REQUISITOS DE DISEÑO (FEMA 450)

The present issue is to some extent a quantitative one, namely, what the length or domain of the tonal unit is. A mora is essentially a unit of quantity.

Beach (op. cit.: 124/5) defines a "tone" generally as "the relative pitch of any significant speech-element chosen as a unit", and specifies that for Hottentot this unit is the

root. These tones (elsewhere called tonemes by him) are said to differ in "height" or "direction" or both.

Beach justifies his choice of the root as the unit of as­ signment i.a. by the fact that "both the nature and the num­ ber of inherent tones of both monosyllabic and disyllabic

roots [are] identical" (op. cit.: 125). - It is not con­ tested here that the root plays a role as a unit of some kind for tone assignment, but the question is whether it is the minimal unit.

Before this point is argued, graphic displays of the funda­ mental frequency (F") curve for the respective Citation and Sandhi melodies are presented (Figures l-12b). Corresponding patterns for CVCV and C W roots should demonstrate that the melodies are essentially the same. This is true also for CVN roots; for reasons of space their reflexes are not displayed here. All recordings use a vertical frequency scale of 0-200 Hz and a horizontal time scale of 2 seconds per screen width, unless indicated otherwise (in chapter 4). F*, i.e.

"pitch" is displayed on the lower half of the screen in ab­ solute terms (Hz), while "intensity" (in relative terms, de­ pending on the distance of the microphone) on the upper half of the screen provides a correlate in DB that is useful for orientation. All recordings were made with the aid of an

Apple H E personal computer with a Visi-Pitch Model 6096 in­

terface by the Kay Elemetrics Corporation, using a reel-to- reel tape recording as source. The voice in all cases was that of Pastor Eliphas Eiseb.

In the following graphic representations in real time the pitch trace of the utterance under investigation is framed by the cursors. Normally the cursors are set on the very first and last pitch reflection, that is, the onset and off­ set. If, however, there is a considerable interruption of the pitch trace at the onset or end, or if the low degree of intensity (esp. a drop) indicates some perturbation with concomitant tonal crumble, then the cursors frame only that part which is considered to be decisive for the pitch tar­ get, so as not to slant the calculation of statistics

(averages, etc.). - The critic may, of course, suspect this application of personal judgement to be a possible source of manipulation.

Pitch readings for the beginning and end of the melody, i.e. for the respective cursor positions are reflected imme­ diately under the frame at L and R respectively. For the benefit of the reader additional statistics are at times in­ cluded underneath the figure. Values pertain to readings

between cursors. As only one set of positions can be re­ flected in a printout, other cursor positions have occasion­ ally been added to the graph by hand. Figures of particular interest are underlined manually. Average pitch for a sec­ tion of an utterance is preceded by a double tilde. Letter­ ing within the graph represents phonetic script; the square brackets are omitted for the sake of convenience.

All reflexes are tested in the same frame sentences. As verbs can be converted into infinitives (i.e. nouns) by the addition of the feminine nominal désignant (= person-gender- number marker) .s, all reflexes can be tested as nominals in a copulative frame sentence

.8 GÈ (It is (a) ...).

This sentence will yield the Citation melody of the word un­ der investigation, as the Citation melody is i.a. obtained when a reflex stands sentence-initially (cf. chapter 4). The

Sandhi form is i.a. obtained when a qualifier precedes the

noun, e.g. the adjective Igai (good). Sandhi forms are thus obtained with the frame sentence

!Gâ"î ____ .8 GÈ (It is (a) good ...).

Conveniently, it is possible to test all words with the same adjective, as the tone of neighbouring words does not in­ fluence a word, tonologically. If there is a considerable interval between two successive tones then the target pitch

of the second tone often is reached only towards the end of its curve, as the beginning of the tonal domain may be sub­ ject to assimilation to the preceding tone. Such glides

(portamento) amount to low-level tonetic detail, however. As a point of departure, the tonal marking represents audi­ tory surface cues, of course. Whether such surface melodies must underlyingly be derived from other underlying tones that are subject to segmental influence, remains to be seen.

Apart from providing the context to elicit Citation and Sandhi forms of a reflex, the frame sentences furthermore have the important function of providing a point of refer­ ence with regard to the determination of a particular toneme, as the pitch of a toneme is, of course, not abso­ lute. The sentence type marker gè (which marks indicative main sentences) has a Low tone 12/. Where ge stands sentence finally, its pronunciation is extended to about double the normal length before tone and intensity begin to crumble. The particular informant's typical pitch for a Low tone is around 129 Hz, but this may vary considerably. The reflex to be tested is assessed relatively to the pitch of gè for au­ ditive cues, i.e. for tonemic assessment. For averaged on­ set and offset frequencies relative to the median gè the reader should compare the individual pitch tracings to the statistical abstractions in Fig. 18 on p.135. In the case of Sandhi forms a further point of reference is provided by

Igai, which has a High-Low melody ("High-High" in old nota­ tion) .

The designations of Haacke 1976 (cf. Table 3, p. 30) are still retained in the captions for Figures la-12b. The re­ finements that will be summarized in Table 14 (p. 119) as part of the present investigation follow in brackets on a

DOUBLE-LOW (LEVEL) Citation; /II/ (> /12/)

VISI-PITCH

S T A T I S T I C COL #1 COL #2 C H A N G E