Congratulations to Li-Fang, who successfully defended her PhD thesis this summer!
[INTONATION IN CONTACT: PROSODIC TRANSFER AND INNOVATION AMONG YAMI-MANDARIN BILINGUALS
Li-Fang Lai, PhD
University of Pittsburgh, 2018
Yami, an Austronesian language spoken on Orchid Island, Taiwan (less than 1,500 fluent speakers), is currently facing endangerment due to heavy contact with Mandarin. This dissertation investigated whether there is contact-induced prosodic variation in Yami-Mandarin bilingual speech, while also describing and documenting the evolution of Yami intonation. I advanced the description of key aspects of Yami intonation, which allowed the examination of Yami-Mandarin bilingual intonation patterns. This permitted identification of potential Mandarin influence in Yami and vice versa.
Five sentence types (statement, neutral question, confirmation-seeking question, default statement question (SQ1), and statement question conveying lighter incredulity (SQ2)) were elicited using a new paradigm – the Interactive Card Game. Three acoustic parameters were considered: final boundary tone, F0 slope, and mean pitch height. To gauge the impact of language background, 44 participants were divided into Yami-monolingual, Yami-dominant bilingual, balanced bilingual, Mandarin-dominant bilingual, and Mandarin-monolingual groups.
Older fluent Yami speakers distinguished falling statements and neutral questions from rising confirmation-seeking questions and SQ1s, but had no authentic SQ2. Bilinguals, however, transferred this Mandarin question type (SQ2) into Yami. This was then intertwined with Yami intonation to form a hybrid pattern. For Mandarin production, ethnically Yami, linguistically Mandarin-monolinguals patterned exactly with mainland Mandarin speakers by making a three-way distinction among falling, level, and rising intonation patterns. Bilinguals only showed a two-way distinction merging SQ1 and SQ2 into a single SQ category (a Yami substrate effect), which was then realized with a Mandarin-SQ2-like level contour to form another hybrid pattern.
The current linguistic ecological context plays a crucial role in determining the evolution of bilingual intonation. Specifically, considering the imbalanced power relationships between the groups and the socioeconomic pressures on Yami speakers, the two innovative hybrid patterns suggest an in-progress asymmetrical convergence of the intonation systems. This research expands the body of work on contact-induced prosodic change underscoring that higher-level prosody is permeable under contact. It also adds to studies on Austronesian/indigenous language intonation features. The broader impacts extend to heritage language education as the study has the potential to help Yami teachers develop new strategies in teaching language prosody.