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INTONATION UNIVERSALS AND PROSODY OF UTTERANCES OF THE TELEUT LANGUAGE // Tomsk Journal of Linguistics and Anthropology. 2014. Issue 3 (5). P. 49-56

The intonation of the Teleut utterances is under consideration in this work: Кижи эзенjит. – ‘The man thinks’. – [kɨӡɨ εzεnjɨt]Салқын қаақjит. – ‘The wind blows’. – [salkъn qa:qjɨt], Кижи эзенjит пa? – ‘Does the man think?’ – [kɨӡɨ εzεnjɨt pa], Салқын қаақjит пa? – ‘Does the wind blow?’ – [salkъn qa:qjɨt pa], Неденааре кижи эзентит? – ‘What does the man think about?’ – [nεdεna:rε kɨӡɨ εzεnjɨt], Каани салкын каақтит? – ‘Where does the wind blow?’ – [ka:nI salkъn ka:qjɨt], which were pronounced by 10 Teleut speakers, who live in the village Bekovo, Belovo district, Kemerovo region. We analyzed the phrases by help of computer programs Speech Analyzer 3.01 and Wave Assistant using audiovisual method and relying on speaker’s perception.

Keywords: Turk languages, the Teleut language, intonation, speech prosody, linguistic universals, speech perception

INTONATION OF NARRATIVE UTTERANCES OF THE ALTAI LANGUAGE (ON THE MATERIAL OF THE ALTAI-KIZHI FOLKLORE) // Tomsk Journal of Linguistics and Anthropology. 2020. Issue 4 (30). P. 83-95

In this paper, we have studied the intonation of the Altai language spoken by the native Altai people living in the Altai Republic, Russia. The frame of our work was the Altai-kizhi folk narrative stories. We focused only on declarative statements. The results obtained were compared with the ones given by our primary study, where the interrogative intonation of the same folk texts was under consideration. In our works, we rely on the auditive and computer (Praat) analysis. So, the unique intonation features of the folk statements with action propositions were found out. Firstly, when describing the fundamental frequency (f0) patterns, f0 maxima of an utterance were found on the syllables of words which are the information focus of an utterance or belong to the folk clichés. Secondly, we studied the relevant literature on the linguistics of folk texts and followed the folklore composition structure when sorting the statements for the further analysis. The typical folklore text is structured as follows: beginning–plot development–ending; intonation variations are most significant in the plot development part, beginning and ending being more invariant. Generally, the Altai folklore statements are characterized by rising-falling or falling intonation. To conclude, not only the intonation of the folk statement with f0 marking the folk clichés reveals its text position, but propositions realized in the speech of the Altai-kizhi speakers as well.

Keywords: intonation, the Altai language, metatext, the Altai folk, f0 contours, PRAAT

The intonation of the dialog in the Kumandin language (Results of the field research) // Tomsk Journal of Linguistics and Anthropology. 2024. Issue 4 (46). P. 47-57

The intonation of Turkic languages has practically not been researched yet. In modern society, against the background of globalization and the leveling of national characteristics of ethnic groups, the problem of recording, studying, and preserving the cultural characteristics of minority peoples is exceptionally acute. This article is the first to examine the intonation of the Kumandin dialogic language. The Kumandin language belongs to the East Uyghur branch of the Turkic languages of the Altai language family, has no established written tradition, and functions only in oral form, accelerating its disappearance. The relevance of the study arises from the increasing interest in the problems of language communication, documentation, and analysis of data on endangered languages in Siberia. The analysis is based on field recordings using the Praat computer program. According to the results of the analysis of experimental data, interrogative statements in the Kumandin dialogic speech, which are the first replica in the structure of the dialog, are characterized by a higher level of the end of the melodic curve than in the affirmative statements. The response in the Kumandin language, which is in a relative relationship to the preceding interrogative component, is both a structurally communicative and intonationally concluding component of the entire dialogic unit. In incomplete statements, the intonation is clearer and brighter. The frequency level in the analyzed interrogative statements is between 106 and 257 Hz. One of the phenomena that claims the status of a linguistic universal in the field of intonation studies is the raising of the frequency of the main tone or pitch, which is used in most languages to distinguish between interrogative and affirmative intonation. Intonation functions in close interaction with the syntactic and lexico-grammatical means of the language: the more complete the dialogic statement, the weaker the intonational contrast, while a brighter, clearer intonation is observed in incomplete statements. The prospects for further research are to deepen the identified tendencies by expanding the body of research and to describe the general model of the intonational structure of certain questions as a result of comparing the intonational contours of statements with different question words. The intonation of the interrogative part in Kumandin’s dialogic speech is considered for the first time. The relevance of the study arises from the increasing interest in the problems of linguistic communication, documentation, and data analysis of the endangered languages of Siberia. The analysis is carried out based on field recordings using the Praat computer program. According to the results of the analysis of experimental data, interrogative statements, which are the first replica in the structure of the dialog, are characterized by an upward movement of the tone.

Keywords: intonation, dialogic speech, minority peoples, the language of the Kumandins, Praat