The realization of unaccentedness in Korean and Japanese pitch accent systems

Abstract

In this paper, I discuss how unaccented words are realized in lexical pitch accent varieties of Korean and Japanese, focusing on Daegu/North Gyeongsang Korean. Previous studies such as Kenstowicz & Sohn (1997) and Jun et al. (2006) claim that Daegu Korean lacks an unaccented class. I show that the final-accented class in Daegu Korean proposed by Kenstowicz & Sohn (1997) and Jun et al. (2006) is in fact unaccented, comparing final-accented words in Daegu Korean with unaccented words in Tokyo Japanese in phrasal contexts. Most previous studies examined only the tone interaction between words and clitics to determine the accentedness or unaccentedness of the words, but this study demonstrates that phrasal prosody should also be considered to help identify the accentedness or unaccentedness of words.