How Many Tonal Contrasts in Ikema Ryukyuan?
نویسندگان
چکیده
In this paper we will show that Ikema, a dialect of Miyako Ryukyuan, has a three-tone system, where three tonal classes, Types A, B, and C, are lexically distinguished, contra the previous studies which have claimed that it has a two-tone system. The results of our quantitative analysis of production data also revealed that Type A words are remarkably small in number, indicating that Type A words are in the process of merging into Type B, as a result of ongoing linguistic change.
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