Uptalk in Chicano Southern California English

Abstract

The present study aims to build on limited Chicano English intonation research by exploring the frequency, phonetic properties, timing, and potential origins of uptalk in neutral declarative statements of Chicano Southern California English (CSCE). Fifteen native CSCE speakers and five native Anglo Southern California English (ASCE) speakers from the Los Angeles Metropolitan Area (all college-age women) participated in three tasks varying in their formality. Five measures were examined across dialects and within the CSCE speaker group: uptalk frequency, starting pitch, scaling, rise alignment, and peak delay. Results show that CSCE and ASCE speakers produce extremely similar uptalk contours both in how often they occur and in their phonetic manifestations, suggesting that ASCE uptalk, rather than the Mexican Spanish circumflex contour, is the main source of intonational transfer for final rising in CSCE. Furthermore, while Barry (2007) proposes that ASCE uptalk is unmarked, we find that uptalk frequency is conditioned by task formality for both dialect groups, indicating that this variable may have since risen above the level of consciousness. The amount of Spanish spoken in childhood and the academic environment of the colleges attended by our CSCE participants also affect how often uptalk is produced and its beginning pitch level.