Re: Too far in to make major changes?

From: "Roger Mills"

> Just in passing, I'll mention that I'm trying to devise a tonal language
for
> the 2nd intelligent species of Planet Cindu.  Am vaguely aware of how
tones
> are believed to have arisen-- would be interested to hear whether tonal
> languages also have intonation patterns for sentences, especially
questions.

Chinese does. The question particle, "ma", for instance, though technically
a "neutral tone", to my ear sounds a little higher in pitch than some other
neutrals. As a result, first, second, and fourth tones start and finish
higher, and the third tone starts and finishes a little lower, than they
would in a declarative sentence. That's not a great description, but I can
hear a difference. Maybe a question stretches the tonal contrasts a little?
At any rate, there *is* a difference in intonation between:

Zhe4pan2 cai4 bu4 hao3chi1 ma?
Is this dish not delicious?

and:

Zhe4pan2 cai4 bu4 hao3chi1 ma.
This dish is (clearly) not delicious.

though I'm hard pressed to describe it.

Kou