Typological and Language Specific Features in Intonation Questions of Armenian and English

Abstract

Melodic patterns of so-called 'intonation questions' (IQ) reveal certain similarities in a number of languages: a rise in pitch on the tonic syllable or a high tone level of the whole utterance. Absence of lexical or syntactic markers of interrogativity is compensated by the intonation (Peskovskij 1930). In this study pitch patterns of the IQs in Armenian will be investigated. The research includes listening experiments in which the effect of Armenian intonation question patterns on native English speakers was studied.