Tone PDF

TONE LANGUAGES
The examples are grouped according to the traditional division into contour- and register-tone
languages.
A. Contour-tone languages
All examples are from the Asian region:
Mandarin
Cantonese
Thai
B. Register-tone languages
Two examples of the many West-African tone languages:
Ibibio, a Niger-Kordofanian language spoken in Nigeria
Yoruba; just a brief example but features talking drums
See separate demo for the Sino-Tibetan language Mpi, which combines tone with voice quality.
See V&C (p. 9-12), BPM (p. 231-233), Course in Phonetics (chap. 10), Laver (p. 465-483) and
Handbook of the IPA (p. 14, and 23/24) for more details.
Transcription of Tone
There are two main systems for transcribing tone.
The first system is commonly used for register tone languages with a small number of tones.
The basic symbols (illustrated over the vowel a) are a!, a~, and a@ for high, low and mid, respectively.
For further possibilities these symbols are combined: e.g a$ is falling (high + low).
Thus, the symbols do not give an impression of the pitch movement, i.e they are not iconic.
This system is used for the Ibibio example below.
The second system is iconic. It is especially used for contour-tone languages. It represents pitch
movement on a 5-point scale (1=lowest, 5=highest) by means of so-called tone-letters consisting of
a vertical reference line on the right preceded by a line indicating pitch. Often the tone is also
explicitly described by a series of numbers on the 5-point scale (it may not actually always be
possible to reproduce all such sequences typographically as a tone letter).
Even though this system is iconic, it is nonetheless a stylized representation, i.e it should not be
assumed that it captures all details of actual pitch contours.
This system is used in the Mandarin example below.
The Thai example below illustrates the use of both systems (as well as the awkward fact that authors
may differ in their designations for tones).
Since the second system can be cumbersome to use in actual transcriptions, for many languages
each tone has conventionally been assigned a tone number. For example, the high level tone in
Mandarin is referred to as Tone number 1. A syllable with this tone can then be simply notated by
appending the tone number as a superscript, e.g ma1.
A further advantage of using tone numbers is that it provides a convenient way of describing tone
sandhi. This refers to the often very complex modifications of tones when pronounced in sequence.
A commonly quoted example for Mandarin is that in a sequence of two Tone-3 syllables, the first
syllable is pronounced with Tone 2.
1. Mandarin
(Example from SoWL)
Note: Words are played automatically in the order below
Tone Tone
Number Description Pitch Letter
1 high level 55 ‰ mþa | “mother”
2 high rising 35 Ÿ mþa | “hemp”
3 low falling rising 214 € mþa | “horse”
4 high falling 51 ‘ mþa | “scold”
Click here for examples of the tones spoken in short phrases
Click here for a complete story using only one syllable, but different tones
2. Cantonese
(Example from IPA Illustrations)
high, level sþi | “silk”
mid, level sþi | “to try”
low-mid, level sþi | “matter”
low-mid to low, falling sþi | “time”
low-mid to high, rising sþi | “history”
low-mid to mid, rising sþi | “city”

3. Thai
Shows alternative designations for the same tones (arranged on the same line), and alternative
transcription methods.
Example from IPA Illustrations Example from SoWL
high kîþa! | “to engage in trade” high rising 45 Ÿ nþaÉ | “aunt”
mid kîþa@ | “to get stuck” mid falling 32 nþaÉ | “field”
low kîþa~ | “galangal” low falling 21 š nþaÉ | (a nickname)
rising kîþa# | “leg” low falling rising 215 € nþaÉ | “thick”
falling kîþa$ | “I” high falling 51 ‘ nþaÉ | “face”
(Just to make life really confusing the SoWL example is reproduced in the web version of “Course
in Phonetics” and also in Laver with yet a third transcription method.)
4. Ibibio
(Example from SoWL)
Although the language has three tones (high, low, and falling) the falling tone only occurs on final
syllables, giving the following combinations in two-syllable words:
Tone on First Syllable
High Low
High a! k¡p a! a~ k¡p a!

Tone on Second Syllable
| “expanse | “first”
of ocean”
Falling a! k¡p a$ n a~ k¡p O$

| “square woven | “rubber tree”
basket”
Low a! k u~ a~ k¡p a~
| “priest” | (small ant)
5. Yoruba
(from A. Simon (ed.) “Musik in Afrika”)
This gives some examples of imitation of tonal patterns by talking drums.
One contrastive example is given at the beginning:
1. ojo (“rain”)
2. ojo (Yoruba name)
Click here for the whole sequence: |

Tone Sandhi
Most tone languages have a number of rules that modify tones when spoken in a sequence, i.e when
spoken in normal phrases rather than in isolation.
One of the most well-known cases is in Mandarin Chinese: when two Tone-3 syllables occur in
sequence, the first one is changed to Tone 2.
Three examples are given. Each consists of 3 syllables. They are spoken first as isolated syllables
(without sandhi) and then as a phrase (with sandhi). The tone of the middle syllable changes in each
case from Tone 3 to Tone2 (indicated by “3>2"). Click on PinYin transliteration for sound; click on
English gloss for sonagram, pitch trace and sound.
mai hau chou chi shuei guo wo hen ho

3 3>2 3 1 3>2 3 3 3>2 3
buy good wine eat water fruit I very good

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TONE LANGUAGES

There are two main systems for transcribing tone.

This system is used in the Mandarin example below.

Note: Words are played automatically in the order below

1 high level 55 ‰ mþa | “mother”

2 high rising 35 Ÿ mþa | “hemp”

3 low falling rising 214 € mþa | “horse”

4 high falling 51 ‘ mþa | “scold”

Click here for examples of the tones spoken in short phrases

high, level sþi | “silk”

mid, level sþi | “to try”

low-mid, level sþi | “matter”

low-mid to low, falling sþi | “time”

low-mid to high, rising sþi | “history”

low-mid to mid, rising sþi | “city”

Example from IPA Illustrations Example from SoWL

high kîþa! | “to engage in trade” high rising 45 Ÿ nþaÉ | “aunt”

mid kîþa@ | “to get stuck” mid falling 32 nþaÉ | “field”

low kîþa~ | “galangal” low falling 21 š nþaÉ | (a nickname)

rising kîþa# | “leg” low falling rising 215 € nþaÉ | “thick”

falling kîþa$ | “I” high falling 51 ‘ nþaÉ | “face”

Tone on First Syllable

High a! k¡p a! a~ k¡p a!

Falling a! k¡p a$ n a~ k¡p O$

This gives some examples of imitation of tonal patterns by talking drums.

One contrastive example is given at the beginning:

Click here for the whole sequence: |

mai hau chou chi shuei guo wo hen ho

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