Effects of Syntactic Constituency on Phonology and Phonetics of Tone

这个研究项目调查了一个句子的句法结构是如何影响它的发音的。该项目将对四种具有不同句法特性的语言（北比斯加巴斯克语、西松加语、卢干达语、爱尔兰语）进行协调的实地调查，其中声调的分布被认为特别能揭示句法组成结构在决定句子发音方面的一般作用。在这些语言中，短语大小成分的左边缘和/或右边缘的位置由音调和其他音系现象（在短语边缘插入音调，倒数第二个元音的延长等）表示。此外，已知这些语言显示出与独特的、更大的、从句级别的成分类型相关的音系效应。因此，这些语言中句子发音的数据可以揭示哪些类型的句法短语或句法从句可以算作音系的“域”。此外，这些领域敏感现象还可以提供一种工具，用于评估纯粹基于句法的音系领域结构理论是否足以作为这些现象在句子中分布的理论，或者是否还必须对领域结构进行适当的音系限制，例如表达对某些节奏模式的偏好。合作团队计划将为研究生和教师提供独特的培训机会，从语法-音系界面收集和分析复杂数据。对这些专家的培训和公开提供的数据库将为进一步提高对这一相对未被充分研究的语法方面的理论理解奠定基础。此外，所收集的数据将用于记录目前未被充分研究和/或濒临灭绝的语言的句子发音，因此将有助于努力保持这些语言独特属性的知识，并将其传授给其他人。

This research project investigates the question of just how the syntactic structure of a sentence can affect its pronunciation. The project will make coordinated fieldwork investigations of four languages with diverse syntactic properties (Northern Bizkaian Basque, Xitsonga, Luganda, Irish) in which the distribution of tone is known to be particularly revealing of the general role for syntactic constituent structure in determining the pronunciation of sentences. In these languages the location of the left and/or right edges of phrase-sized constituents is indicated by tonal and other phonological phenomena (insertion of tones at phrase edges, lengthening of the penultimate vowel, etc.) Moreover these languages are known to display phonological effects associated with a distinct, larger, clause-level type of constituent. So data from the pronunciation of sentences in these languages can reveal just what types of syntactic phrases or syntactic clauses count as "domains" for phonology. These domain-sensitive phenomena can moreover provide a tool for assessing whether a purely syntax-based theory of phonological domain structure is adequate as a theory of the distribution of these phenomena in a sentence, or whether appeal also has to be made to properly phonological constraints on domain structure, such as those expressing preference for certain rhythmic patterns.The collaborative teamwork planned will provide unique training opportunities for both graduate students and faculty in the collection and analysis of complex data from the syntax-phonology interface. The training of these experts and the databases to be made publicly available will provide a foundation for further advances in the theoretical understanding of this relatively understudied aspect of grammar. Moreover, the data collected will serve to document sentence pronunciation in languages that are currently understudied and/or endangered and so will help contribute to efforts to keep the knowledge of the unique properties of these languages alive, and to teach it to others.