Editing Zulu language (section)

====Tone assimilation====

Zulu has tonic [[assimilation (linguistics)|assimilation]]: high tones tend to spread allophonically to following low-tone syllables, raising their pitch to a level just below that of adjacent high-tone syllables. A toneless syllable between a high-tone syllable and another tonic syllable assimilates to that high tone. That is, if the preceding syllable ends on a high tone and the following syllable begins with a high tone (because it is high or falling), the intermediate toneless syllable has its pitch raised as well. When the preceding syllable is high but the following is toneless, the medial toneless syllable adopts a high-tone onset from the preceding syllable, resulting in a falling tone contour.

For example, the English word ''spoon'' was borrowed into Zulu as {{lang|zu|isipunu}}, phonemically {{IPA|/ísipúnu/}}. The second syllable {{lang|zu|si}} assimilates to the surrounding high tones, raising its pitch, so that it is pronounced {{IPA|[ísípʼúːnù]}} sentence-finally. If tone pitch is indicated with numbers, with 1 highest and 9 lowest pitch, then the pitches of each syllable can be denoted as 2-4-3-9.<ref>''Zulu-English Dictionary'', Doke, 1958</ref> The second syllable is thus still lower in pitch than both of the adjacent syllables.