Underlying low tones in Ruwund

An examination of data from Ruwund, a Bantu language with surface tone patterns often the reverse of those reconstructed for Proto-Bantu, proposes that, whereas most contemporary Bantu languages are believed to have tonal systems based on an underlying high/toneless contrast, Ruwund is based on a lo...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Studies in African linguistics 1992, Vol.23 (3), p.223-278
Main Author: NASH, J. A
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Descriptive studies and applied theories
Linguistics
Phonology
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:An examination of data from Ruwund, a Bantu language with surface tone patterns often the reverse of those reconstructed for Proto-Bantu, proposes that, whereas most contemporary Bantu languages are believed to have tonal systems based on an underlying high/toneless contrast, Ruwund is based on a low /toneless contrast. Tone spread & deletion rules apply to low tones rather than high & the "default low insertion" rule of other languages is replaced in Ruwund by a rule adding default high tones. This is theoretically significant in that it contradicts D. Pulleyblank's (1986) proposal that "low" is always the default value in a two-tone language. 1 Appendix, 10 References. Adapted from the source document
ISSN:0039-3533
2154-428X