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Heritage speakers (HSs) are known to differ from monolingual speakers in various linguistic domains. The present study focuses on the syntactic properties of monolingual and heritage Russian. Using a corpus of semi-spontaneous spoken and written narratives produced by HSs of Russian residing in the US and Germany, we investigate HSs’ word order patterns and compare them to monolingual speakers of Russian from Saint Petersburg. Our results show that the majority language (ML) of HSs as well as the clause type contribute to observed differences in word order patterns between speaker groups. Specifically, HSs in Germany performed similarly to monolingual speakers of Russian while HSs in the US generally produced more SVO and less OVS orders than the speakers of the latter group. Furthermore, HSs in the US produced more SVO orders than both monolingual speakers and HSs in Germany in embedded clauses, but not in main clauses. The results of the study are discussed with the reference to the differences between main and embedded clauses as well as the differences between the MLs of the HSs., Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, Projekt DEAL

It has been observed for English that pre-boundary lengthening (PBL) is initiated on the syllable with main stress of the phrase-final word. Furthermore, the results of some studies suggest that the scope of PBL varies depending on the segmental composition of the phrase-final word. The present study investigates the scope of PBL in German. We report on a production experiment that tested for the position of word stress (penultimate vs. antepenultimate) and the presence/absence of an additional segment at the end of the word (CV.CV.CV vs. CV.CV.CVC) as predictors for the initiation of PBL. The results revealed that the initiation of PBL occurred on the stressed syllable across conditions. Furthermore, PBL was initiated later when a coda consonant was added to the words with penultimate stress, shifting the initiation point from the onset consonant to the following vowel of the stressed syllable. These observations suggest that the nuclear vowel of the main stress syllable serves as an anchor for PBL, but the initiation occurs earlier if the amount of material between the nuclear vowel and the prosodic boundary is limited. Thus, in line with findings from other languages, the scope of PBL in German is determined by the prosodic structure as well as the segmental composition of the phrase-final word.

The article analyses violations of the Obligatory Contour Principle (OCP) above the word level in Tswana, a Southern Bantu language, by investigating the realization of adjacent lexical high tones across word boundaries. The results show that across word boundaries downstep (i.e. a lowering of the second in a series of adjacent high tones) only takes place within a phonological phrase. A phonological phrase break blocks downstep, even when the necessary tonal configuration is met. A phrase-based account is adopted in order to account for the occurrence of downstep. Our study confirms a pattern previously reported for the closely related language Southern Sotho and provides controlled, empirical data from Tswana, based on read speech of twelve speakers which has been analysed auditorily by two annotators as well as acoustically.

This study investigates the segmental lengthening patterns resulting from prosodic boundaries in Tswana, a Southern Bantu language. The aim is to shed light on the interaction between Penultimate Lengthening and Final Lengthening, providing the first quantitative investigation of these phenomena in Tswana. We conducted a production experiment that applies a widely tested design to elicit production data of two different prosodic phrasing patterns in coordinated noun phrases. The results suggest that Penultimate Lengthening and Final Lengthening constitute independent mechanisms which both apply in Tswana. Penultimate Lengthening occurs before prosodic phrase boundaries as well as before word boundaries but to differing degrees (cf. Cole 1955: 55). Before prosodic phrase boundaries, it involves a strong lengthening effect on the vowel of the penultimate syllable. Before word boundaries, the amount of lengthening is smaller. Final Lengthening operates on the final syllable before a prosodic phrase boundary, involving a larger amount on the final vowel than on the preceding consonant. This pattern is in line with the pattern observed in other languages. The amount of lengthening on the final vowel is comparable to the amount on the penultimate vowel. Given that a large increase of lengthening on the penultimate syllable has not been observed in connection with Final Lengthening, we assume that Penultimate Lengthening constitutes a language-specific mechanism that applies independently. Final Lengthening, on the other hand, might be a universal phenomenon. The perceptual salience of Penultimate Lengthening, which has been widely reported in the literature for Bantu languages, might have to do with the dynamics within the lengthening domains, namely that the lengthening in penultimate position is relatively stronger than in final position when compared to the preceding syllable.

International audience; A phoneme-detection task shows that listeners of Sepedi use semantic information in processing but not prosody (Experiment 1). Sepedi is a language with no grammaticalised prosodic expression of focus. Sepedi listeners detected phoneme targets faster when the phoneme-bearing words were focussed (as opposed to unfocussed) but not when occurring in a context conducive to prosodic emphasis (as opposed to non-conducive). Experiment 2 tested the role of semantic focus and prosody in processing by Sepedi L1/English L2 listeners (English being a language with systematic focus-to-accent mapping). Non-native listeners detected phoneme-bearing words faster in focussed condition (as opposed to unfocussed) and in accented condition (as opposed to deaccented). The results suggest that the L2 prosodic structure is exploited by Black South African English listeners even if this feature is not present in their L1. Our experiments replicate the pattern of results found in Akker and Cutler's (Biling Lang Cogn 6:81-96, 2003) experiment for Dutch L1/ English L2 listeners, even with listeners whose L1 does not use prosody the way English does.

The article presents results of an elicited-production study investigating syntactic and prosodic consequences of language contact on two varieties of multilingual Black speakers of South African English, namely Black South African English (BlSAfE) and a newly emerging variety by Black speakers (“crossing over variety”). The results indicate that contact varieties of South African English share syntactic traits of General South African English (GenSAfE) relating to focus marking. At the same time, BlSAfE also shows differences in the frequency of use of the syntactic structures. The differences cannot be accounted for solely by L1 influence. Also, in prosody, significant differences between the varieties emerge. For BlSAfE, the differences can be related to L1 influence. A language can exert its influence differently on different areas of another language’s grammar: With respect to syntax the “crossing over” variety groups with GenSAfE, with respect to prosody it is in-between GenSAfE and BlSAfE.

This paper reports on an elicited production study which investigates prosodic marking of narrow focus in modified noun phrases in varieties of South African English. The acoustic analysis of fundamental frequency, intensity, and duration in narrow focus is presented and discussed. The results suggest that these three acoustic parameters are manipulated differently in narrow focus in the varieties of English as a Second Language as compared to General South African English. The article compares the results to what is known about prosodic marking of information structure in other varieties of English as a Second Language and underlines the necessity of carefully controlled data in the investigation of phonological and phonetic variation in varieties of English.

Sepedi (Southern Bantu, S30) does not have grammaticalized focus prosody due to which focused constituents are unambiguously marked by prosodic prominence in one way or another. Nevertheless, prosodic traces of emphasis might still exist. The paper reports on a study that investigates acoustic traces of emphasis in Sepedi and their role for processing. An auditory analysis of sentences uttered in different focus contexts reveals a number of acoustic cues occurring in different focus structures. However, the cues are not consistently present and therefore raise the question as to their relevance for semantic interpretation. Results from a phoneme-detection study are used to investigate the role of these acoustic cues for processing.

International audience

(2012). Variation in the grammar of Black South African English. By Verena Minow. Southern African Linguistics and Applied Language Studies: Vol. 30, No. 1, pp. 131-135.

We present findings of a multi-speaker production study that was undertaken to investigate the realisation of two adjacent high tones within the verb word in Northern Sotho, a Southern Bantu language. Experimental tokens are selected to ensure that the high tones originate from different combinations of morphosyntactic constituents. It is found that the morphosyntactic constituency determines how the adjacent high tones are realised. When both high tones originate within either the inflectional stem or the macrostem constituents, a single pitch peak is realised. Additionally, when the macrostem contains two high tones, the tone of the object concord is absorbed into the stem. Two adjacent high tones, of which one stems from the inflectional stem and the other from the macrostem, produce two pitch peaks, with the latter of the two delayed in order to satisfy the Obligatory Contour Principle. These generalisations are supported by acoustic data. A set of rules is formulated that describes the surface realisation of adjacent high tones in the verbal domain of Northern Sotho (with the exception of one unresolved issue).Southern African Linguistics and Applied Language Studies 2010, 28(2): 101–121

Traditionally, tone languages and intonation languages are considered to be typologically distinct. Tone languages use pitch changes to distinguish morphemes, while intonation languages use meaningful pitch changes at the sentence level, often anchoring them to positions of phrasal stress (Ladd, 1996). However, tone and intonation have come to be considered more and more as overlapping areas of research since Pierrehumbert’s (1980) influential Ph.D. dissertation persuasively argued that intonation melodies are best represented as sequences of tones, using the autosegmental formalism developed for the analysis of tone languages. Modern textbooks (Ladd, 1996; Yip, 2002; Gussenhoven, 2004) recognize this fundamental compositional similarity between tone and intonation. Recent research shows, moreover, that there is no clear-cut distinction between tone and intonation languages. Tone languages also make use of intonation, defined as meaningful alternations in pitch across the sentence (e.g., Xu, 1999 for focus in Chinese, Downing et al., 2004 for Chichewa and Rialland (this issue)). Similarly, recent research argues that intonational melodies show tonal behavior in some non-tonal languages (Fery and Kugler, 2008). For reasons like these, Jun (2005) argues for a more fine-grained feature set to classify languages according to how they use pitch changes, placing them along a typological continuum rather than in absolute classes like tone vs. intonation language. For instance, the tone language Mandarin Chinese has both lexical pitch (i.e., tone) and stress, whereas Cantonese only has lexical pitch (Jun, 2005:444). Mandarin thus shares the property of having stress with well-known intonation languages like German or English, even though it is also clearly a tone language (i.e., a language with phonemic tone) while English and German are not. Some of the articles in this www.elsevier.com/locate/lingua Available online at www.sciencedirect.com

This article reports on a production study that investigates the realisation of a single high tone in the verbal constituent in Northern Sotho, a Bantu language spoken in South Africa. The parameters of variation investigated are based on existing descriptive and theoretical literature and relate to numbers of syllables in the verb stem, morphosyntactic constituency and verb-internal morphological boundaries. The results are interpreted as both phonological and phonetic influences on high tone realisation in this language: phonologically, a high-toned object concord causes a peak shift one syllable to the right. Phonetically, the study shows that the F0 peak associated with a high tone is not necessarily reached within the syllable carrying the high tone but only later ( peak delay ) depending on the segmental make-up of the tone-bearing syllable and its position within the utterance. The segmental make-up of the tone-bearing syllable leads to systematic surface variation in tone realisation. By collecting controlled acoustic data on tone realisation, this study provides a ground for cross-dialectal comparison of Southern Bantu tone. Southern African Linguistics and Applied Language Studies 2009, 27(4): 357–380

Much is already known about the prosodic systems of the indigenous South African languages from descriptions and analyses in the existing literature. All of the existing work has been carried out in the field of African studies or formal linguistics. In order to be able to implement the generalisations obtained into computational models in speech processing, the existing sources and results must be made accessible to researchers in these areas. In the opposite direction, the modelling of Bantu intonation in speech processing shows the need for more quantitative data. The present article presents a review of durational and pitch-related tonal aspects relating to intonation in South African Bantu languages. Its aim is, on the one hand, to make the results of Africanist and linguistic studies accessible to research in speech processing, laying a foundation on which work in the speech-processing branch of Human Language Technologies can be based. On the other hand, by pointing out gaps in our knowledge, it wants to draw attention to the fact that more quantitative research is needed in order to advance our knowledge also in the theoretical linguistic field. Southern African Linguistics and Applied Language Studies 2008, 26(2): 235–254

Palatalization of labial sequences is a well-known phenomenon in the Southern Bantu languages. This paper re-investigates the trigger for palatalization in passive and diminutive formation as well as in environments of juxtaposed vowels. It argues for palatalization being uniformly triggered by a palatal glide. The palatal glide is not necessarily present underlyingly, but may arise through the application of two further phonological processes, namely glide formation and labial dissimilation. Thus, the paper argues against /-iw-/ as the underlying passive morpheme as well as against any role by an original *y in the diminutive suffix. Both glide formation and labial dissimilation feed palatalization, so they need to be discussed in conjunction with palatalization in Southern Bantu. New data from the Lobedu dialect of Northern Sotho lend support to the otherwise non-transparent process of labial dissimilation in Southern Bantu.

The chapter presents a markedness scale of sentence prosody that allows formulating predictions concerning linguistic differences in language contact, based on the general assumption that marked features are prone to change. It builds on the markedness scale of sentence accent that has been proposed for foreign language acquisition by Rasier and Hiligsmann (Nouv cah linguist fr 28:41–66, 2007), but motivates a separation of pragmatic considerations of sentence prosody into prosodic focus and givenness marking. Furthermore, it is sketched out how the markedness scale can be combined with other prominence scales in order to allow more fine-grained predictions. The markedness scale provides a unified basis from which predictions concerning sentence prosody as it relates to focus and givenness marking in learner and L2 contact varieties can be derived. Contact varieties under consideration in this chapter are mainly ‘indigenized’ varieties of former colonial languages.

Information structure has been one of the central topics of recent linguistic research. This review discusses a wide range of current approaches with particular reference to African languages, as these have been playing a crucial role in advancing our knowledge about the diversity of and recurring patterns in both meaning and form of information structural notions. We focus on cross-linguistic functional frameworks, the investigation of prosody, formal syntactic theories, and relevant effects of semantic interpretation. Information structure is a thriving research domain that promises to yield important advances in our general understanding of human language.

Cambridge University Press, UK Hardback, ISBN 0521848792, price ZAR1360 x + 697 pages Southern African Linguistics and Applied Language Studies 2008, 26(4): 547–549

The article gives a description of the tones occurring with locatives in Tswana. Assuming a background in the morphology and semantics in locative formation it states the tones of the locative suffix -ng and the locative morphemes gá-, gó-, fá, kwá (kố), and mố, and describes how the suffix and the prefixes influence the tone of their base noun. It also lays out how locatives derived by prefixes influence the tone of a preceding noun, and how preceding words can change the tones of an underived locative. An analysis is provided within an integrated framework assuming an autosegmental representation of tone and tonal rules referring to prosodic domains as stated in the Prosodic Hierarchy. Open questions in the study of tones in the locative are pointed out.S.Afr.J.Afr.Lang., 31(2) 2011

The paper addresses second language teaching of phonetic, phonological and prosodic features in the Sotho-Tswana languages (Southern Bantu) from a linguistic perspective. It motivates the inclusion of phonetic, phonological and prosodic background knowledge in second language teaching, and singles out potential areas of learners’ difficulties based on a comparative analysis, assuming a Germanic language as the learner’s first language. It adopts the idea that learner problems can be overcome by a mixture of linguistic background explanation and practical, contrast-directed exercises.

Previous studies have shown that characteristics of a person’s first language (L1) may transfer to a second language (L2). The current study looks at the extent to which this holds for aspects of intonation as well. More specifically, we investigate to what extent traces of the L1 can be discerned in the way intonation is used in the L2 for two functions: (1) to highlight certain words by making them sound more prominent and (2) to signal continuation or finality in a list by manipulating the speech melody. To this end, the article presents an explorative study into the way focus and boundaries are marked prosodically in Zulu, and it also compares such prosodic functions in two variants of English in South Africa, i.e., English spoken as an L1, and English spoken as an L2/additional language by speakers who have Zulu as their L1. The latter language is commonly referred to as Black South African English. This comparison is interesting from a typological perspective, as Zulu is intonationally different from English, especially in the way prosody is exploited for signalling informationally important stretches of speech. Using a specific elicitation procedure, we found in a first study that speakers of South African English (as L1) mark focused words and position within a list by intonational means, just as in other L1 varieties of English, whereas Zulu only uses intonation for marking continuity or finality. A second study focused on speakers of Black South African English, and compared the prosody of proficient versus less proficient speakers. We found that the proficient speakers were perceptually equivalent to L1 speakers of English in their use of intonation for marking focus and boundaries. The less proficient speakers marked boundaries in a similar way as L1 speakers of English, but did not use prosody for signalling focus, analogous to what is typical of their native language. Acoustic observations match these perceptual results.

This article investigates the phenomenon of rhoticity in the speech of black speakers of South African English. Historically, South African English is non-rhotic. Thus, any shift towards a rhotic variant is a significant language change. Thirty-nine interviews were conducted with both males and female participants. The two groups were evenly split into more and less affluent groups. It was found that rhoticity in Black South African English is preferentially a female phenomenon, found most frequently in affluent female speakers. Male speakers also exhibit this feature but less frequently so. Of the affluent females 90% displayed some degree of rhoticity. None of the less affluent males displayed any rhoticity. The data gathered seem to suggest that a covert prestige exists amongst men to use their African languages. This is in contrast to the overt prestige amongst women to use English. The research thus isolates an important socio-economic stratification, providing evidence that both gender and affluence influences the degree in which a group creates a new language variety. We also speculate about reasons for the adaptation of rhoticity in affluent, female speakers, thus providing the basis for a follow-up study in which the sociological dimension of this linguistic phenomenon is explored in more detail.Southern African Linguistics and Applied Language Studies 2009, 27(2): 135–148

The article discusses penultimate lengthening and the finality restriction in Northern Sotho, a Bantu language of South Africa. These suprasegmental rules crucially refer to prosodic structure in the definition of their domain of application. Relying partially on acoustic evidence, the article shows that the prosodic domains at whose right edges lengthening and the finality restriction apply are co-extensive and that they can be characterized as Intonational Phrase. By investigating the contexts in which lengthening and the finality restriction apply the article argues that the right edge of the Intonational Phrase in Northern Sotho is aligned with the right edge of the syntactic InfP. The findings of this article match the patterns of phrasing reported for the Bantu languages Haya and Kinyambo. The languages differ, however, in the phonetic cues employed for phrasing. The article thus contributes to comparative work across Bantu languages in what concerns phonetic cues to phrasing as well as relevant constraints on the phonology-syntax mapping.

Inversion structures, in which the logical subject appears in postverbal position, are a wide-spread phenomenon among Bantu languages. The paper presents an overview of inversion structures in Bantu languages and describes in detail the inversion constructions in the Southern Bantu language Northern Sotho. It argues that Northern Sotho shows only one inversion structure, namely the impersonal construction. I propose that constructions which arguably constitute cases of locative inversion in neighboring languages can be analysed as impersonal constructions with preposed locative constituents. Evidence from morphosyntax, syntax, intonation and discoursepragmatics is investigated. The paper supports the claim made by Demuth (1990) and Baker (1992) for Southern Sotho. Southern African Linguistics and Applied Language Studies 2006, 24(3): 361–376