on a particular syllable of each word, and while many speakers of languages such as English may accompany this stress with a rising intonation, French has neither stress nor distinctive intonation on a given syllable. Instead, on the final syllable of every "rhythm group" except the last one in a sentence, there is placed a rising pitch. For example (note that as before the pitch change arrows ↘ and ↗ apply to the syllable immediately following the arrow):
Adjectives are in the same rhythm group as their noun. Each item in a list forms its own rhythm group:
Side comments inserted into the middle of a sentence form their own rhythm group:
A form found in both spoken and written French is the Est-ce que ... ("Is it that ...") construction, in which the spoken question can end in either a rising or a falling pitch:
The most formal form for a yes/no question, which is also found in both spoken and written French, inverts the order of the subject and verb. In this case too the spoken question can end in either a rising or a falling pitch:
Sometimes yes/no questions begin with a topic phrase, specifying the focus of the utterance. In this case the initial topic phrase follows the intonation pattern of a declarative sentence, and the rest of the question follows the usual yes/no question pattern:
In both cases, the question both begins and ends at higher pitches than does a declarative sentence.
In informal speech, the question word is sometimes put at the end of the sentence, in which case the question starts and ends at a high pitch, often with a slight rise on the high final syllable:
Linguistics
Linguistics is the scientific study of human language. Linguistics can be broadly broken into three categories or subfields of study: language form, language meaning, and language in context....
, intonation is variation of pitch
Pitch (music)
Pitch is an auditory perceptual property that allows the ordering of sounds on a frequency-related scale.Pitches are compared as "higher" and "lower" in the sense associated with musical melodies,...
while speaking which is not used to distinguish words. It contrasts with tone
Tone (linguistics)
Tone is the use of pitch in language to distinguish lexical or grammatical meaning—that is, to distinguish or inflect words. All verbal languages use pitch to express emotional and other paralinguistic information, and to convey emphasis, contrast, and other such features in what is called...
, in which pitch variation does distinguish words. Intonation, rhythm, and stress
Stress (linguistics)
In linguistics, stress is the relative emphasis that may be given to certain syllables in a word, or to certain words in a phrase or sentence. The term is also used for similar patterns of phonetic prominence inside syllables. The word accent is sometimes also used with this sense.The stress placed...
are the three main elements of linguistic prosody
Prosody (linguistics)
In linguistics, prosody is the rhythm, stress, and intonation of speech. Prosody may reflect various features of the speaker or the utterance: the emotional state of the speaker; the form of the utterance ; the presence of irony or sarcasm; emphasis, contrast, and focus; or other elements of...
. Intonation patterns in some languages, such as Swedish
Swedish language
Swedish is a North Germanic language, spoken by approximately 10 million people, predominantly in Sweden and parts of Finland, especially along its coast and on the Åland islands. It is largely mutually intelligible with Norwegian and Danish...
and Swiss German
Swiss German
Swiss German is any of the Alemannic dialects spoken in Switzerland and in some Alpine communities in Northern Italy. Occasionally, the Alemannic dialects spoken in other countries are grouped together with Swiss German as well, especially the dialects of Liechtenstein and Austrian Vorarlberg...
, can lead to conspicuous fluctuations in pitch, giving speech a sing-song quality.
Fluctuations in pitch either involve a rising pitch or a falling pitch. Intonation is found in every language and even in tonal languages, but the realisation and function are seemingly different. It is used in non-tonal languages to add attitudes to words (attitudinal function) and to differentiate between wh-questions, yes-no question
Yes-no question
In linguistics, a yes–no question, formally known as a polar question, is a question whose expected answer is either "yes" or "no". Formally, they present an exclusive disjunction, a pair of alternatives of which only one is acceptable. In English, such questions can be formed in both positive...
s, declarative statements, commands, requests, etc.
Intonation can also be used for discourse analysis where new information is realised by means of intonation. It can also be used for emphatic/contrastive purposes.
All languages use pitch pragmatically as intonation — for instance for emphasis, to convey surprise or irony
Irony
Irony is a rhetorical device, literary technique, or situation in which there is a sharp incongruity or discordance that goes beyond the simple and evident intention of words or actions...
, or to pose a question. Tonal languages such as Chinese
Chinese language
The Chinese language is a language or language family consisting of varieties which are mutually intelligible to varying degrees. Originally the indigenous languages spoken by the Han Chinese in China, it forms one of the branches of Sino-Tibetan family of languages...
and Hausa
Hausa language
Hausa is the Chadic language with the largest number of speakers, spoken as a first language by about 25 million people, and as a second language by about 18 million more, an approximate total of 43 million people...
use pitch for distinguishing words in addition to providing intonation.
Generally speaking, the following intonations are distinguished:
- Rising Intonation means the pitch of the voice increases over time [↗];
- Falling Intonation means that the pitch decreases with time [↘];
- Dipping Intonation falls and then rises [↘↗];
- Peaking Intonation rises and then falls [↗↘].
Those with congenital amusia
Amusia
Amusia is a musical disorder that appears mainly as a defect in processing pitch, but it also encompasses musical memory and recognition. Two main classifications of amusia exist: acquired amusia, which occurs as a result of brain damage, and congenital amusia, which results from a music processing...
show impaired ability to discriminate, identify and imitate the intonation of the final words in sentences.
Transcription
In the International Phonetic AlphabetInternational Phonetic Alphabet
The International Phonetic Alphabet "The acronym 'IPA' strictly refers [...] to the 'International Phonetic Association'. But it is now such a common practice to use the acronym also to refer to the alphabet itself that resistance seems pedantic...
, global rising and falling intonation are marked with a diagonal arrow rising left-to-right [↗] and falling left-to-right [↘], respectively. These may be written as part of a syllable, or separated with a space when they have a broader scope:
- He found it on the street?
- [ hiː ˈfaʊnd ɪt
Here the rising pitch on street indicates that the question hinges on that word, on where he found it, not whether he found it.
- Yes, he found it on the street.
- [↘ˈjɛs ‖ hi ˈfaʊnd ɪt
- How did you ever escape?
- [↗ˈˈhaʊ dɪdjuː
Here, as is common with wh- questions, there is a rising intonation on the question word, and a falling intonation at the end of the question.
More detailed transcription systems for intonation have also been developed, such as ToBI
ToBI
ToBI is a set of conventions for transcribing and annotating the prosody of speech. 'ToBI' is sometimes used to refer to the conventions used for describing English specifically, but ToBI systems have been defined for a number of other languages, for example J-ToBI refers to the ToBI conventions...
(Tones and Break Indices), RaP
Rap
Rap may refer to:*Rapping, performance in which rhyming lyrics are used, with or without musical accompaniment ; while an MC performs spoken verses in time to a beat/ melody**Hip hop subculture**Hip hop music...
(Rhythm and Pitch), and INTSINT
INTSINT
INTSINT is an acronym for INternational Transcription System for INTonation.It was originally developed by Daniel Hirst in his 1987 thesis as a prosodic equivalent of the International Phonetic Alphabet, and the INTSINT alphabet was subsequently used in Hirst & Di Cristo 1998 in just over half of...
.
Uses of intonation
The uses of intonation can be divided into six categories:- informational: for example, in English I saw a ↘man in the garden answers "Who did you see?" or "What happened?", while I ↘saw a man in the garden answers "Did you hear a man in the garden?"
- grammatical: for example, in English a rising pitch turns a statement into a yes-no questionYes-no questionIn linguistics, a yes–no question, formally known as a polar question, is a question whose expected answer is either "yes" or "no". Formally, they present an exclusive disjunction, a pair of alternatives of which only one is acceptable. In English, such questions can be formed in both positive...
, as in He's going ↗home? This use of intonation to express grammatical moodGrammatical moodIn linguistics, grammatical mood is a grammatical feature of verbs, used to signal modality. That is, it is the use of verbal inflections that allow speakers to express their attitude toward what they are saying...
is its primary grammatical use (though whether this grammatical function actually exists is controversial). Some languages, like ChickasawChickasaw languageThe Chickasaw language is a Native American language of the Muskogean family. It is agglutinative and follows the pattern of subject–object–verb. The language is closely related to, though perhaps not entirely mutually intelligible with, Choctaw...
and Kalaallisut, have the opposite pattern from English: rising for statements and falling with questions.
- illocution: the intentional force is signaled in, for example, English Why ↘don't you move to California? (a question) versus Why don't you ↗move to California? (a suggestion).
- attitudinal: high declining pitch signals more excitement than does low declining pitch, as in English Good ↗morn↘ing versus Good morn↘ing.
- textual: linguistic organization beyond the sentence is signaled by the absence of a statement-ending decline in pitch, as in English The lecture was canceled [high pitch on both syllables of "canceled", indicating continuation]; the speaker was ill. versus The lecture was can↘celed. [high pitch on first syllable of "canceled", but declining pitch on the second syllable, indicating the end of the first thought] The speaker was ill.
- indexical: group membership can be indicated by the use of intonation patterns adopted specifically by that group, such as street vendors, preachers, and possibly women in some cases (see high rising terminal.)
Intonation in English
Halliday and Greaves have made a detailed case that three types of meanings—textual, interpersonal, and logical—are all in part achieved through intonation. This is done, they have argued, through the choices we make in terms of (i) rising and falling pitch contour, (ii) where we locate that contour as part of a clause, throughout a whole clause, or over more than a single clause; and (iii) the shape of the contour.According to some accounts, American English
American English
American English is a set of dialects of the English language used mostly in the United States. Approximately two-thirds of the world's native speakers of English live in the United States....
pitch has four levels: low (1), middle (2), high (3), and very high (4). Normal conversation is usually at middle or high pitch; low pitch occurs at the end of utterances other than yes-no questions, while high pitch occurs at the end of yes-no questions. Very high pitch is for strong emotion or emphasis. Pitch can indicate attitude: for example, Great uttered in isolation can indicate weak emotion (with pitch starting medium and dropping to low), enthusiasm (with pitch starting very high and ending low), or sarcasm (with pitch starting and remaining low).
Declarative sentences show a 2-3-1 pitch pattern. If the last syllable is prominent the final decline in pitch is a glide. For example, in This is fun, this is is at pitch 2, and fun starts at level 3 and glides down to level 1. But if the last prominent syllable is not the last syllable of the utterance, the pitch fall-off is a step. For example, in That can be frustrating, That can be has pitch 2, frus- has level 3, and both syllables of -trating have pitch 1. Wh-question
Interrogative word
In linguistics, an interrogative word is a function word used for the item interrupted in an information statement. Interrogative words are sometimes called wh-words because most of English interrogative words start with wh-...
s work the same way, as in Who (2) will (2) help (3↘1)? and Who (2) did (3) it (1)?
But if something is left unsaid, the final pitch level 1 is replaced by pitch 2. Thus in John's (2) sick (3↘2) ..., with the speaker indicating more to come, John's has pitch 2 while sick starts at pitch 3 and drops only to pitch 2.
Yes-no questions with a 2↗3 intonation pattern usually have subject-verb inversion, as in Have (2) you (2) got (2) a (2) minute (3, 3)? (Here a 2↗4 contour would show more emotion, while a 1↗2 contour would show uncertainly.) Another example is Has (2) the (2) plane (3) left (3) already (3, 3, 3)?, which, depending on the word to be emphasized, could move the location of the rise, as in Has (2) the (2) plane (2) left (3) already (3, 3, 3)? or Has (2) the (2) plane (2) left (2) already (2, 3, 3)? And for example the latter question could also be framed without subject-verb inversion but with the same pitch contour: The (2) plane (2) has (2) left (2) already (2, 3, 3)?
Tag question
Tag question
A question tag or tag question is a grammatical structure in which a declarative statement or an imperative is turned into a question by adding an interrogative fragment . For example, in the sentence "You're John, aren't you?", the statement "You're John" is turned into a question by the tag...
s with declarative intent at the end of a declarative statement follow a 3↘1 contour rather than a rising contour, since they are not actually intended as yes-no questions, as in We (2) should (2) visit (3, 1) him (1), shouldn't (3, 1) we (1)? But tag questions exhibiting uncertainty, which are interrogatory in nature, have the usual 2↗3 contour, as in We (2) should (2) visit (3, 1) him (1), shouldn't (3, 3) we (3)?
Questions with or can be ambiguous in English writing with regard to whether they are either-or questions or yes-no questions. But intonation in speech eliminates the ambiguity. For example, Would (2) you (2) like (2) juice (3) or (2) soda (3, 1)? emphasizes juice and soda separately and equally and ends with a decline in pitch, thus indicating that this is not a yes-no question but rather a choice question equivalent to Which would you like: juice or soda? In contrast, Would (2) you (2) like (2) juice (3) or (3) soda (3, 3)? has yes-no intonation and thus is equivalent to Would you like something to drink (such as juice or soda)?
Thus the two basic sentence pitch contours are rising-falling and rising. However, other within-sentence rises and falls result from the placement of prominence on the stressed syllables of certain words.
Note that for declaratives or wh-questions with a final decline, the decline is located as a step-down to the syllable after the last prominently stressed syllable, or as a down-glide on the last syllable itself if it is prominently stressed. But for final rising pitch on yes-no questions, the rise always occurs as an upward step to the last stressed syllable, and the high (3) pitch is retained through the rest of the sentence.
Pitch also plays a role in distinguishing acronyms that might otherwise be mistaken for common words. For example, in the phrase "Nike asks that you —Participate in the Lives of America's Youth", the acronym may be pronounced with a high tone to distinguish it from the verb 'play', which would also make sense in this context. Alternatively, each letter could be said individually, so might become "P-L-A-Y" or "P.L.A.Y.". However, the high tone is only employed for disambiguation and is therefore contrastive intonation rather than true lexical tone.
Dialects of British and Irish English vary substantially, with rises on many statements in urban Belfast, and falls on most questions in urban Leeds.
Summary
FrenchFrench language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
intonation differs substantially from that of English. There are four primary patterns.
- The continuation pattern is a rise in pitch occurring in the last syllable of a rhythm group (typically a phrase).
- The finality pattern is a sharp fall in pitch occurring in the last syllable of a declarative statement.
- The yes/no intonation is a sharp rise in pitch occurring in the last syllable of a yes/no question.
- The information question intonation is a rapid fall-off from high pitch on the first word of a non-yes/no question, often followed by a small rise in pitch on the last syllable of the question.
Continuation pattern
The most distinctive feature of French intonation is the continuation pattern. While many languages, such as English and SpanishSpanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
, place stress
Stress (linguistics)
In linguistics, stress is the relative emphasis that may be given to certain syllables in a word, or to certain words in a phrase or sentence. The term is also used for similar patterns of phonetic prominence inside syllables. The word accent is sometimes also used with this sense.The stress placed...
on a particular syllable of each word, and while many speakers of languages such as English may accompany this stress with a rising intonation, French has neither stress nor distinctive intonation on a given syllable. Instead, on the final syllable of every "rhythm group" except the last one in a sentence, there is placed a rising pitch. For example (note that as before the pitch change arrows ↘ and ↗ apply to the syllable immediately following the arrow):
- Hier ↗soir, il m'a off↗ert une ciga↘rette. (The English equivalent would be "Last eve↗ning, he offered ↗me a cigar↘ette.")
- Le lendemain ma↗tin, après avoir changé le pansement du ma↗lade, l'infir↗mier est ren↗tré chez ↘lui.
Adjectives are in the same rhythm group as their noun. Each item in a list forms its own rhythm group:
- Chez le frui↗tier on trouve des ↗pommes, des o↗ranges, des ba↗nanes, des ↗fraises et des abri↘cots.
Side comments inserted into the middle of a sentence form their own rhythm group:
- La grande ↗guerre, si j'ai bonne mé↗moire, a duré quatre ↘ans.
Finality pattern
As can be seen in the example sentences above, a sharp fall in pitch is placed on the last syllable of a declarative statement. The preceding syllables of the final rhythm group are at a relatively high pitch.Yes/no pattern
It is most common in informal speech to indicate a yes/no question with a sharply rising pitch alone, without any change or rearrangement of words. For example- Il est ↗riche?
A form found in both spoken and written French is the Est-ce que ... ("Is it that ...") construction, in which the spoken question can end in either a rising or a falling pitch:
- Est-ce qu'il est ↗riche? OR Est-ce qu'il est ↘riche?
The most formal form for a yes/no question, which is also found in both spoken and written French, inverts the order of the subject and verb. In this case too the spoken question can end in either a rising or a falling pitch:
- Est-il ↗riche? OR Est-il ↘riche?
Sometimes yes/no questions begin with a topic phrase, specifying the focus of the utterance. In this case the initial topic phrase follows the intonation pattern of a declarative sentence, and the rest of the question follows the usual yes/no question pattern:
- Et cette pho↘to, tu l'as ↗prise?
Information question pattern
Information questions begin with a question word such as qui, pourquoi, combien,, etc., often referred to in linguistics as wh-words because most of them start with those letters in English. The question word is followed in French by est-ce que (as in English "(where) is it that ...") or est-ce qui, or by inversion of the subject-verb order (as in "(where) goes he?"). The sentence starts at a relatively high pitch which falls away rapidly on the last syllable of the question word, and there may be a small increase in pitch on the final syllable of the question. For example:- ↘Où part-il? OR ↘Où part-↗il?
- ↘Où est-ce qu'il part? OR ↘Où est-ce qu'il ↗part?
In both cases, the question both begins and ends at higher pitches than does a declarative sentence.
In informal speech, the question word is sometimes put at the end of the sentence, in which case the question starts and ends at a high pitch, often with a slight rise on the high final syllable:
- Il part ↗où?
See also
- Prosody (linguistics)Prosody (linguistics)In linguistics, prosody is the rhythm, stress, and intonation of speech. Prosody may reflect various features of the speaker or the utterance: the emotional state of the speaker; the form of the utterance ; the presence of irony or sarcasm; emphasis, contrast, and focus; or other elements of...
- Affect (linguistics)Affect (linguistics)In linguistics, speaker affect is attitude or emotion that a speaker brings to an utterance. Affects such as sarcasm, contempt, dismissal, distaste, disgust, disbelief, exasperation, boredom, anger, joy, respect or disrespect, sympathy, pity, gratitude, wonder, admiration, humility, and awe are...
- High rising terminalHigh rising terminalThe high rising terminal , also known as uptalk, upspeak, rising inflection or high rising intonation , is a feature of some accents of English where statements have a rising intonation pattern in the final syllable or syllables of the utterance.Empirically, Ladd proposes that HRT in American...
- Prosodic unitProsodic unitIn linguistics, a prosodic unit, often called an intonation unit or intonational phrase, is a segment of speech that occurs with a single prosodic contour...