This paper explores the role of cross-linguistic influence and task type in the realization of pitch accents and nuclear contours across English sentence types (statements, absolute questions and declarative questions) by sequential Inuktitut-English bilinguals. In Inuktitut, intonation is mainly a cue for phrasing; i.e., boundary tones are mapped to finality vs. continuity in turn-taking [1,2]. Questions are morphologically marked [3], and while a rising intonation may also be used, it is not always present. In contrast, English absolute questions are syntactically marked, whereas the difference between statements and declarative questions is purely prosodic. Participants performed two tasks: a delayed imitation task, and a contextualized production task. Results revealed that bilinguals differed from controls in the type and phonetic realization of the first pitch accent (but not the nuclear contour), displaying a reduced use of pitch. In the semispontaneous task, bilinguals differed from controls in the number of non-target-like realizations, particularly in contexts that prompted declarative questions. We argue that these findings demonstrate clear patterns of prosodic and morphosyntactic cross-linguistic influence, as well as the importance of incorporating contextual information as a variable [4].
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