Clause chaining and the utterance phrase: Syntax–prosody mapping in Matukar Panau

3.1 Clause sequence prosody

Non-chaining languages often use sequences of independent or coordinated clauses to encode connected events. Typically each clause prosodifies as an intonational phrase, marked by some kind of right-boundary tone, and these intonational phrases are grouped into larger sets by tone scaling. The domain in which such scaling occurs has been labelled a “paratone” (Fox 1973; Brown et al. 1980; Wennerstrom 2001 inter alia). Paratone phenomena have been most extensively studied in English, but have also been demonstrated in other Indo-European languages (see Zellers 2011: 67 for references), and in Native American languages (see Beck and Bennett 2007: 13 for references). A particularly clear example is a British English radio news report, in which each distinct news item is prosodified as a paratone (Wichmann 2000: 25ff). Each news item consists of multiple clauses, with pitch accents and boundary tones. The beginning of a news item is marked by a substantially elevated H* accent, a “pitch reset” to the top of the speaker’s register, while all subsequent accents within the same item are downstepped in line with register declination. The final boundary of a paratone involves a lower pitch than preceding intonation-phrase boundaries within the paratone (Brown et al. 1980: 30; Wichmann 1993; Wichmann 2000: 58). Prosody thus plays an important role in how speakers communicate discourse structure to their listeners (Wennerstrom 2001).^[1]

Some versions of prosodic hierarchy theory propose an “utterance phrase” as the highest prosodic domain, and this is essentially an alternative name for the paratone domain described above. “Prosodic sentence” is another alternative label used for what appear to be the same type of phenomena (Chafe 1994; Palakurthy 2019; Genetti and Slater 2004; see discussion below). Final lowering indicates an utterance phrase that may encompass several clauses in Dutch (Gussenhoven 2005), Bininj Gun-wok (Fletcher and Evans 2002; Bishop and Fletcher 2005), Lushootseed (Beck and Bennett 2007: 11), and arguably in West Greenlandic (Arnhold 2014: 239). Nespor and Vogel (2012 [1986]) propose an utterance phrase in English, though rather than tone scaling, they focus on segmental effects. While phonological and intonational phrases are mapped from syntactic constituents, Nespor and Vogel’s utterance phrase is instead mapped from groups of clauses among which causal or logical relations are pragmatically inferred. For example in (3, 4), pairs of clauses are prosodically integrated due to implicit causal connections, and the grouping is also reflected in anaphora or ellipsis in the second clause of each pair (Nespor and Vogel 2012: 242–3). Where the second clause is logically compatible with the first, and the appropriate coordinator would be and, clauses are more likely to be prosodically integrated (5). But where the second clause has some implicit contradiction to the first, the more appropriate coordinator would be but, and the clauses form separate υ constituents (6).^[2]

While the utterance phrase may be proposed as a single prosodic domain above the intonational phrase, recursive nesting is often proposed for higher prosodic domains (e.g. Brown et al. 1980: 71; Wichmann 2000: 28; Cho 2016). One source of evidence for recursive constituents is found in multi-level scaling of pitch accents, for example in English (Ladd 1988) and German (Truckenbrodt and Féry 2015). Ladd constructed an experiment using the clause conjunctions and and but, where the former indicates a closer pragmatic connection than the latter. Triple-clause sequences with the structure [[A and B] but C] were contrasted with those of the structure [A but [B and C]] (7, 8), showing that there is downstepping of H* accents across all clauses, but with a greater reset at the higher discourse boundary, i.e. the but connector. This is interpreted as reflecting one prosodic domain encompassing the and coordination, and another higher prosodic domain encompassing the but coordination. Figure 1 illustrates these prosodic mappings, with horizontal lines representing pitch registers, and circles representing pitch accents.

Figure 1

Pitch scaling and reset (drawn after Truckenbrodt and Féry 2015: 22).

While Ladd (1988) and Truckenbrodt and Féry (2015) interpret this pitch scaling as a hierarchy of recursive intonational phrases, in this study we propose a different approach. In our analysis, if a tone T is the realisation of a prosodic constituent, then scaling of a group of T tones should be interpreted as the realisation of a distinct, higher constituent. For example, if a phonological phrase is the domain of an H* accent, then the scaling of a group of H* accents is the realisation of a higher, intonational phrase. Similarly, if L% boundary tones mark intonational phrases, then the scaling of a group of L% tones is the realisation of a higher, utterance phrase, rather than a recursive intonational phrase. The current study is focused on the application of this approach to Matukar Panau clause chains, but in the discussion below (Section 7.1) we further reflect on the implications for prosodic hierarchy theory more generally.

3.2 Clause subordination prosody

Clause subordination structures are somewhat like clause chains, in that they combine an independent clause with one or more clauses marked as dependent. A subordinate clause and its matrix may either be prosodified as two intonational phrases, or integrated into a single intonational phrase, depending on the language, the particular subordination structure, and speaker variation. For example, English complement clauses are integrated into the same intonational phrase as their matrix (9a), while adverbial clauses may be integrated when they follow their matrix clause (9b), but are usually prosodically separate when they precede the matrix (9c) (Chafe 1984; Chafe 1988). Tonal scaling of the sister intonational phrases in (9c) (cf. Cho 2016: 121) shows that these are encompassed by a higher prosodic domain.

Illocutionary force has been shown to be an important factor in clause prosody: clauses which carry their own illocutionary force, i.e. “speech acts,” are more likely to produce intonational phrases (Downing 1970; Selkirk 2005; Truckenbrodt 2015 inter alia). Thus, a clause complementation structure, such as (9a) above, does not assert that Jim is in fact the Lizard King, but only that he claims to be so. Only the matrix clause has illocutionary force (as a declarative), while the complement clause has no force, and thus does not produce its own intonational phrase.^[3]

In Matukar Panau and other clause-chaining languages (e.g. Korafe: Farr 1999), illocutionary force scopes over the clause chain, which we will argue forms a single prosodic domain. Alongside illocutionary force the related dimension of information structure (e.g. topics, new vs given information) is also known to play a major role in prosodic organisation (Féry and Ishihara 2010; Büring 2016). Below we will illustrate some uses of prosody in Matukar Panau topic-comment structures, though a comprehensive treatment of information structure is beyond the scope of this study.^[4]

3.3 Prosody of clause chains in Dolakhā Newar

Grammatical descriptions of clause chaining often observe that clause chains form an intonational unit, without analysing how this might reflect a hierarchy of prosodic constituents. Observations of pitch movement sometimes attest level or rising tone in medial clauses and falling tone in final clauses (e.g. Manam: Lichtenberk 1983: 103; Nungon: Sarvasy 2015). A more detailed account of clause-chain prosody is for the Tibeto-Burman language Dolakhā Newar (Genetti and Slater 2004; Genetti 2007a), with similar findings also reported for Kabardian (Applebaum 2013: 204). Newar has clause chains in which medial clauses have non-finite verbs, and only the final clause has a finite verb. While the notion of the “paragraph” is evoked in both the paratone literature and in some studies of clause chaining (e.g. Longacre 1985), Genetti instead evokes the notion of the “sentence,” defining the Newar “syntactic sentence” as either a simple independent clause or a clause chain (Genetti 2007b: 485). Syntactic sentences usually prosodify as “prosodic sentences,” marked by distinctive final boundary tones that appear at the end of syntactic sentences but not medial clauses.

Genetti and Slater (2004) annotated 243 clauses from a monologic narration of the Mahābhārata as having either “final” or “continuing” boundary tones. The most common final boundary tone is low, while continuing tones are high, though more nuanced final and continuing tone types are also discussed (Genetti and Slater 2004: 6–13). Finite clauses most frequently prosodify using a final boundary tone (n = 116), though some do prosodify with continuing tones (n = 28). Non-finite clauses have a more tightly constrained mapping, with almost all instances exhibiting continuing tones (n = 98), and just a single example found where a non-finite clause exhibits a final boundary tone. Thus, a complete syntactic sentence is predictably required to form a prosodic sentence. On the other hand, there is some flexibility in the possibility of integrating multiple syntactic sentences into a single prosodic sentence, perhaps reflecting the same type of pragmatically driven multiclausal groupings as are found in non-chaining languages.

Genetti (2007a) thus argues that the Dolakhā Newar syntactic sentence maps to a higher prosodic constituent above the intonational phrase. This implies an extension to prosodic hierarchy theory, which we further articulate in this study.^[5] As we will see below, Matukar Panau clause-chain prosody is quite similar to Newar clause-chain prosody. We will argue that both datasets motivate an extension of prosodic hierarchy theory above the clause level.

4.1 Conditional sentences

Matukar Panau has two flavours of conditional subordinate adverbial clauses, a when-conditional and an if-conditional.^[6] When-conditionals are marked with -dope on the protasis clause verb, and a final or medial verb in the apodosis clause. These are used primarily when an event is expected to occur, but it is not happening in the moment, or for outcomes that necessarily follow a condition. The final clause is normally inflected with a realis imperfective suffix (-go or -gokai). In example (10), every time the speaker has her period (Conditional), she goes down to the beach (Final). The vast majority of conditional sentences consist of one subordinate adverbial clause before the final clause, but multiple adverbial clauses are possible (11). An example of an adverbial clause followed by a medial clause can be seen in Section 6.2.

If-conditionals are used in hypothetical situations, where it is not presumed that the event in the protasis will occur. Should it occur, however, the consequence will be the event expressed in the apodosis. The verb in the protasis clause is marked with the conditional suffix -tape and the verb in the apodosis clause has a final or medial TAM suffix. In (12, bold text), the speaker quotes herself explaining to Francis that if he doesn’t talk to Josef, then Josef will be confused. She is trying to prevent the event in the protasis from happening. She then goes on to explain how Francis should tell Josef how to harvest the yams. Because of the hypothetical nature of the protasis, the apodosis is normally inflected with an irrealis suffix (Ø, -ba or -bawai).

4.2 Clause chains

In Matukar Panau clause chains, the verbal suffixes in medial clauses encode temporal and causal relations between the event in one clause and its following clause. Medials (m) agree with the final clause (f) for realis or irrealis mood, and in some cases for aspect. While some other chaining languages allow for dependent clauses to occasionally form complete utterances (e.g. Nungon, see Sarvasy 2015), we have not observed any clear instances of this in Matukar Panau.

The irrealis medial suffix -dop ∼ -p d:irr co-occurs with final verbs inflected with either the general irrealis independent suffix (13), the desiderative irrealis independent suffix (14), or verbs in the imperative mood.^[7] Example (13) shows an overlapping relationship between clauses. Examples (14, 15) show events that are sequential and pragmatically purposive.

In the realis mood, there are three different medial suffixes, distinguished by aspect and the semantic connections between events. The medial -do d:r is primarily used for simultaneous or overlapping events (16), the medial -e is used for sequential events (17), and -ma d:hab is used in habitual aspect (cf. Figure 4 in Section 6.2). All of these medial types co-occur with a final clause with realis mood marking. Note that the sequential realis medial -e d:seq is homophonous with -e i:r:pfv, the realis perfective suffix used in final clauses. This suffix therefore does not disambiguate medial/final clauses when looking at transcribed clauses in isolation. Contextual and pragmatic interpretation play a role in identifying the boundaries of some syntactic sentences, and as we will see below (Section 6.2), utterance-phrase prosody provides an important cue to this interpretation.

We have seen above that aspect and mood specification from the final clause has scope over medial clauses. Illocutionary force also has scope over the entire clause linkage (18), as has been reported for some other chaining languages (e.g. Korafe: Farr 1999).

Negative scope is local, with negation in final clauses only having scope for that particular clause (19). In this example, events in the medial clauses transpire and only the event in the final clause does not. This example shows a kind of event relation that is encoded with a complement clause in English, while in Matukar Panau there is no formal basis for distinguishing clause complementation from medial/final structures.

4.3 Verbless copula clauses (nominal predication)

Matukar also has verbless copula clauses (cp), where predication is expressed by juxtaposition of two nominal expressions. Because TAM is marked on verbs, verbless clauses are unspecified for TAM. In example (20), the past stative meaning is inferred from context, while in (21) present tense is inferred. We extend our notion of syntactic sentence to include verbless copula clauses, since they are not dependent on a subsequent clause for TAM agreement. Thus, the Matukar syntactic sentence, defined as a TAM phrase, may consist of one or more finite clauses in which the non-final clauses agree with the final clause for TAM; or it may consist of a single verbless clause where TAM is contextually interpreted.

As we will see below (Section 6.4), sequences of multiple copula clauses may be pragmatically integrated into a sentence, where the contextually interpreted TAM is shared across the sequence and the whole prosodifies as an utterance phrase.

5.1 Data and method

The prosodic analysis of Matukar Panau requires more intensive annotation than the grammatical description, and is therefore based on a smaller dataset. We use three of the corpus texts, each of which is accessible with audio and prosodic annotations via the PARADISEC archive.^[8] The three texts are spoken by different speakers (two women, one man). Two texts are monologic narratives. In “Sik Mun,”^[9] the Tok Pisin for a women’s time of menstruation, Clara Kusos Darr recounts how women dealt with their periods in her mother’s time, in her own time, and now in her daughter’s time. Tomas Taleo Kreno, a clan leader, recounts his life story in second text.^[10] The third text, from a picture elicitation task (San Roque et al. 2012), has Kadagoi Rawad Forepiso asking her sister Sel Pain Wadom questions about several picture task cards.^[11] In this third text, we annotate solely the declarative answers given by Sel Pain, as question prosody is outside the scope of this study. We selected this third text to include data representing a different speech genre, though we did not find any major difference between this dialogic speech and the monological narratives, suggesting that the utterance phrase is a general phenomenon, not specific to monologues. Table 2 lists the three texts used for prosodic analysis and gives the number of intonational phrases annotated. Prosodic annotation was done by Mansfield, based on listening and inspection of pitch traces in Praat (Boersma and Weenink 2021).

5.2 The prosodic constituents

Our main focus in this study is on higher prosodic constituents, but we begin by providing a preliminary analysis of lower prosodic domains.

Matukar Panau appears to have word stress, falling on the stem-final syllable of content words. Thus, for simple words we hear word-final stress, e.g. kalám “moon,” while for suffixed verbs we hear a word-internal stress, e.g. di-nagé-nggo “3p.S-put-i:r:ipfv.” While phonetic analysis of word stress is outside the scope of this study, its identification is facilitated by H* pitch accents that are anchored to these syllables, usually one per phonological phrase (see below). We tentatively analyse the stress domain, encompassing prefix and stem, as a “prosodic word” (ω). As is common for prosodic words (McCarthy and Prince 1993), this domain requires bimoraic minimal weight, evidenced by phonetic vowel lengthening in prosodic words that consist of a single open syllable. This can be observed both in simple words such as tiː “not,” and in verbs where the stem and prefix together consist of a single open syllable, e.g. ng-aː-gokai “1s.S-go- i:r:ipfv:hab.”

One or more prosodic words are encompassed by a “phonological phrase” (φ), in which one main content word has an H* pitch accent aligned to its stressed syllable. Phonological phrases may be followed by pauses.^[12] The Matukar Panau phonological phrase prosodifies syntactic phrases such as NPs, AdvPs, PPs, and verbs. However, we also find sequences of two or three such syntactic phrases prosodifying with a single pitch accent; this could be interpreted either as prosodic integration into a single φ constituent or as de-accentuation in some φ constituents (Cruttenden 2006). Example (22) shows a sentence annotated for ω and φ prosody (subsequent examples will instead be annotated for intonational and utterance phrases).

The intonational phrase (ι) is marked by a right boundary tone: L%, H%, or HL%. It is also sometimes referenced for the scaling of H* accents. These show a general pattern of declination over the utterance phrase, but in some examples there are minor resets at ι boundaries, while in others there appear to be distinct accentual registers in different ι constituents. We annotate H* declination as [H* ↓H* …], but also note some instances of accentual upstep (e.g. in topic-comment structures) as [H* ↑H* ↓H* …].

The utterance phrase (υ) does not produce tones as such, but rather involves scaling of tones in daughter ι constituents. This is clearest for low right-boundary tones, which are “semi-low” on all non-final ι daughters (annotated ↑L%, though we discuss alternative analyses below), while only the final ι daughter drops to the bottom of the register and is “fully low” (annotated L%). There is not necessarily a consecutive scaling of ↑L% tones within the υ constituent: often multiple ↑L% tones are of a similar pitch, while the L% tone is markedly lower. When the speaker is already in the lower part of their register, the ↑L% tone may be produced as a lengthened ending without clear pitch lowering. This results in some phrases where the presence of a ↑L% tone is not altogether clear-cut (see examples below), though in most cases its presence is fairly obvious.^[13] H* pitch accents usually show declination across the υ domain, with a major pitch reset at the beginning of a new υ, but we also sometimes observe partial H* resets at ι boundaries. Substantial pauses occur reliably between υ constituents in our data, whereas ι constituents may be either followed by a pause or run on immediately to the next ι constituent.

The following section will illustrate several examples of higher-level prosody, analysed in terms of prosodic mapping from clauses and sentences.

6.1 Conditional sentences

In conditional sentences, the conditional (subordinate) protasis clause usually prosodifies as an ι constituent with an H% or HL% boundary tone. The (final) apodosis clause prosodifies as a second ι constituent, this time with an L% boundary, as illustrated in Figure 3. This prosodic pattern is exhibited for 13/15 adverbial clauses in our data. The remaining two instances involve prosodic integration, where the adverbial clause is prosodically integrated into the same ι as the apodosis (Figure 8).

Figure 3

Adverbial clause with H* protasis.

6.2 Clause chains

Medial clauses in our data either form non-final ι constituents or are prosodically integrated into the following clause’s ι constituent. Only a final clause can be the final ι constituent in the υ domain. The primary evidence for this is relative pitch of L% boundaries. Chains may also contain conditional adverbial clauses, with H% or HL% boundaries as mentioned above.

Figure 4 shows an υ embracing two copula clauses (cp), five medial clauses (m), and a final clause (f). Each of the first two copula clauses prosodifies as an ι constituent with a ↑L% boundary (for more on copulas see Section 6.4). The medial clauses are all either prosodically integrated or have ↑L% boundaries. Only the final clause has L% indicating the end of the υ constituent. For this male speaker, the L% tone is around 90 Hz and ↑L% tones are 130 Hz or above. This example also suggests distinct tonal registers for ι constituents: the first ι is at a lower level around 130–150 Hz; the second has an ↑H* upstep to 200 Hz but returns to 150 Hz at its ↑L% boundary; the third ι moves up to a higher register around 190 Hz; and the remaining ι constituents occupy successively lower registers, accompanied by successively lower ↑L% boundaries. Other patterns of register shift and associated relative ↑L% levels are found in other examples (compare Figure 7).

Figure 4

Clause chain with medial ↑L% tones and final L% tone.

There are potential alternative analyses of ↑L%. On the one hand, the failure to descend to the bottom of the register could be analysed as a targetless boundary, “%” (Gordon 2005: 316; Gussenhoven 2005: 125). However, we prefer the ↑L% analysis to this, since in those instances where the preceding pitch level is fairly high, as in the second intonational phrase of Figure 5, there does appear to be a “targeted” downward pitch movement to ↑L%. Another alternative analysis is that these are downstepped ↓H% boundaries (Arvaniti and Baltazini 2005), which might be seen as parsimonious given our analysis of downstepped ↓H* accents. However, the disadvantage of this analysis would be that it conflates different types of pitch movements: our ↓H* accents often involve upwards movement, albeit to a lower level than the preceding accent (as in the fourth intonational phrase of Figure 4). But the ↑L% boundary involves either downwards movement, or level tone where the register is already fairly low, but never movement towards a high target.

Figure 5

Clause chain with HL% on the first medial clause.

Figure 5 illustrates the prosody for a habitual aspect clause chain. Again the chain prosodifies as a υ constituent, but here the first medial clause has an HL% boundary tone. Medial clauses with H% or HL% tones are less common (11 instances) compared to medial clauses with ↑L% tones (23 instances). While our current data are insufficient to conclusively interpret this tonal variation, it is notable that the HL% medial clause in this instance forms a tail-head linkage with the final clause of the preceding chain. This example also shows H* declination across the whole υ constituent, without any H* resets at the ι boundaries (see also Figure 11).

Figure 6 illustrates a sequence where three clauses have the -e suffix that is potentially ambiguous between two interpretations: medial realis sequential and final realis perfective. The interpretation of these as medial unspecified clauses is suggested by the imperfective marking on the final clause in the sequence, together with pragmatics and prosody. The three -e d:seq clauses all have ↑L% tones, indicating that they form a sentence with the final -go i:r:pfv clause. The sentence status of this example thus involves the interaction of syntax, pragmatics, and prosody. This υ constituent is produced with several pauses, and ι constituents prosodify not just for clauses but also lower phrases such as the locative NP malal main=te. The example also shows a minor reset between the second and third ι constituents (perhaps indicating a partial restart of the sentence). There is a larger accentual upstep in the penultimate clause, which may be due to the role of high pitch in topic-comment structures (see also Figure 9). The previous clause has introduced “the moon looked at her” as new information, and the upstepped clause repeats this as the first part of a topic-comment sequence: “when it was the time the moon looked at her/she had her time (had her period).” For this female speaker, the L% tone is around 130 Hz, while ↑L% tones are around 200 Hz (see also Figure 5), and when she is already in that pitch range the ↑L% tone may be realised as a level, long final syllable.

Figure 6

Clause chain with medial ↑L% tones and final L% tone.

Figure 7 illustrates prosodic integration of the first two medial clauses into the ι of the following conditional adverbial clause, which has the typical H% boundary. The next medial clause, ngasa ngapidama ab=ate, is an example of somewhat ambiguous prosody. It is followed by a pause, but it does not exhibit either the ∼200 Hz pitch or lengthening characteristic of a ↑L% tone, and we therefore annotate it as toneless, i.e. prosodically integrated. On the other hand, two NPs denoting beneficiaries in the final clause have gently descending, lengthened final syllables which we do annotate as ↑L% tones.

Figure 7

Clause chain with medials lacking boundary tones.

Figure 8 illustrates a seven-clause chain with more extensive prosodic integration. Four clauses in the middle of the sentence (two adverbial and two medial) are integrated into a single long ι constituent, which also has few distinguishable H* accents. The last medial clause, diyama, is prosodically integrated with the final clause.

Figure 8

Clause chain both medial and adverbial integration.

6.3 Final clauses that are prosodically non-final

There is also prosodic integration of final (i.e. independent) clauses, which are sometimes non-final within υ. Note that the opposite situation, i.e. a medial clause being final within υ, never occurs in our data. Figure 9 illustrates a υ constituent where the first clause is syntactically independent (ending in the verb di-tor-ago 3pl-walk-i:r:ipfv), but prosodically integrates with the following ι constituent, as indicated by a ↑L% boundary (which here is essentially level with the preceding unaccented syllables). In this instance, the relationship between the first clause and those that follow is not of the temporally sequential type that would induce syntactic chaining. However, the first statement (“children with their own thoughts”) has an implied causal relationship with the second statement (“they don’t do it right”). The grouping of clauses is also reinforced by pronominal anaphora. This shows that connected events are not always syntactically chained in Matukar Panau, but may nonetheless be prosodically integrated as a υ constituent. The υ constituent is the default prosody for a syntactic sentence, but may also prosodify pragmatically grouped sentences, as in non-chaining languages.

Figure 9

Final clause that is not prosodically final.

Figure 9 also illustrates two instances of a topicalisation structure in which main-angan top-new marks a topic upon which the speaker is about to comment (see also Figure 3). Each topicalised phrase in this example prosodifies as an ι constituent with an H% boundary, though the rise is somewhat suppressed in the first instance. The association of H% boundaries with topics is also reflected in adverbial clauses, which usually have H% or HL% boundaries, and often function to present a topic upon which the apodosis provides a comment. The use of H boundaries for topicalisation has also been reported for Austronesian languages of Indonesia and East Timor (Himmelmann 2018).

Figure 10 illustrates another example of final clauses with non-final prosody. In this instance, three clauses form a list, each using the verb pan “give” with an independent TAM suffix. The first two independent clauses are part of a larger rhetorical structure, i.e. a pragmatic sentence, and integration into a single υ group provides a prosodic cue for this. The final clause of this example contains three nominalised clauses, which could be regarded as another type of clause subordination. These three form a kind of list and prosodify as non-final ι constituents with ↑L% boundaries. However, nominalised clauses do not always prosodify as ι constituents (e.g. ilo girek uyan in the first line of this example), and we suspect that the insertion of ι boundaries here may be due to the list structure. This example also illustrates partial H* reset at ι boundaries, in particular between the second and third, and fourth and fifth, ι constituents.

Figure 10

Final clause that is not prosodically final.

6.4 Copula clause sequence

Most of the copula clauses in our data prosodify as an ι forming its own υ group, which is consistent with our proposal that copula clauses are syntactic sentences. However, pragmatically grouped copula clauses, with a shared TAM interpretation, may be prosodically integrated into a υ group. Figure 11 illustrates the prosody of the three copula clauses integrated into a single υ constituent, as evidenced by the ↑L% and L% boundaries. The three clauses share TAM interpretation and form a rhetorical unit using word repetition to develop a single idea of belonging.

Figure 11

Three verbless clauses prosodically integrated into an utterance phrase.

7.1 Utterance phrase or recursive intonational phrases?

In other work, H* scaling has been used to argue for recursive embedding of phonological phrases (Itô and Mester 2012) or intonational phrases (Ladd 1988; Truckenbrodt and Féry 2015), rather than a distinctly labelled prosodic constituent. Therefore, we may consider recursive intonational phrases as an alternative interpretation of the Matukar Panau data. However, there are a number of reasons to prefer the analysis with a distinct υ constituent determining pitch scaling among groups of ι constituents.

Ladd (1988) focuses on H* pitch accent scaling. Since intonational phrases have internal downstep of pitch accents, and the multi-clause group shows a higher level of nested accentual downstep, the higher level may be regarded as a parent intonational phrase encompassing daughter intonational phrases. However, this does not take into account the downstep among L% boundary tones, which has also been observed in English multi-clause sequences (Brown et al. 1980: 30; Wichmann 2000: 58). Boundary tones show that the higher constituent has a type of scaling not found in intonational phrases. On our interpretation, intonational phrases are marked by the presence of boundary tones, while the utterance phrase is marked by the scaling of boundary tones, and sometimes additional scaling of pitch accents.

Some analyses propose minimal and maximal sub-types of a recursive constitiuent, e.g. φ_min vs φ_max (Selkirk 2011; Itô and Mester 2012; Elfner 2015). But while this may be motivated where the same syntactic phrase type is recursively nested, in Matukar Panau the clause and the clause chain are clearly different constituents. Indeed, the lack of any clear syntactic constituent above the clause in non-chaining languages has arguably been one reason not to include a higher prosodic constituent in some versions of prosodic hierarchy theory. But in a theory that encompasses the clause-chain as a syntactic constituent, present in some languages but not others, there is a stronger motivation to posit a distinct prosodic constituent above the clause level.

We propose that in general, where there is a prosodic constituent that bears tonal marking, and multiple instances of the constituent are gathered into a scaling group, the scaling group should be treated as a distinct constituent unless the lower and higher domains can be shown to be equivalent, syntactically, and/or phonologically (cf. Bickel et al. 2009: 51). This approach still allows for prosodic recursion where it is well-motivated, but overall may result in a larger number of distinct prosodic levels than have been proposed in some recursion analyses.^[15]

7.2 Limitations and further research

Finally, we would like to emphasise that this study is one of the first forays into prosodic hierarchy analysis of clause chaining. There are several limitations of this study, each of which implies directions for further research. Like many studies of the prosodic hierarchy, our work is based on impressionistic observations of prosodic cues, namely pitch accents and boundary markers. While our annotations were produced by careful audition and visual inspection of pitch traces, we have not attempted to systematically measure and statistically test the phonetic cues of Matukar Panau prosody. Furthermore, this study has been deliberately constrained to particular sentence types, annotating declarative sentences in monological narrative and dialogic discussion. Analysis of other sentence types would be required to describe the range of pitch and boundary tones used in the language. The role of information structure has also remained largely outside the scope of this study. Finally, our findings represent just one clause chaining language. Although the syntactic types of clause linkage has been a rich area of study (e.g. Bril 2010; Genetti 2005; Longacre 2007), and although authors acknowledge a prosodic component to clause linkage, the prosodic aspect of clause linkage is under-studied. It is difficult to know if our observations of Matukar Panau are similar for other languages of Papua New Guinea. Further research is required to show whether the prosodic constituency we propose can be supported in other clause chaining languages, either in Papua New Guinea or in other chaining regions such as the Amazon.