The Location of F0 Offset Targets for Taiwanese Long Tones

This paper presents the alignment of offset targets for five Taiwanese long tones, HH, LH, HL, ML, and MM, in different contexts. The location and value of offset target, in terms of f0 turning point, peak and valley, relative to the tonebearing syllable was studied. Corpus was sentences with five syllables. Tonal values of the second, third, and fourth syllables in these sentences were varied, while the tonal values of first and fifth (final) syllables were controlled. F0 data were extracted from 5%, 20%, 40%, 60%, 80% and 95% points into the duration of second, third and fourth syllables. Results showed that f0 turning points for HH and MM tones located before offset boundaries of the second and third syllables; f0 targets for LH, HL and ML tones at the second syllables located after the offset boundaries. The turning points for HH tone in the penultimate syllables occurred after the offset boundaries, while the turning points for MM tone occurred before the boundaries. At the penultimate and antepenultimate syllables, the location of offset targets of HL and ML tones depended on the following tonal onsets. When followed by M onset, the targets occurred after the offset boundary of the syllables; when followed by H onset, the tonal targets occurred before the boundaries. There is a systematic relationship between offset tonal target and offset boundary of tone-bearing syllable in Taiwanese.