Wokshop on developing an International Prosodic Alphabet (IPrA) within the AM framework

1. Wokshop on developing an International Prosodic Alphabet (IPrA) within the AM framework Sun-Ah Jun, UCLA José Ignacio Hualde, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Pilar Prieto, ICREA – Universitat Pompeu Fabra

2. Outline • 1. Introduction & the motivations for developing the IPrA(Jun, Hualde, Prieto) • 2. Proposals on labels of • - Pitch accents (Prieto) • - Phrasal/Boundary tones (Jun) • - Non-f0 features (Hualde)

3. Part 1 Introduction & the motivations for developing the IPrA (by Sun-Ah Jun)

4. Transcription system of intonation and prosodic structure in AM framework • ToBI (Tones and Break Indices) is a consensus system for labelling spoken utterances to mark phonologicallycontrastive intonational events and prosodic structure based on the Autosegmental-Metrical model of intonational phonology (e.g., Pierrehumbert 1980, Beckman & Pierrehumbert 1986, Ladd 1996/2008). • It was originally designed for English (1994), but has become a general framework for the development of prosodic annotation systems at the phonological level

5. Various ToBI systems/AM models of intonation • Models of intonational phonology and ToBI annotation systems have been developed independently for dozens of typologically diverse languages (e.g., edited books by Jun 2005, 2014, Frota & Prieto 2015).

6. ToBI is language-specific, not an IPA for prosody. • The ToBI system proposed for each language is assumed to be based on a well-established body of research on intonational phonology of that language. • Prosodic systems of various languages analyzed and described in the same framework allowed us to compare the systems across languages, i.e., prosodic typology “ToBI is not an IPA for prosody. Each ToBI is specific to a language variety and the community of researchers working on the language variety”

7. Prosodic Typology • Classification of languages based on their prosody. Classify based on what? • Jun (2005, 2014) compared phonological categories (e.g., types of tones, the size of tonal inventory, the type of prosodic units) across languages whose prosodic system has been described in the AM phonology framework. • Some researchers have argued that prosodic typology can be performed on crosslinguistic comparisons of prosodic systems described at the underlying, phonological level (e.g., Gussenhoven 2007, 2011; Hyman 2012).

8. Prosodic Typology • However, Ladd (2008b: 373-376), in his review of Jun’s (2005) 1st edited volume of Prosodic Typology, highlighted the problems of proposing a typology based on the comparison of abstract categories only: • “The heart of the issue is whether there is any basis for identifying SLPFP (sustained level phrase-final pitch, e.g., calling contour) as a cross-linguistically comparable phenomenon to be transcribed in comparable ways. ToBI can’t have it both ways. If the analyses on which the transcription systems are based are truly language-specific (or indeed, variety-specific), then they are strictly speaking incommensurate, and typological generalisations are at best difficult and at worst useless.”

9. Ladd (2008; 376) • “The problem is that in order to do typology, you have to have a set of agreed descriptions cast in comparable terms. And if we decide that they are crosslinguistically identifiable, then we need … ‘a set of agreed descriptions cast in comparable terms’. It won’t do in the long run if you call something an upstepped low boundary tone and I say there’s no boundary tone there at all.” • (p.373) “That kind of consensus is still lacking in the description of prosody. The broad AM approach is certainly leading us toward such a consensus, but we’re not there yet – it’s only the practical and collegial cohesiveness of the ToBI movement that makes the progress seem greater than it is.”.

10. Two levels of prosodic transcription:Broad/categorical phonetic vs. Phonological • Antecedents • The idea of incorporating two levels of prosodic transcription is not new. • Korean ToBI system (Jun 2000, 2005) incorporated two levels of tonal transcription. • Phonetic tone tier: label 14 tonal patterns of an Accentual Phrase (basic patterns: LHLH or HHLH), which are not distinctive but discrete categories (some of them in free variation). • Phonological tone tier: label AP boundaries and IP boundary tones

11. NOTIFICA Example of various AP tonal patterns in Korean : LH, HH, LLH, LHLH, LL I-TOP powerful family-POSS a tutor-ACC met

12. Antecedents (cont.) • Beckman, Hirschberg, & Shattuck-Hufnagel (2005:39) supported having a phonetic tier in ToBI with temporary labels, which are hypotheses about discrete phonological categories, not an encoding of a downsampled f0 contour. • Jun & Fletcher (2014:518) proposed a list of tonal labels to “be used as “temporary” labels as a guideline for deciding tonal categories and symbols when analyzing F0 contours in the AM framework before finalizing distinctive categories of the target language” (when trying to develop an AM model of a language/dialect)

13. Antecedents (cont.) • Finally, the French ToBI system (Delais-Roussarie et al. 2015) recognizes two levels of tonal representation by annotating allophonic variants of underlying tonal pattern of Accentual Phrase, (aL) (Hi) (L) H* • In IP-final final AP, the AP-final H* contrasts with L*, but in non-IP-final AP position, the AP-final H* can be realized as L* non-contrastively (probably due to dependency relations; Martin 1980, 2009), and this allophonic variant is annotated as L* in the F-ToBI system.

14. French AP-final pitch accent is sometimes realized as L* (allophonic) - see the first 3 APs (Fig.3.4 in Delais-Roussarie et al. F-ToBI, 2015) • “The children followed the grandfather of the girl that wore a long black dress.”

15. Also, useful in labeling L2 prosodyex. Korean intonation by L2 Korean learners of L1 English Korean AP-initial “L” is produced as H*, followed by AP-second syllable H, creating H*+H, which is a hybrid of English and Korean intonation. • Lee, H. (UCLA dissertation, in prog.)

16. NOTIFICA Proposal: Develop an International Prosodic Alphabet (IPrA) • Develop a set of discrete tonal labels and diacritics that are transparent and consistent at the categorical phonetic level. • This will be used: • 1. as a temporary label before establishing a phonological analysis of tones • 2. as a way to represent allophonic realizations of an underlying tonal category • 3. as a way to represent hybrid or exceptional tonal categories that are not part of the intonational model of any specific language.

17. DO WE NEED A UNIVERSAL SET OF PROSODIC LABELS? (by Jose Hualde)

18. Comparative work • Difficult or impossible if labels have different interpretations in different languages or analyses

19. Current situation • The same contour may be given different labels • The same label is used for different contours

20. Examples: final sustained pitch and final rise

21. Advantages of a common understanding of symbols • Answering typological questions such as: • How many stress languages have a contour with a fall from the pretonic to the stressed syllables? H+L* (or HL*?) • What is the distribution/pragmatics of this contour in different languages?

22. Different interpretations of same label: L*+H and L+H* in different ToBI systems

23. Another question:Why not use IPA tone diacritics?

24. Syllable-by-syllable tonal transcription systems make generalizations across utterances difficult

25. Autosegmental labels capture the relation between underlying/phonological and broad/categorical phonetic levels of description in a more conspicuous way.

26. Autosegmental notation was introduced for the analysis of lexical tone in order to better account for the mapping between the broad phonetic level and the postulated phonological level, including phenomena such a contour formation from underlying sequences of tone, tone spreading, surfacing of tone on different syllables from their lexical sponsor, floating tones, etc.

27. Bruce (1977) demonstrated the usefulness of the autosegmental approach in our understanding of the intonational contours of Swedish, by providing a uniform underlying representation for the two contrastive lexical pitch-accent, in spite of surface variation as lexical and postlexical tones interact.

28. A clear advantage of the AM symbols is in indicating differences of alignment between segments and tonal events.

29. Also: • IPA symbols for “global rise” and “global fall” (in addition to lexical tone and word accent ) do not appear to be enough to capture all relevant facts in intonation.

30. WHY DO WE NEED TWO LEVELS OF PROSODIC TRANSCRIPTION? (by Pilar Prieto)

31. Main argument: Because it is very useful to represent the correspondence between underlying prosodic categories and surface patterns In this section, we provide a set of examples (and more arguments) to motivate the need for a two-level approach to prosodic annotation

32. Broad phonetic transcriptions, segmental level • Broad phonetic transcriptions are very commonly used at the segmental level. • They include easily heard characteristics and ignore important phonetic detail.* • Broad phoneticmeter (English) mira ‘s/he looks’ (Catalan) • [ˈmiɾə] [ˈmiɾə] • Similar broad phonetic transcriptions, yet different phonological analyses : • Phonologicalmeter (English) mira ‘s/he looks’ (Catalan) • /ˈmitər/ /ˈmiɾ+a/ • * A narrow phonetic transcription would encode finer differences of phonetic detail.

33. Broad phonetic transcriptions are useful for the systematic description of the phonetic realization of underlying segments. • For example, in Spanish, it is important to know that [ˈehta] and [ˈesta] are two ways of pronouncing the same word esta /ˈesta/ ‘this, fem.’ in many dialects. Having access ONLY to a phonological level of transcription would not inform us about the surface patterns of syll-final /-s/. Conversely, having access ONLY to a broad phonetic level would not inform us about the fact that they are phonetic realizations of the SAME category.

34. These two levels of representation have been the standard way of analyzing sound alternations across languages. The same arguments can be applied at the suprasegmental level. In here, we will consider two types of examples which involve tonal alternations dependant on prosodic context.

35. The case of truncated tunes • Truncated tunes are quite frequent crosslinguistically • It is quite common crosslinguistically for a rising-falling underlying intonation sequence such as L+H* L% to be truncated if lexical stress falls on the word-final syllable (see Grice et al. 2005 for southern Italian varieties, Ortega-Llebaria and Prieto 2009 for Catalan and Peninsular Spanish, Armstrong 2010 for Puerto Rican Spanish, Gabriel et al. 2010 for Argentinean Spanish, and Cabrera-Abreu and Vizcaino-Ortega 2010 for Canarian, among many others) • Yet, current ToBI practices make it hard for researchers to systematically refer to truncated patterns.

36. Truncated interrogative tunes, Puerto Rican Spanish • “The phonetic realization of a ¡H* L% interrogative tune can initially cause confusion for transcribers” (Armstrong 2015). • In stress-final words it can be truncated, while in paroxytonic words it is not. ¿Que vieron a Mariana? ‘Did you see Marianne?’ ¿Se quieren callar? ‘Do you want to stop talking?’

37. Transcribing truncated contours • Having access ONLY to a phonological level of transcription does not allow researchers to systematically refer to a representation of truncated patterns. • Conversely, having access ONLY to a broad phonetic level of transcription does not inform us about the fact that we are dealing with surface realizations of the SAME category.

38. Contextual neutralization is a pervasive phenomenon in segmental phonology and, arguably, its incidence is very strong in the intonational component. • Not allowing for a level of broad phonetic representation means that we will not have access to the level of representation that represents allophonic differences (e.g., distinguishes between truncated vs. non-truncated contours, etc.).

39. Neutralization of contrasts: L+H* and H* • The potential contrast between H* and L+H* has been the source of a good amount of inter-transcriber disagreement across several ToBI systems (e.g. Pitrelli et al 1994 and Syrdal et al 2001 for Mainstream American English ToBI, and Escudero et al. 2012 for Catalan ToBI). • For American English ToBI the issue has not been settled yet (e.g. work by Ladd 2008a, Ladd and Morton 1997 arguing for a gradient difference, Steedman 2013 for a categorical difference, and also depends on dialect). • However, phrase-initial positions are a clear neutralizing context in English (MAE_ToBI) and in other languages with the L+H*/H* alternation.

40. Catalan neutralization of L+H* vs. H* In Catalan, we have a clear contrast between a H* and a L+H* pitch accent. And, like in English, phrase-initial L+H* can surface as H*.

41. Again, if we are interested in analyzing the patterns of correspondence between the underlying L+H* pitch accent and its surface realizations, one level of analysis is not sufficient. • Some work has adopted an intermediate level of analysis, like (L)+H* (e.g., Grice 2005). Yet, in a system with phonological H* (Catalan), a H* transcription can ambiguously correspond to two distinct phonological categories.

42. ADVANTAGES OF ADOPTING TWO LEVELS OF PROSODIC TRANSCRIPTION It allows for a clearmapping between underlying categories of prosody and their surface patterns. And… It can allow for more abstract phonological analyses of intonation across languages. It can contextualize results of detailed phonetic analyses of tunes.

43. Abstract phonological analyses • Another advantage of the two-level analysis would be the clarification of the status of each level of transcription. • Some ToBI systems represent a compromise between broad phonetic and phonological levels of transcription. E.g., Korean ToBI and French ToBI examples. • In Spanish ToBI, the label L+<H* is very useful as a broad prosodic label to analyze dialectal differences (e.g., retracted peaks reported in Andean Spanish by O’Rourke 2005, Buenos Aires Spanish by Colantoni and Gurlekian 2004; Spanish in contact with Basque by Elordieta and Calleja 2005), but no phonological differences in alignment are reported in prenuclear positions.

44. If transparent labellings are encoded at the broad phonetic level, important generalizations and non-predictable information can be encoded at the phonological level.

45. Conversely, adopting a level of broad phonetic transcription will also help clarify systematic analyses of fine phonetic features across intonation contours (F0 Max, F0 Min, duration, etc.), which will be able to incorporate a level of broad phonetic transcription. • Oftentimes, this work does not incorporate a phonological analysis of the pitch contours and uses general terms such as “global rise”, “global falling”, etc. • Having access to an IPrA alphabet to transcribe the curve will facilitate the use of the tools for broad phonetic transcription.

46. We regard this proposal as an opportunity to integrate purely phonetic vs. phonological work on intonation

47. PARTIAL CONCLUSIONS • IPrA PROPOSAL IN A NUTSHELL • Adoption of two levels of analysis, e.g. broad phonetic and phonological. • Arguments for developing an IPrA alphabet which is based on units that are universally accepted.

48. Advantages of having broad phonetic transcription in addition to the phonological tones in ToBI • To facilitate the prosodic labelling of languages for which the phonological repertoire is not yet known. • To allow for more transparent comparisons across languages. • To clarify in a systematic way the relationship between the phonetic forms and phonological categories. • To clarify the level of transcription different ToBI systems are using right now. • To allow for more abstract phonological analyses of intonation across languages. • To facilitate the use of tools for broad phonetic transcription to researchers interested in fine phonetic detail. • To increase the levels obtained by inter-transcriber agreement tests. • To facilitate the study of languages in contact and L2 prosody. • To facilitate the automatic and semi-automatic labelling of large corpora.

49. Part 2 Brief practical proposal and rationale behind the IPrA set

50. NOTIFICA Rationale behind the construction of an IPrA set • Proposal based on prosodic descriptions of more than 30 languages (e.g., languages included in Jun 2005, Jun 2014, Frota & Prieto 2015, among others). • New units are incorporated if they can be shown to be used with a distinctive value in a given language. That is, we are adopting a tone symbol for the broad phonetic representation if the symbol was used in some language to have a distinctive value. • This is similar in nature in how the IPA incorporates a new symbol in the segmental inventory. • Our goal is to establish a set of “broad phonetic tonal labels”, that is, we are trying to capture the categorical nature of f0 contour, thus not narrow phonetic representation of f0 (like INTSINT and IViE),