Lexical and grammatical tone in Wiru (Southern Highlands Province, PNG)

Abstract

This paper presents the first description of the tonal system in Wiru, a Trans New Guinea language spoken in the Southern Highlands Province of Papua New Guinea. Wiru has a mixed prosodic system, with both word-initial stress as well as lexical and grammatical tone based off of two tonal primitives: H and L. Both tones are phonologically active, as evidenced by the presence of contour tones and the preservation of floating L tones in cases of H tone spread. The domain of the tone contrast is a left-aligned trochaic foot, which can be specified as /H/, /HL/, or /LH/. Grammatical tone is found at the phrase level, particularly within noun phrases. In particular, certain noun phrase modifiers, including demonstratives and relative clauses, trigger replacive grammatical tone melodies on the modified noun. Phonological processes affecting tone include dramatic phrase-final lowering as well as bidirectional H-tone spread.