Acoustic Analysis of Intonation Characteristics of Interrogative Emotionally Colored Phrases in French and Mari

The results of an experimental study of the prosodic parameters of interrogative phrases in the differently structured French and Mari languages represent the analysis of the acoustic characteristics of emotionally charged constructions, their common features and differences. Phonetic research demonstrates the presence of some universal intonation aspects: the movement of the fundamental tone; the frequency of the fundamental tone, increasing on the term containing the question; slowing down the pace of speech in the final part of the construction; dynamic organization of utterance. Interrogative utterances in the studied languages are characterized by a sharp rise in the logical center of the phrase. The general characteristics also include the ascending-descending character of the melody, which differs only in the intensity of pitch fluctuations and the tempo of pronunciation. As the speaker's emotional stress increases, the intensity of the dynamic organization of emotional interrogative phrases increases. The instrumental analysis revealed differences in the frequency range, rhythm and tempo of utterances in the compared languages. Dynamic concentration is focused in different parts of the phrase: in French it is localized in the initial part, whereas in Mari, it is in the final segment. The choice of intonation tools largely depends on the ways of actual sentence division, characteristic of each of the languages. The French language makes extensive use of phonetic and grammatical means, whereas the Mari language uses normative phonetic and lexical means. This is the reason for the specificity of the prosodic characteristics of the studied phrases, which has a high degree of emotional impact on the interlocutor. Emotionally colored interrogative phrases are characterized by a pronounced communicative orientation, conveying a variety of emotional states of participants in a speech act, in particular, using such prosodic means as the frequency and orientation of the main tone, frequency range, and tempo of speech associated with the speed of articulation.