Tone
Dialects are classified as North Gyeongsang or South Gyeongsang based on pitch accent. North Gyeongsang has high tone, low tone (short vowel), and low tone (long vowel), whereas South Gyeongsang has high, mid, and low tone. For example, South Gyeongsang distinguishes sóni 'guest', sōni 'hand', and sòni 'grandchild'. Pitch accent plays a grammatical role as well, for example distinguishing causative and passive as in jép-pida 'make s.o. catch' and jepída 'be caught'.
In North Gyeongsang, any syllable may have pitch accent in the form of a high tone, as may the two initial syllables. For example, in trisyllabic words, there are four possible tone patterns:
- 메누리 ('daughter-in-law')
- 어무이 ('mother')
- 원어민 ('native speaker')
- 오래비 ('elder brother')
Read more about this topic: Gyeongsang Dialect
Famous quotes containing the word tone:
“Whose are the truly labored sentences? From the weak and flimsy periods of the politician and literary man, we are glad to turn even to the description of work, the simple record of the month’s labor in the farmer’s almanac, to restore our tone and spirits.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“There was about all the Romans a heroic tone peculiar to ancient life. Their virtues were great and noble, and these virtues made them great and noble. They possessed a natural majesty that was not put on and taken off at pleasure, as was that of certain eastern monarchs when they put on or took off their garments of Tyrian dye. It is hoped that this is not wholly lost from the world, although the sense of earthly vanity inculcated by Christianity may have swallowed it up in humility.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)
“Eloquence resides as much in the tone of voice, in the eyes, and in the expression of the face, as in the choice of words.”
—François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld (1613–1680)