შეტყობინებები: 40
ენა: English
sudanglo (მომხმარებლის პროფილი) 8 სექტემბერი, 2012 21:27:17
I can't recall in ordinary conversation in Esperanto ever being misunderstood or misunderstanding through the frazmelodio. But now I am floundering to think whether I would actually automatically stick in a ĉu in fluent speech.
Do you imagine HB that to turn a statement into a question there might be a frazmelodio common to most European languages. I suppose my informal conversations in Esperanto have all been with native speakers of European languages.
erinja (მომხმარებლის პროფილი) 8 სექტემბერი, 2012 21:43:33
I believe that Japanese and Korean also use a rising intonation to indicate questions, at least in the normative forms of those languages.
So it's not universal to all languages, but it's not limited to European languages either.
Esperanto speakers should use "ĉu" when it's called for but I think that if you want to add a rising tone to a statement of fact, many (most?) Esperanto speakers would understand it to mean a question whose answer is expected to be yes. (that is, the difference between "Are you coming?" and "You're coming?")
Hyperboreus (მომხმარებლის პროფილი) 8 სექტემბერი, 2012 21:48:38
Bruso (მომხმარებლის პროფილი) 8 სექტემბერი, 2012 23:40:39
erinja:I don't know about Korean, but a somewhat old Japanese grammar (the old EUP "Teach Yourself" book by Dunn and Yanada) says there is no rising intonation for the usual questions ending in "ka", which is the Japanese "ĉu".
I believe that Japanese and Korean also use a rising intonation to indicate questions, at least in the normative forms of those languages.
However, the word "ne" (a sort of catchall tag-question which can replace "ka" ) and ka-less questions, usually the sort of sentence fragments that would lack ĉu in Esperanto, do have the rising intonation.
Irish and Scottish Gaelic are not supposed to have rising intonation in questions, but of course there are more English-language learners than native speakers of those languages these days and the English habit tends to carry over. In Gaelic, the verb itself is conjugated to indicate a question, and begins the sentence, so it's quite clear immediately a question is meant.
Esperanto could clearly do without rising intonation for normal complete sentences - either a question-word or ĉu begins a question. The only reason to use it is that it's usual in most learners' first language.
creedelambard (მომხმარებლის პროფილი) 8 სექტემბერი, 2012 23:57:58
erinja:I don't speak Chinese so I may be wrong, but I believe that Chinese also employs a rising tone to indicate a question, in many instances at least. Chinese does have an equivalent of "ĉu", but there is also this intonation.I don't remember that to be the case from my college Mandarin course (which admittedly is some 40 years behind me). You're right that there's a version of "ĉu" - the particle "ma" at the end of the sentence. "Ni hau" = you are well. "Ni hau ma" - often shortened to "ni hau a" = "Are you well?" = "How are you?" Though it technically has a tone, my Mandarin teacher taught us to say it with a neutral tone. I'm certainly not an expert, but in a tonal language like Mandarin it seems like imposing a rising tone to denote a question would risk changing the word to a similar word with the rising (a/k/a second) tone.
There might be other dialects or versions of Chinese for which this is the case, but I don't think it is for Mandarin.
pdenisowski (მომხმარებლის პროფილი) 9 სექტემბერი, 2012 03:08:09
Bruso:You can definitely use intonation to differentiate between questions and statements in Japanese, although I would hesitate to describe it as a "rising" intonation. This also happens more often in plain (familiar) form than formal Japanese.erinja:I don't know about Korean, but a somewhat old Japanese grammar (the old EUP "Teach Yourself" book by Dunn and Yanada) says there is no rising intonation for the usual questions ending in "ka", which is the Japanese "ĉu".
I believe that Japanese and Korean also use a rising intonation to indicate questions, at least in the normative forms of those languages.
However, the word "ne" (a sort of catchall tag-question which can replace "ka" ) and ka-less questions, usually the sort of sentence fragments that would lack ĉu in Esperanto, do have the rising intonation.
Ne and ka aren't quite the same thing: ne is looking for or assuming agreement on the part of the listener (right?), whereas ka is simply a question marker. "So desu ka" and "So desu ne" have different meanings, regardless of intontation (and each can be intoned in various ways at that).
Amike,
Paul
pdenisowski (მომხმარებლის პროფილი) 9 სექტემბერი, 2012 03:20:36
erinja:I don't speak Chinese so I may be wrong, but I believe that Chinese also employs a rising tone to indicate a question, in many instances at least. Chinese does have an equivalent of "ĉu", but there is also this intonation.Chinese normally uses "ma" (吗) to indicate a question, although you can also use the ~ bù (不) ~ construction, e.g. hǎo bù hǎo - "good not good" meaning "is it good (or not?). You can't simply use a rising intonation (2nd tone) at the end since this would change ma into má (麻), a completely different word.
That said, there are pitch (not tone) patterns in Chinese that can indicate that a statement is a question, but these are much more complicated than just raising pitch at the end of a sentance.
Amike,
Paul
pdenisowski (მომხმარებლის პროფილი) 9 სექტემბერი, 2012 03:26:47
sudanglo:John seems to assert that native English speakers make a much greater use of intonation to convey meaning that is usual in other languagesI can think of several languages which (in my experience) make much more use of intonation to convey meaning than English does -- Japanese in particular. The use of intonation also varies widely by individual speakers - some are more monotone than others.
Rugxdoma (მომხმარებლის პროფილი) 9 სექტემბერი, 2012 09:08:58
Kiam svedoj de Finnlando kaj svedoj de Svedio renkontiĝas, iliaj demandaj frasoj estas ofte miskomprenataj, ĉar tio, kio estas normala demanda frazmelodio en unu grupo ne estas normala en la alia.
pdenisowski:That said, there are pitch (not tone) patterns in Chinese that can indicate that a statement is a question, but these are much more complicated than just raising pitch at the end of a sentance.Chinese patterns are complicated, but perhaps one could say that a rising tone appears frequently, because la particle ma (吗) at the end of the phrase often is pronounced with rising tone.
One can test the rising "ma" by using Google Translate like this: Write a question, translate it into Chinese, translate it back and listen. (Of course that is not the normal sentence intonation, but I feel it sounds fairly well.)
Ĉinaj skemoj estas komplikaj, sed eble povas diri, ke altigxanta tono aperas ofte, cxar la finfrasa vorteto "ma" (吗) ofte estas elparolata altigxante.
Oni povas testi kreskantan "ma" uzanta Google translate tiel: Skribu demandon, traduku gxin en la ĉinan, retraduku kaj auxskultu.
(Kompreneble tio ne estas la normala frazo melodio, sed ŝajnas al mi ke ĝi sonas sufiĉe bone.)
akbari (მომხმარებლის პროფილი) 9 სექტემბერი, 2012 11:21:36
Ŝomâ kelid e ma’râ bar dâŝtid. ( You took my key.) An statement sentence is always without intonation.
Âyâ ŝomâ kelid e ma’râ bar dâŝtid? (Did you take my key?) The intonation is always falling on the question particle.
Ŝomâ kelid e ma’râ bar dâŝtid? (Did you take my key?),
Ŝomâ kelid e ma’râ bar dâŝtid? Or, Kelid e ma’râ ŝomâ bar dâstid?* (Did you take my key?),
Ŝomâ kelid e ma’râ bar dâŝtid? Or, Kelid e ma’râ Ŝomâ bar dâŝtid? Or even, bar dâŝtid kelid e ma’râ Ŝomâ*?(Did you take my key?).
*in Persian, like Esperanto, the word order is flexible, but there is a preferential form.