This study examines the relationship between tonal phonetics, tonal reduction and orthographic patterns produced by Me'phaa Vátháá speaking teachers. It discusses these patterns in the context of Indigenous education in Mexico and of the language ideologies held by the teachers, which have parallels to those held by speakers of Spanish and practitioners of language revitalization. Its main finding is that tones undergo phonetic changes which reduce their relative psychoacoustic distances, and this combines with the writing practices of the teachers (in which they repeat the words to themselves at varying speeds) to produce hesitation when writing the tonal markers. This is framed in an ideological process of privileging writing as the ideal form of language revitalization, and of rejection of variants and spelling 'mistakes', which results in further linguistic insecurity by the teachers. This has repercussions for the revitalization of the language, in that teachers sometimes choose not to write in Me'phaa Vátháá, particularly in contexts involving technology such as social media, out of fear of making 'mistakes'. In studying these phenomena, this study also describes the processes of tonal reduction in Me'phaa Vátháá and describes its similarities and differences with the reduction described for other tonal languages such as Mandarin, Thai and Triqui. Tonal reduction processes in Me'phaa Vátháá are not an exact match to any of these languages, which suggests that, while reduction is universal, it has language-specific expressions, which suggest that reduction typologies should be further studied. In addition to this, the study offers a report on the process of tonal spelling learning by adults who didn't receive this training as children. This is relevant to both educational and language planners, as well as to practitioners of language revitalization.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:arizona.edu/oai:arizona.openrepository.com:10150/623099 |
| Date | January 2017 |
| Creators | Coto Solano, Rolando Alberto, Coto Solano, Rolando Alberto |
| Contributors | Wedel, Andrew, Zepeda, Ofelia, Wedel, Andrew, Zepeda, Ofelia, Warner, Natasha, Wyman, Lesiy, DiCanio, Christian |
| Publisher | The University of Arizona. |
| Source Sets | University of Arizona |
| Language | en_US |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text, Electronic Dissertation |
| Rights | Copyright © is held by the author. Digital access to this material is made possible by the University Libraries, University of Arizona. Further transmission, reproduction or presentation (such as public display or performance) of protected items is prohibited except with permission of the author. |
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