THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO A MULTI-GENERATIONAL ACOUSTIC AND SOCIOLINGUISTIC STUDY OF EMPHASIS IN TUROYO A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF THE DIVISION OF THE HUMANITIES IN CANDIDACY FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY DEPARTMENT OF LINGUISTICS BY CHRISTINA MICHELLE WEAVER CHICAGO, ILLINOIS AUGUST 2019 Copyright c 2019 by Christina Michelle Weaver All Rights Reserved for the Mor Gabriel community and for my children CONTENTS LIST OF FIGURES . vii LIST OF TABLES . x ACKNOWLEDGMENTS . xi ABSTRACT . xiii 1 INTRODUCTION AND MOTIVATION . 1 2 LITERATURE REVIEW . 4 2.1 Turoyo . 4 2.1.1 Language . 4 2.1.2 People . 9 2.2 Emphasis . 15 2.2.1 What Is Emphasis? . 15 2.2.2 Reported Instances of Emphasis . 16 2.2.3 Previous Experiments . 22 2.3 Heritage Speakers . 31 3 METHODOLOGY . 34 3.1 Methodology for the Acoustic Experiment . 34 3.1.1 Materials . 34 3.1.2 Participants . 36 3.1.3 Procedure . 37 3.1.4 Measurements . 37 3.1.5 Statistical Analysis . 38 3.1.6 Hypothesis . 39 3.2 Methodology for the Sociolinguistic Study . 40 3.2.1 Stimuli . 41 3.2.2 Participants . 42 3.2.3 Conducting the Interviews . 43 3.2.4 Analyzing the Data . 44 4 INTRODUCTION TO THREE GENERATIONS IN THE MOR GABRIEL COMMU- NITY . 45 4.1 Introduction to the Three Generations . 48 4.1.1 Grandparent Generation . 49 4.1.2 Parent Generation . 51 4.1.3 Child Generation . 52 4.2 Comparing Generations Through Their Answers to the Sociolinguistic Questionnaire 53 4.2.1 Basic Information . 53 4.2.2 Language Use . 55 iv 5 ACOUSTIC CORRELATES OF EMPHASIS IN MOR GABRIEL TUROYO . 68 5.1 Consonants . 68 5.2 Vowels . 69 5.2.1 F1 . 71 5.2.2 F2 . 76 5.2.3 F3 . 83 5.3 Summary of Acoustic Correlates of Emphasis . 88 5.4 Individual Vowel Spaces for Grandparent Generation and Discussion . 88 5.4.1 Speaker 1 . 90 5.4.2 Speaker 2 . 91 5.4.3 Speaker 3 . 93 5.4.4 Speaker 4 . 94 5.4.5 Speaker 5 . 96 5.4.6 Speaker 6 . 97 5.5 Discussion of Acoustic Correlates of Emphasis . 99 6 SOCIOLINGUISTIC VARIABILITY OF ACOUSTIC CORRELATES OF EMPHASIS IN MOR GABRIEL TUROYO . 102 6.1 Results: Acoustic Correlate Variability that Exists Between Generations and Genders102 6.1.1 F1 . 102 6.1.2 F2 . 105 6.1.3 Summary of Acoustic Correlate Variability Between Generations and Gen- ders . 112 6.1.4 Individual Vowel Spaces for Parent Generation and Discussion . 113 6.1.5 Individual Vowel Spaces for Child Generation and Discussion . 124 6.1.6 Discussion of Acoustic Correlate Variability Between Generations and Gen- ders . 137 6.2 Synthesis of the Results of the Acoustic Study with the Results of the Sociolin- guistic Study . 138 6.2.1 Family . 138 6.2.2 Social Networks . 142 6.2.3 Religion . 147 6.2.4 Ranking? . 151 6.2.5 Identity . 152 6.3 Summary . 169 7 CONCLUSION . 170 7.1 Conclusion . 170 7.2 Ideas for Future Work . 172 7.3 Practical Suggestions . 173 A ACOUSTIC EXPERIMENT WORD LIST . 175 v B PICTURES AND PROPS FOR THE ACOUSTIC EXPERIMENT . 176 B.1 Pictures . 176 B.2 Props . 177 C SOCIOLINGUISTIC QUESTIONNAIRE . 178 BIBLIOGRAPHY . 182 vi LIST OF FIGURES 2.1 Aramaic language family tree (Hoberman, 1989) . 4 4.1 Map of Tur QAbdin (Unknown, 2015) . 50 5.1 Grandparent vowel means for target words (three repetitions each) following /s/ . 69 5.2 Grandparent vowel means for target words (three repetitions each) following /t/ . 70 5.3 Model predictions for F1 values following /s/ in Mor Gabriel Turoyo by vowel for the grandparent generation . 72 5.4 Model predictions for F1 values for vowels following /s/ in Mor Gabriel Turoyo for the grandparent generation . 73 5.5 Model predictions for F1 values for points following /t/ in Mor Gabriel Turoyo for the grandparent generation . 74 5.6 Model predictions for F1 values for vowels following /t/ in Mor Gabriel Turoyo for the grandparent generation . 75 5.7 Model predictions for F2 values for vowels following /s/ in Mor Gabriel Turoyo for the grandparent generation . 77 5.8 Model predictions for F2 values for points following /s/ in Mor Gabriel Turoyo for the grandparent generation . 78 5.9 Model predictions for F2 values for vowels following /s/ in Mor Gabriel Turoyo for the grandparent generation . 79 5.10 Model predictions for F2 values for vowels following /s/ in Mor Gabriel Turoyo for the grandparent generation . 80 5.11 Model predictions for F2 values for points following /s/ in Mor Gabriel Turoyo for the grandparent generation . 81 5.12 Model predictions for F2 values for vowels following /t/ in Mor Gabriel Turoyo for the grandparent generation . 82 5.13 Model predictions for F1 values vollowing /s/ in Mor Gabriel Turoyo by vowel for the grandparent generation . 84 5.14 Model predictions for F3 values for vowels following /s/ in Mor Gabriel Turoyo for the grandparent generation . 85 5.15 Model predictions for F3 values for points following /t/ in Mor Gabriel Turoyo for the grandparent generation . 86 5.16 Model predictions for F3 values for vowels following /t/ in Mor Gabriel Turoyo for the grandparent generation . ..