Intonation acquisition

Key

Intonation of emotions

Declination

It consists in the following: as a general rule, pitch is on the average lower at the end of an intonation group than at the beginning. High-peaked accents decline together with the base-line of unaccented syllables. A drop in subglottal pressure accounts for the phenomenon of declination. Any absence of it or suspension is a sign of either tentativeness or appeal as was described for non-final intonation groups in declaratives, yes-no questions and requests.

People who speak different languages experience similar emotional states and find no difficulty in identifying them when listening to foreigners. A cross-language study of English and Russian intonation means of expressing emotions indicated clearly that there are more common features than points of difference. Emotions are generally grouped into positive and negative, strong and weak (like happy - angry, indignant - sad), and there is gradience in their power which affects the value of such parameters as pitch, duration and intensity. There was only one difference in expressing fear: English speakers accelerated their tempo, while the Russian speakers slowed it down.

By comparing emotional intonations in Russian, Ukranian and English it was found that there are more typological features in Slavic languages, Russian and Ukranian, as compared with English: it was a matter of degree, not a matter of choice. In English emotional speech accentuation was a most powerful means. Other prosodic means of expressing emotions were universal.

An experiment in switching Russian and North American (Canadian) intonations suggested that listeners' perceptions in both languages were identical, except for the fact that Russian negative intonation was rated more negative than it meant to be, and Canadian English speech was rated more surprised in one particular case.

Most linguists agree that intonation means of expressing emotional states belong to a universal, though perhaps peripheral, and, therefore, "paralinguistic" part of language. An important point here is that emotions are distinguished from attitudes: emotions are biologically determined reactions, while attitudes are culturally-bound ways of expression {Cooper-Kuhlen 1986).

In different cultures higher "Key" (or register, pitch range) is used to convey deference, higher social role, more formal style {Crystal 1967).

Our own research in social variation of intonation has given plenty of evidence that pitch range may be a social marker of regionality, social status and social role in a particular social context {Shevchenko 1990, 2003).

Alan Cruttenden has pointed out another function of "key", or pitch range, which he called "discourse-linking". Indeed, text-to-speech analysis of connected speech intonation has revealed an integrating role of prosody in creating the text {Cruttenden 1986).

This might have constituted another peripheral part of language use if it were not so important for the child's cognitive and social development. The most common opinion is that intonation means of expression precede the acquisition of the phonological system as a whole. There are well established stages in the baby's intonation performance development. They are:

• 1-3 months — the first cries are demanding rise-falls;

• 3 months -1 year - babbling period where level, wavy and rising intonations of content are practised;

• 1 year 9 months — one-word period with the fall + rising intonations of deictics and requests;

• 1 year 9 months + 3 months - two-word period, high, mid and low registers differentiated.

The child's acquisition of basic pitch patterns for intonation production and perception is normally completed by the age of nine. However there are nuances of intonation the child may not know until eleven. (Alan Cruttenden comments on the child's inability to guess the score at the football match from intonation of the first part of the announcement on the public address system).

Much literature has been written on the so-called "baby-talk" — the speech of adults to babies. There is considerable unanimity in the samples from different cultures: high pitch, lip rounding and palatalization are the most salient features.

Дата добавления: 2014-01-11