关键词：
I-P假说
韵律－句法界面
语调
句末语气词
类型学
摘要：
The Intonation-Particles Hypothesis (I-P Hypothesis), proposed by Feng (2015), claims that intonation influences the distribution of tone in sentence-final positions, where Sentence Final Particles (SFPs) generate. Despite the significance of this hypothesis, research on the relationship between tone, intonation, and SFPs requires further discussion and more evidence. To address this gap, this study conducts a comprehensive survey of Chinese dialects, establishing a direct correlation between the complexity of the tonal system and the number of SFPs. The findings reveal how SFPs and intonation patterns interact in sentence-final positions through processes of assimilation, differentiation, and substitution. Additionally, the study further verifies that SFPs are a variant of intonation, supported by evidence from diverse tonal languages worldwide. Building upon the I-P Hypothesis, the research further intensively demonstrates that various languages share a common prosodic property within universal grammar, reinforcing the idea that that both SFPs and tonogenesis originate from intonemes. The study extends this deduction to ancient Sino-Tibetan and Altaic languages, showing that the asymmetric distribution of monosyllabic tones prevents the projection of intoneme to the word level, particularly in complex contours such as rising and falling tones. The significance of this study lies in that its provision of new typological evidence that supports the I-P Hypothesis. It reveals that intonation and SFPs exhibit a complementary distribution, closely tied to their prosodic expression, contributing to a deeper understanding of how intonation influences the distribution of tones and SFPs across diverse languages.
