[lingtalks] Abstract for October 5 Colloquium speaker, Larry Hyman

[Karma Dolma]

USC Linguistics Colloquium Series presents:

Larry Hyman, U.C. Berkeley, October 5, 2009

Title: "Do tones have features? Or: Is tone different?"

Unless explicitly concerned with developing a system of features per se,
most studies of tonal phonology refer to contrasting high, mid, low and
contour tones as H, M, L, HL, LH (etc.), rather than with features such as
[±upper], [±raised]. Since this practice stands in marked contrast to vowel
and consonant phonology, where features seem unavoidable, it is natural to
ask whether this is due simply to convenience or whether tones lend
themselves less naturally to a featural interpretation than vowels and
consonants. In this talk I suggest that this is indeed the case: while they
sometimes allow a general and insightful account, there are inconsistencies,
indeterminacies, and other reasons to doubt the value of tonal features (and
tonal geometry). This then naturally leads to a more general question: Why
should tone be different? In Hyman (in press), I provide evidence to suggest
that tone is different in its

capabilities: tone can do everything that segmental and metrical phonology
can do, but the reverse is not true. I start by illustrating some examples
to make this point then turn to the question of how this provides insight
into the relative unimportance of featural analyses of tone. In the course
of the talk I also raise the question of why tone, which might seem like a
good bet, is not a linguistic universal (as compared to consonants and
vowels). Since some tonal phenomena have no segmental or stress analogues, I
argue that anyone who is interested in the outer limits of what is possible
in phonology would be well-served to understand how tone systems work

 

GFS 118, 3:00-4:30 pm

For more information, email usc.ling.talk at gmail.com

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