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The Intonational Structure of Singapore English by Daryl Chow

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The Intonational Structure of Singapore English by Daryl Chow The intonational structure of Singapore English by Daryl Chow Dissertation Submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Linguistics University of Ottawa Supervisor: Professor Marc Brunelle Doctoral Committee: Professor Ian McKay Professor Lisa Lim Professor Stephen Levey Professor Andres Salanova © Daryl Chow, Ottawa, Canada, 2016 ABSTRACT This dissertation is a comprehensive description of the structure of the prosody of Singapore English. Using the Prosodic Hierarchy as a framework, each layer of the structure of Singapore English is described in detail. The smallest level described in this dissertation is the syllable, the domain in which the majority of segmental processes occur in Singapore English. The second level is the prosodic word domain, where there is a high tone anchored to the final syllable and a low tone anchored to the left edge, and these tones are shown in this dissertation to be recursive. These tones are independent of stress, which is argued to not exist in Singapore English. The third level is the intonational phrase, where the final syllable carries the boundary tone of the entire intonational phrase, affecting the tones of final particles. There is also a phrase-initial boost on the first prosodic word of the intonational phrase. Markedly absent is any intermediate phrase or domain between the word and intonational phrase, which is argued to not exist in this dissertation. The dissertation ends with a look at the possible origins of the prosody of Singapore English and a consideration of the prosodic systems which may have influenced its development. ii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This dissertation is dedicated to my wife Lily whose indescribable support comes in so many different ways. I would also like to thank my family, especially my sister, who have always been there for me since the beginning. Many thanks to my advisor Marc Brunelle whose constant guidance and timely revisions made this work the best it could be. Thanks also to my committee members, Lisa Lim, Stephen Levey, Ian MacKay and Andres Salanova for their invaluable comments and advice. iii Contents List of Figures .............................................................................................................................................. vii `§1 Introduction ..................................................................................................................................... 1 §1.1 An Introduction to Singapore English ........................................................................................... 2 §1.2 The Levels of the Prosodic Hierarchy ............................................................................................ 3 §1.3 Syntax and the Prosodic Hierarchy ............................................................................................... 7 §1.4 The Universality of the Prosodic Hierarchy .................................................................................. 9 §1.5 Recursion .................................................................................................................................... 11 §1.6 Autosegmental-Metrical Theory ................................................................................................. 12 §1.7 Framework of Dissertation ......................................................................................................... 15 §2 A Review of Singapore English Prosody .......................................................................................... 17 §2.1 Segmental Phonology ................................................................................................................. 17 §2.2 Word Prosody ............................................................................................................................. 18 §2.2.1 Word Stress and Standard English ...................................................................................... 18 §2.2.2 Syllable Timing ................................................................................................................... 19 §2.2.3 Word Stress in Singapore English ....................................................................................... 21 §2.2.4 Word Tone ......................................................................................................................... 26 §2.2.5 Vestigial lexical tone ........................................................................................................... 31 §2.3 Intermediate or Phonological Phrases ........................................................................................ 32 §2.4 The Intonational Phrase .............................................................................................................. 35 §2.4.1 Rightmost Prominence ....................................................................................................... 35 §2.4.2 Sentence-Final Particles ..................................................................................................... 37 §2.4.3 Old versus New Information .............................................................................................. 38 §2.4.4 Sentential Prominence ....................................................................................................... 41 §2.5 Summary and outstanding research questions .......................................................................... 43 iv §3 The Prosodic Word in Singapore English ........................................................................................ 48 §3.1 The Syllable ................................................................................................................................. 48 §3.2 The Core Prosodic Word and its Tonal Structure........................................................................ 50 §3.3 The Structure of the Extended Prosodic Word ........................................................................... 52 §3.4 The Prosodic Word: Formal Analysis .......................................................................................... 57 §3.5 The Prosodic Word Structure Applied to Data ........................................................................... 59 §3.6 The Prosodic Word: Function Words .......................................................................................... 65 §3.6.1 Function Words: Methodology .............................................................................................. 66 §3.6.2 Function Words: Results and Discussion ............................................................................... 69 §3.6.3 Function Words: General Discussion ..................................................................................... 76 §3.7 The Prosodic Word: Additional Cases ........................................................................................ 83 §3.8 The Prosodic Word: Summary ................................................................................................... 86 §4 The Phonological/Intermediate Phrase in Singapore English ......................................................... 89 §4.1 Does an intermediate phrase exist? ........................................................................................... 89 §4.2 Research Questions and Methodology ...................................................................................... 91 §4.3 Results and Discussion ............................................................................................................... 94 §5 The Intonational Phrase in Singapore English ............................................................................... 100 5.1 The phrase-initial boost in Singapore English .......................................................................... 100 §5.1.1 Research Questions and Methodology ............................................................................... 103 §5.1.2 Results and Discussion ........................................................................................................ 104 §5.2 The Final Syllable in the Intonational Phrase ............................................................................ 110 §5.2.1 Final Syllable: Research Questions and Methodology ......................................................... 111 §5.2.2 Results and Discussion ......................................................................................................... 113 §5.3 Final Particles in Singapore English ........................................................................................... 118 §5.4 Summary and Formalization of the Intonational Phrase .......................................................... 123 v §6 The origins of Singapore English prosody ..................................................................................... 125 §6.1 The Language Situation in Singapore ........................................................................................ 125 §6.2 New Englishes ........................................................................................................................... 129 §6.3 The difficulties with ascribing contact ...................................................................................... 130 §6.4 The Reinterpretation of Stress into Word Tone ....................................................................... 133 §6.5 The Development of Phrasal Prosody ....................................................................................... 139 §7 Conclusion ....................................................................................................................................
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