Prosodic realization of focus in statement and question in Tibetan (Lhasa Dialect)

Xiaxia Zhang, Bei Wang, Qian Wu*, Yi Xu

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contributionpeer-review

4 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

The present study investigated prosodic realization of foeus in statement and yes/no question in Tibetan (Lhasa dialect). Two target sentences were uttered by 8 speakers in both statement and yes/no question under four focus conditions, initial, medial, final and neutral focus. Systematic acoustic analysis showed that: (1) On-focus words exhibited significant F0 rising, pitch range expansion, and duration lengthening, while pitch range of pre-focus words remained largely intact. Importantly, focus led to post-focus F0 lowering and compression. Focus was realized the same way in both statement and question. (2) Interrogative intonation had higher F0 than statement in unfocused words. In general, the prosodie realization of focus in Tibetan was comparable to English and Beijing Mandarin. The distribution and origin of post-focus compression (PFC) was also discussed.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publication13th Annual Conference of the International Speech Communication Association 2012, INTERSPEECH 2012
Pages666-669
Number of pages4
Publication statusPublished - 2012
Externally publishedYes
Event13th Annual Conference of the International Speech Communication Association 2012, INTERSPEECH 2012 - Portland, OR, United States
Duration: 9 Sept 201213 Sept 2012

Publication series

Name13th Annual Conference of the International Speech Communication Association 2012, INTERSPEECH 2012
Volume1

Conference

Conference13th Annual Conference of the International Speech Communication Association 2012, INTERSPEECH 2012
Country/TerritoryUnited States
CityPortland, OR
Period9/09/1213/09/12

Keywords

  • Focus
  • PFC
  • Post-focus compression
  • Tibetan

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