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Chichewa (a Bantu language of Central Africa, also known as Chewa, Nyanja, or Chinyanja) is the main language spoken in south and central Malawi, and to a lesser extent in Zambia, Mozambique and Zimbabwe. Like most other Bantu languages, it is tonal; that is to say, pitch patterns are an important part of the pronunciation of words. Thus, for example, the word ''nsómba'' ‘fish’ is pronounced with a pitch pattern High-Low, ''nyama'' ‘meat’ is pronounced with Low-Low, and ''madzí'' ‘water’ is Low-High. Unlike English, whose words can change their tones according to the context in which they are used,〔cf. Cruttenden (1986), p.12-13.〕 these tonal patterns are an inherent part of the word and remain more or less fixed in every context. As well as these lexical (word-based) tones, tones also play an important grammatical role in the Chichewa verb. Each tense of the verb, positive and negative, has its own tonal pattern, out of ten or more possible patterns, so it is possible for two tenses to be distinguished by tone alone: *''ndí-ma-thandíza'' ‘I usually help’ vs ''ndi-ma-thándiza'' ‘I was helping’ *''sí-ndí-pita'' ‘I don't go’ vs ''si-ndi-píta'' ‘I won't go’ A change of tones can also show whether a verb is being used in a dependent clause or a main clause: *''ndí-kana-píta'' ‘if I had gone’ vs ''ndi-kaná-pita'' ‘I would have gone’ *''á-kú-sáka'' ‘who are hunting’ vs ''a-ku-sáka'' ‘they are hunting’〔Mchombo (2004), p.17.〕 A third use of tones in Chewa is to show phrasing and sentence intonation. For example, immediately before a pause in the middle of a sentence the speaker's voice tends to rise up; this rise is referred to as a boundary tone. Other intonational tones are sometimes heard, for example to distinguish a question from a statement. ==Definitions== When a vowel has a high pitch compared with a vowel in the same position in a different word that might potentially be substituted for it, it is said to have a High tone; otherwise it is said to have a Low tone. For example, the word ''nsómba'' ‘fish’ can be heard to have a High tone in the following sentence since it contrasts in pitch with the Low-toned word ''nyama'' ‘meat’ which could be substituted for it: *''mu-ndi-pátsé nsómba'' ‘please give me some fish’ *''mu-ndi-pátsé nyama'' ‘please give me some meat’ These two pitch levels, High and Low, conventionally written H and L, are usually considered to be sufficient to describe the tones of Chichewa.〔Mchombo (2004), p.11.〕 From a theoretical point of view, however, it has been argued that Chichewa tones are best thought of not in terms of H and L, but in terms of H and Ø, that is to say, High-toned vs toneless syllables.〔Myers (1998).〕 The reason is that H tones are much more dynamic than L tones and play a large role in tonal phenomena, whereas L-toned syllables are relatively inert.〔Hyman (2000).〕 Some authors therefore, instead of referring to ‘High’ and ‘Low’ tones, prefer to write in terms of syllables which have a High tone (or simply a ‘tone’) vs those which are toneless.〔e.g. Kanerva (1990); cf. Mtenje (1976), pp.212f.〕 The terms tone and pitch are different. ‘Pitch’ is an absolute term (for example, the Middle C note on a piano always sounds at c.262 cycles per second), but ‘tone’ is relative: a man’s High tone will be lower than a woman’s, and a High tone near the end of a sentence is usually lower than one at the beginning. Tones are not marked in the standard orthography used in Chichewa books and newspapers, but linguists usually indicate a High tone by writing it with an acute accent, as in the first syllable of ''nsómba'', the Low tones generally being left unmarked. In most words other than compounds and verbs there is usually just one High tone or none; if there is one High tone, it is usually heard in one of the last three syllables of the word.〔Kanerva (1990), pp.12-14.〕 This relatively simple type of tonal system has sometimes been referred to in the past as a pitch-accent system;〔Clark (1988), pp.51ff.〕 but with increasing knowledge of the variety of the tonal systems of different languages, it has been argued that this term is an over-simplification and should be avoided.〔Hyman (2009).〕 Nowadays therefore languages of all types with tones are usually referred to as tonal languages. In Chichewa itself the High tone is called ''mngóli wókwéza'' (‘tone of raising’), and the Low tone ''mngóli wótsítsa'' (‘tone of lowering’).〔Mtanthauziramawu wa Chinyanja (c.2000), p.vi.〕 One author, Kulemeka, adds a third term, ''mngóli wápákáti'' ‘middle tone’ to describe the apparent mid-height tone heard on the second syllable of Remote Past tense verbs like ''anãfa'' (i.e. ''ánáafá'') ‘he died (temporarily)’.〔Kulemeka (2002), p.15.〕 But this idea has not been adopted by most other scholars, who treat this half-height tone as a surface realisation of the High tones before and after it. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Chichewa tones」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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