Tone in the Nyifon and Igbo Languages: A Preliminary Comparative Study

Abstract

The focus of this paper is the comparison of tone in the Nyifon and Igbo languages of Nigeria, aimed at revealing the  similarities, differences and uses of tone in both languages. The study will pave the way for further investigation and  application of theories to the study of tone and other phenomena in Nigerian languages, especially the less studied like Nyifon. Data for Igbo were obtained from ten Igbo native speakers, existing literature, and the researchers‟ native  speaker intuition. For Nyifon, thirty native speakers provided the data. From our data, descriptively analyzed, the study  discovers that the two languages have three level tones in common- high, low and downstep. In addition, Nyifon has a  high falling contour tone. Although tone performs lexical and grammatical functions in both languages, its degree of  involvement differs significantly. From our data, the only grammatical function of tone in Nyifon is differentiating  interrogatives from declaratives. In Igbo, tone performs this function and many more, including differentiating canonical words from associative words, proper from common nouns, subjunctive from imperative sentences, and  relative clause from declarative sentence. On the differentiation of interrogatives from declaratives, Igbo changes high  tone of the pronominal subject of declaratives to low for interrogatives while Nyifon uses a contrasting tone on  reduplicated final vowel for interrogative. The findings call for more researches on the phonology of Nigerian languages  for their better appreciation, ICT application and use in language pedagogy.