Tongan ways of talking

Abstract

in which the three categories of words are re-distributed. Ways of talking are not just "lexical" but full expressive systems about conventionalised subject matters. They are linguistic resources to be selected for use depending on the speaker's purpose and the social context.

Phonetics of Tongan stress

“…Specifically, the measures that statistically correlate with stress could be used in studies investigating how speakers of Tongan use and perceive the ‘definitive accent’ (Anderson & Otsuka 2006). They could also serve as a tool in studies aimed at settling the ongoing dispute over the phonological structure of vowel–vowel sequences in Tongan (see Churchward 1953, Feldman 1978, Poser 1985, Schütz 2001, Taumoefolau 2002, Garellek & White 2010).…”

“…Stress may also be relevant for a controversial phonological process in Tongan called ‘syllable fusion’. It has been claimed that certain sequences of two vowels may be ‘fused’ into a single syllable (Churchward 1953, Feldman 1978, Poser 1985, Schütz 2001), but there is disagreement as to which sequences of vowels may undergo the process (and under which conditions), with some claiming that the process never occurs at all (Taumoefolau 2002). Measuring stress correlates could offer insights on the syllabic structure of these vowel sequences.…”

“… 1 Long vowels have often been analyzed as sequences of two short vowels in separate syllables (Taumoefolau 2002, Anderson & Otsuka 2006). This distinction will not be crucial in this paper. …”

Corrigendum: Online photovoice to engage indigenous Cook Islands youth in the exploration of social and ecological wellbeing amidst a global disruption

“…The corrected sentence appears below: "In addition to the socio-economic and environmental impacts of colonial interventions and the promulgation of neoliberal development policies, studies demonstrate how colonization and Christianisation negatively impacted the traditional ways of learning and education systems of Pacific Islands people (Taufe'ulungaki, 2004;Thaman, 2008;Johansson-Fua, 2016;Taumoefolau, 2019). "…”

Phonological encoding in Tongan: An experimental investigation

“…A phrase such as "mālō e lelei" (meaning "hello" in Tongan) is transcribed as /ma/+/a/+/lo/+/o/+/e/+/le/+/le/+/i/ and has eight moras (note: the macronin mā and lō indicates a long vowel, and has a duration of two moras). According to Taumoefolau (2002) and Anderson and Otsuka (2006), it is also possible to determine the number of syllables by simply counting the vowels, therefore the number of moras and syllables are suggested to be coextensive in Tongan (Anderson & Otsuka, 2006, p. 41). Tongan is a stress language and the primary stress almost always falls on the penultimate mora of a word (Garellek & Tabain, 2020).…”