The present paper aims at comparing the INTONATION of Persian statements and questions in terms of the pitch scaling of tonal events in Pre-nuclear and nuclear prosodic positions as well as utterance final position. Previous research suggest that the direction of the sentence-final fundamental frequency (F0) movement is the most salient INTONATIONal cue to questions and statements in Persian. Prototypical yes/no questions are often characterized by a high F0 rise (H%) whereas statements have a terminal F0 fall (L%). It has also been suggested that the H tone of the nuclear pitch accent as well as the pitch range is higher in questions than statements. The present study explored the question as to what extent the pre-nuclear, nuclear and boundary tones may contribute to tune meaning in Persian, thereby distinguishing between statements and questions. The research methodology was the one used in laboratory phonology. The results showed that the tonal structure of the F0 contour between the nuclear pitch accent and the end of the utterance is different in the two sentence type: statements are characterized by L-L% while questions are characterized by L-H%. The results further suggested that the differences between statement and question INTONATION are not limited to boundary tones as the pitch scaling of both the L and the H tones of pre-nuclear and nuclear pitch accents are also different in the two sentence types...

Ta’arof has a special place in the Iranian culture and its linguistic repesentations are various and considerable. Since Ta’arof expressions are used in interactive contexts by native speakers of Persian, it is expected that the INTONATION patterns of these expressions be affected by discourse factors and vary as a function of context. The present study adopts Brazil’s (1975, 1978, 1997) and Brazil et al.’s (1980) approach to INTONATION with the main purpose of investigating the INTONATION patterns of Ta’arofs in Persian. The distinguishing feature of Brazil’s approach to INTONATION is its focus on the effect of discoursal context on INTONATION patterns each with a meaning of its own. In his approach, “meaning” does not refer to attitudes such as “surprised” or “expectant”, nor to grammatical meanings such as “interrogative” or “declarative”. Rather, it refers to the interactive role of INTONATION i.e., constant evaluation of discourse by the speaker and choosing the appropriate INTONATION pattern to achieve coherence and cohesion in discourse. To this end, the INTONATION features of tone and the prominence level of the onset (key) and tonic (termination) syllables were annotated and analyzed using the Praat software in 29 Ta’arof expressions in the Iranian series Hayula. Results showed that the dominent tone in these expressions is level or fall. Keys were mostly mid or high, while terminations were mostly mid. Considering the fact that INTONATION patterns of each Ta’arof expression depends on its situational and discoursal context, the Taarof expression ̒Gorbunet beram̓ ‘(lit.) may I be sacrificed for you’ with 4 different representations was chosen and analysed as one of the most frequent Ta’arof expression in the corpus of this study. Results showed that Ta’arof expressions although fixed lexically and syntactically, show different INTONATION patterns due to the influence of social norms such as politeness, power relations, the prediction of listener’s judgment, and listener’s agreement expectation.

This paper is an investigation into the INTONATIONal patterns of three different call types in Persian: default calls (those made in a linguistically unmarked context), anger, and surprise calls (expressing the emotions of anger and surprise respectively).The analysis of calls on the basis' of recordings with 4 Persian native speakers (performed in the auto segmental-metrical frame work and the To BI annotation system) reveals that all three types share the L*+H pitch accent; however, the Accentual Phrase boundary tone for default and anger calls is high and that for surprise call is low. As for phonetic differences, the pitch range of default calls is significantly lower than that of anger and surprise calls. The difference lies in the pitch amount of the peak, but the lows of the three types are the same. With regard to duration, surprise calls are significantly longer than the other two types. The intensity of the calls does not exhibit significant difference in the three types.

Introduction: Considered as an important factor in communication, prosody is composed of a number of features including INTONATION, pitch, stress, rhythm and duration, among others. INTONATION is the variation of pitch in the course of producing a sentence. In this study, fundamental frequency range was defined as the minimum and maximum amounts of fundamental frequency one can produce when speaking a sentence. The aim of the present study was to evaluate two aspects of prosody, namely, fundamental frequency range and INTONATION contour in declarative sentences expressed by normal Farsi-speaking adults through laboratory procedures. Materials and Methods: Participants of this cross-sectional descriptive-analytic study were 134 males and females, aging between 18 to 30 years, who natively spoke Farsi. Voice samples obtained by having each subject produce 2 declarative sentences were analyzed by Dr. Speech program (real analysis software). Data were statistically analyzed via unilateral analysis variance and INTONATION contour was drawn for each of these sentences. Results: The INTONATION contour was similar among two sex groups. However, fundamental frequency range of males during speaking the sentences significantly differed from that produced by female subjects (P≤0.001). Conclusion: The INTONATION contour of declarative sentences was characterized by a falling status at the end of the sentence. Females showed much more changes in fundamental frequency in order to transfer declarative state in their expressions than males did.

Introduction: Since the ultimate purpose of learning a foreign language is being capable of communicating in that language, the concept of interactional competence is of dire importance in teaching and learning a second language. Interactional competence is the ability to use language in different social contexts. Furthermore, as a paralinguistic code, INTONATION has direct influence on the accent of learner or the so-called foreign accent. Literature Review: Chomsky (1965) introduces performance versus competence. Hymes (1972) broadens competence to include language use in social situations that he calls communicative competence. According to Kramsch (1986) concepts of addressee and communication context are main factors that differentiate interactional competence from communicative competence. Based on Young (2011), interactional competence includes identity, linguistic and interactional resources. Markee (2008) views interactional competence in three elements, namely, a formal system, a semiotic system and paralinguistic features.  Methodology: This article aims at going from linguistic and communicative competence to interactional competence that is both context- and interactants-dependent, in order to study INTONATION in real conversation. To this end, functions of INTONATION in German language are introduced and described in the process of reaching interactional competence and maintaining successful communication in this language. Results: In teaching a foreign language, we should engage the learners in social and cultural aspects of the language in order to improve and develop their interactional skills and reach near native accent.

The holy Quran - miracle of Muhammad the prophet (PBUH) - is an everlasting treasure which was inspired to him with the emergence of Islam. As time goes by more and more astonishing originalities are discovered in this divine book. One aspect of the holy Quran which has not been thoroughly paid attention to is its musical and phonetic system. This is the impression made by the musical recital of the holy Quran and not by its precious content the impression mead by textual structure and not by meaning. This musical INTONATION is woven into the words and sentences of the holy Quran and is only apprehended through high imperceptible understanding. The present article studies this aspect of the holy Ourem.

Background and Aim: prosody is a very important factor in communication and includes such parameters as: duration, INTONATION, pitch, stress, rhythm etc. INTONATION is the pitch variation in one sentence. Duration is the time taken to utter a voice. The aim of the present study was to evaluate some parameters of prosody such as duration and INTONATION curve in interrogative sentences among normal Farsi speaking adults in order to determine the characteristics of this aspect of language with an emphasis on laboratory testing.Methods: This study was performed as a cross-sectional one. The participants included 134 male and female Farsi speaking individuals aging between 18-30 years. In this study two interrogative sentences with open and closed answers were used. The voice samples were analyzed by Dr.speech -real analysis software. Data analysis incorporated unilateral analysis of variance and an INTONATION curve was drawn for each sentence.Results: The parameter of duration among men and women was significantly different (p£0.001). Duration in open questions was significantly longer than yes/no questions (p£0.001). The INTONATION curves of the two groups were similar.Conclusion: Men and women use duration changes, for making difference in prosody. On the whole, duration among women is longer than men. In open questions, the duration of sentences is mostly due to the question word. The INTONATION curve in open questions has more amplitude. Women show much more changes in basic frequency for transferring interrogative state in their expressions.