Bantu tone

1. Bantu tone

3. Autosegmental representation • Parallel tiers of segments, where segments are decomposable into features (functions which take on the values + and -). • In the case at hand, that means vowels and consonants on one tier, and tones (High, Low) on the other. • We usually just represent them in familiar notation...

4. ba la mu bon a L H L bà lá mú bòn à usual transcription style... association lines: represents alignment in time

5. benefits from autosegmental represenation • Accounts for stability, the fact that tones do not delete when the vowels that they are associated with delete. Kirundi: • a ra rim a s/he hoes • ba ra rim a they hoe • a ba goré ba ra rim a “the women hoe” • u mu gor á ra rim a “the woman hoes”

6. u mu gor e a ra rim a H u mu gor a ra rim a H

7. autosegmental representation V H L • Deals with contour tones • Floating tones, and morphemes which are specified only on the tonal tier • Accounts for the naturalness of assimilation rules as addition of association lines (i.e., restructuring what is already there).

11. Lake Victoria

13. Ci-Ruri (David Massamba)

14. A verb stem can be: toneless, or bear a High tone. Underlyingly, that tone is on the first syllable of the stem. And it moves to the second syllable. Unless it’s already in the penultimate syllable of the word, in which case it stays fixed. o ku sumikir a o ku sumikir a H H

15. Written as a rule: • V V • e * • H The line with the cross-bars is an association line in the input to the rule which is deleted by the rule; the dotted association line is added by the rule.

17. What’s happening? Two things: If there are 2 High tones in a row (object marker and stem both), the second one is deleted. The Object Marker puts a High tone on the next syllable.

18. V V • g g H H Meeussen’s Rule • V V • e * • H

19. Two Obj Markers H

20. o ku ba li temer a g g g H H H o ku ba li temer a Two OM rule g g g g H H H H o ku ba li temer a Meeussen’s Rule g g H H

22. Tonga verb structure

23. Tonga (Bantu, Zambia) acute accent marks High tone; no accent marks Low tone

27. ba lá mú bon a H L H L lexical packages

28. An odd rule in Tonga: Delete a verb-initial High tone H →Ø / [verb ___ ba lá mú bon a H L H L Ø

29. So in the verb: you need a sequence of accented – unaccented – accented or Low High Low to get any Highs at all.

32. Morphemes: • 3rd person subject markers (u, ba) • Plural object markers (ba) • verb stems: bon, silik, swiilil, etc.

33. Present tense; accented subject ‘u’ what’s going on?

35. Recent past: -a-

36. But infinitives are simple nouns í kú bòn à ‘to see’ 3g gg 97r H L í kú mú bòn à ‘to see him/her’ 3g 9 g 97r H L

37. unaccented infinitive ì kù làngà ‘to look at’ 7r ì kù mù làngà ‘to look at him/her’

38. People’s Republic of Congo (formerly: Zaïre)

39. KiHunde (with Mutima Sinamenye) • infinitives: i tém a ‘to cut’ i tém er a ‘to cut for s.o.’ i tém er an a ‘to cut for one another’ i som a ‘to read’ i som er a ‘to read for somone’ • Looks simple enough

40. Present continuous: I am verb-ing • High toned verb i tém a Meeussen’s Rule is at work: delete H after H (the Subject Marker is High, in this tense). a ba tem a PresentTense Subject Root FinalVowel

41. Present continuous: Low tone verb a ba som a Tense Subject Root FinalVowel a bá sóm á g @ gg H H

42. Present continuous: low toned verb • It’s the indented forms – the ones with an object, ‘book’ = kitabo, which are most revealing: they show the form closer to the underlying form. • A High goes on the second vowel of the verb stem: where the stem begins with the verb root (or radical). • a ni som a ... a ni som a a plateauing process -- • g g g 2 g • H H H H

43. Plateau rule

44. Same tense, same low-tone stem a tú sóm á ... a tú sóm ér a a tú sóm ér an a we are reading... for them ....... for each other Always a High tone on the second vowel of the stem. a tú ki som á ... a tú mu som ér a a tú mu som ér an a we are reading it... for him ....... for each other Always a High tone on the second vowel of the stem, and if this produces, H L L H, it does not “plateau” to H H H H.

45. a tú sómér a a tú mu somér a g 3 g g g H H H H

46. Final pullback rule • We’ve seen this already: a ní som á kitabo but a ní sóm a. V V ## phrase-finally # i H

47. Relationship between Pullback and Plateau