Re: [tied] Re: Stød and rising tone

--- In cybalist@... s.com, "aquila_grande" <aquila_grande@ ...>
wrote:
>
> In scandinavian monosyllabic words tend to be avoided. The most
> standard word structure is disyllabic consisting of a root plus an
> ending. In a text, you will find many monosyllabic words, but in
> dayly speach these are often transformed into disyllabic units in
> several ways. Maybe the stød began as a means of making
> monocyllabic roots disyllabic by making the root wovel disyllabic.
>
> In Norwegian, transforming monysyllabic units into disyllabic
words
> often results in a structure with tune 2 (falling-raising over two
> syllables)
>
> An example:
>
> Ja -yes, very often pronounced jaa (falling-rising over two
> syllables)
>
> Another example.
>
> Standard: Gå ut (Go out) (1. word: Low stress high or high stress
> rising - 2. word: high stress rising)
>
> In dayly speach Gåut (high stress falling - low stress raising
over
> 2 syllables) This is a stress and tune pattern of a disyllabic
word.

The last one sometimes sounds to me like: low tone with high "grace
note" - high tone.

Those monosyllabics were disyllabic in Runic. Since then final
vowels were lost except /a/ which was kept in Swedish, became schwa,
written [e] in Danish, and was lost in Jysk.
Disyllabics are pronounced with high note - low note in Jysk, low
note - high note in Standard Danish.
In continuous speech, Standard Danish drops final schwa too, with
compensatory lengthening of the vowel in the preceding syllable.
Eg. 'Du skal vent´ her' (usually so written) "you must wait here",
pronounced /du ska ven:t heO?/. Cf imperative 'vent!' /ven?t/.
The way I pronounce that infinitive is with a rising note (but
/ven?t/ with a level note), which is perhaps from underlying
/ve[low]n.[high] t/ <- /ven[low]t&[ high]/.
In other words the tone pattern is kept unchanged, while the
phonetic sequence is "stretched" and has its tail chopped off.
With my limited intuition of Jysk, the infinitive /ven?t/ (vs.
imperative /vent/) could be /ve[high]?n. [low]t/, with a similar
pattern, but with a glottal stop inserted to keep the tones of
the two morae from merging. In that case, Kortlandt can't use
Vestjysk stød to prove anything about alleged presence of
glottalics in PIE.

BTW for those English-speakers who think this looks unreal:
There is a similar tone pattern in my favorite Country artist
Buck Owens' songs, to the degree that the tones of his dialect
define the tones of the songs.
Also: I noted that Goofy, of the early Disney cartoons has a
similar tone pattern (Gosh!). Here's why: Buck Owens belongs
to the Bakersfield (California) school of Country, and Goofy
was most likely intended to be a caricature of a Bakersfield
Okie (from Oklahoma), of 'Grapes of Wrath' fame. So that
particular dialect is most likely Oklahoman (before that
Appalachian? ). Further back than that I can't trace it.
But I still think it's odd no one seems to be interested
in tones in West Germanic dialects.

Torsten
_____________________

Aren't tones in West Germanic dialects mostly related to semantics and syntax (and emotional expression) rather than being peculiarities of individual words?  Besides, the tones of the North Germanic dialects are much more pleasing to the ear, in my opinion.

Andrew