Why Do So Many Asian Languages Have Tones?
Try Lingopie for FREE: https://learn.lingopie.com/julesy You might have heard that many Asian languages are tonal, but have you ever wondered WHY? Why are tonal languages clustered in Asia, and how did they develop tones in the first place? And why don't most European languages have tones? I break down all these questions -- and more -- in my first ever video on "tonogenesis" - how languages develop tones. [Timeline] [00:00] Introduction [03:44] Linguistics 101 [04:50] Tonogenesis of initial consonants [07:55] Tonogenesis of final consonants [09:17] Why languages develop tones [11:24] Why Asia has so many tonal languages [14:03] Why European languages aren't tonal [17:06] African tonal languages [References] Brunelle, M. (2005). Register and tone in Eastern Cham: Evidence from a word game. Mon-Khmer Studies. 35. 121-132. 10.15144/MKSJ-35.121. Dryer, M. S. & Haspelmath, M. (eds.) 2013. WALS Online (v2020.4) [Data set]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.13950591 (Available online at https://wals.info) Esther, C. (2017). The Tone Marking System of the Igbo Language: A Documentary Overview. Hyslop, G. (2022) Toward a typology of tonogenesis: Revising the model, Australian Journal of Linguistics, 42:3-4, 275-299, DOI: 10.1080/07268602.2022.2157675 Kingston, J. (2011). Tonogenesis. M. van Oostendorp, C. J. Ewen, E. Hume, and K. Rice (eds.) Blackwell Companion to Phonology, v. 4, (pp. 2304-2334). Oxford, UK: Blackwell Publishing. Thurgood, G. (2002). Vietnamese and tonogenesis: Revising the model and the analysis. Diachronica. 19. 333-363. 10.1075/dia.19.2.04thu. Wu, B., Zhang, H., and Zhang, M. 2023 Phylogenetic insight into the origin of tones. Proc. R. Soc. B 290: 20230606. https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2023.0606 SAY HI! Instagram: / julesytooshoes
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