Division of Utterances into Intonation-Groups

Analysis of English utterances into intonation-groups shows that they are co-extensive with a stretch of speech of various grammatical nature: an independent sentence, a principal or a subordinate clause, two or even more clauses, a group of words or even one word. Co-extensiveness with a sentence is typical of only a small portion of speech material (about 17 %, according to experimental data). An intonation-group corresponding to a grammatical sentence is marked by specific characteristics of tone, stress and duration, serving to express semantic completeness and independence — the relevant features of an utterance. An intonation-group of this kind is defined as a simple tune.

Most grammatical sentences are prosodically expressed by a combination of intonation-groups. These combinations have a specific function of a double nature: on the one hand, they present information in the form of relatively separate semantic items, and on the other hand, they make up a communicative whole (entity) out of these separate parts. Utterances which are composed of more than one intonation-group form a combined tune.

Some sentences lend themselves to be subdivided more readily than others. Long sentences, most naturally, break up into smaller parts in spoken language. Their division is based both on physiological convenience (an intonation-group is normally a breath-group) and on the complexity of information being conveyed, e.g.:

After a long boring wait | I eventually boarded my plane.

Of the two factors - physiological convenience and complexity of information - semantic reasons are overriding in importance. Through intonation division the speaker can make several items stand out as more or less independent parcels of information in a short utterance, too, increasing thereby the general prominence of the utterance,

Nobody | could deny it.

Another major characteristic involved is the syntactic structure of an utterance. The number of intonation-groups in utterances of the same length may often vary precisely because of the peculiarities of their syntactic structure, which may either presuppose prosodic division as an obligatory feature or, vice versa, 'forbid' it, or else (as a third and most frequently occurring variant) allow of two options: with or without an intonation boundary between the constituents of a sentence.

Prosodic division is typically optional in expanded simple sentences with adverbial modifiers of different kinds, complex sentences with object, relative or attributive clauses and some others. The grouping of words within a message into longer or shorter sections and the placement of an intonation boundary in such cases is largely a matter of the speaker's semantic interpretation of an utterance, as well as his communicative intention. As a result the same written sentence read aloud by different people may have a different number of intonation-groups. E.g.:

Many working mothers do not have time to cook. Many working mothers | do not have time to cook.

She has learned to keep quiet about her personal relationships. She has learned to keep quiet | about her personal relationships.

Often the number of intonation-groups is the same, but the location of their boundaries varies. E.g.:

Los Angeles | is well known | for both the high level of its air pollution | and the efforts made to control it.

Los Angeles is well known | for both the high level of its air pollution | and the efforts | made to control it.

An intonation boundary is obligatory, or, at any rate, highly probable in complex sentences with subordinate clauses of condition, cause, time (in pre-position to the principal clause), concession, result, comparison (particularly, when there is an adverbial modifier of manner in the principal clause) and some others. E.g.:

Since you refuse to help, | I must do it alone.

In spite of the rain and bitter cold | they all came in time.

Strictly speaking, there is no rule forbidding a pause in any place within an utterance (cf. the so-called hesitation pauses), but from the point of view of syntactical predicta­bility certain positions in an utterance display a very small probability of a break. Thus, e.g. the subject of a sentence expressed by a personal pronoun is but seldom separated from the predicate; a preposed attribute is usually closely linked to the noun, etc.

The choice of a number of intonation-groups in an utterance also depends on the type and form of speech. In a dictation, for instance, an utterance is divided up into smaller sections than in any other kind of reading, and spontaneous speech is characterized by uneven length of intonation-groups, and their boundaries are less predictable from the syntactic structure than in reading aloud.

Utterance stress in English, its phonetic nature. and function. The relationship between utterance stress and word stress in English

THE STRESS PATTERN OF ENGLISH WORDS. TENDENCIES

In almost all languages, there is a variation in the relative prominence of syllables. The prominence of syllables is referred to as stress. It is a function of pitch, duration/length/loudness, and quality. In different languages one of the factors is usually more significant than the others. Depending upon which factor is the principal one in giving prominence to a syllable, word stress in languages may be of different types. 1. If special prominence is achieved through the increased loudness (i.e. intensity of articulation), such word stress is termed DYNAMIC. 2. If special prominence in a stressed syllable is achieved mainly through the change of pitch, such type of word stress is MUSICAL, or TONIC. 3. QUANTITATIVE stress is when prominence is achieved through the changes in the quantity of vowels, i.e. their duration. 4. QUALITATIVE stress is when the stressed vowel is made prominent due to its clear and distinct character.

There are languages which do not have word stress, such as Evenk, or Kalmyk, but many languages combine various types of words stress. Russian displays qualitative, quantitative and dynamic features. Word stress in Ancient Greek used to be tonic, but is characterized as dynamic in Modern Greek. Scandinavian languages make use of both dynamic and tonic stresses in more or less equal degree. Oriental languages like Chinese, Japanese, Korean are tonic In English prominence is achieved due to increased duration, loudness and higher pitch, i.e. quantitative, tonic and dynamic stressing.

Some languages have fixed stress, associated with a certain syllable in a word. In Finnish, Czech, Latvian stress always falls on the first syllable, in Turkish – on the final syllable of the root form, in French – on the final syllable in the word. In English, Russian stress placement is free in that different words can have different stress pattern..Any word with more than one syllable has a word stress. The stress pattern of a word reflects the distribution of prominence among its syllables. In words that have one stress, the latter is called ‘ primary stress’. In longer words, it is possible to pick out a second, weaker stressed syllable that bears secondary s tress notated as low mark. Two main tendencies determine the place and different degrees of word stress in English: the RECESSIVE tendency and the RHYTHMIC tendency. The oldest of the English word accentuation tendencies is the RECESSIVE tendency, characteristic of all Germanic languages. It originally consisted in placing the word stress on the initial syllable of nouns, adjectives, and verbs and on the root syllable of words which belonged to other parts of speech and had a prefix. The recessive accent in Modern English is of two types: UNRESTRICTED and RESTRICTED (by an unstressed prefix). UNRESTRICTED recessive accent falls on the first (root) syllable, as in words FATHER, MOTHER, HUSBAND. RESTRICTED recessive accent falls on the second (root) syllable of native English words with a prefix which has lost its meaning: AMONG, BECOME, FORGET, INDEED. Under the influence of the native English tendency to unrestricted recessive stress, all the disyllabic and trisyllabic words borrowed from French until the 15^th century underwent ‘accentual assimilation’: the original accent on the final syllable of loan words and gradually shifted to the beginning: COLOUR, MARRIAGE, REASON< etc. In Chaucer’s poems we find such free accentual variants as ‘REASON and REA’SON. Loan words with prefixes which have no particular meaning now also have restricted recessive stress: CON’DUCT, DE’PEND, SUR’PRISE.
The RHYTHMIC tendency can be accounted for the presence in English of a great number of monosyllabic words, some of which are stressed (notional) words, others are not (form words). Such phenomenon has created the English rhythm, consisting of alternating stressed and unstressed syllables This tendency has caused the appearance in borrowed polysyllabic words of a secondary stress on the syllable separated from the word-final principal stress by an unstressed syllable. The words began to be pronounced in isolation on the model of short phrases in which a stressed syllable alternated with an unstressed one. Thus the word ‘RADICAL originally had a stress on the final syllable – RADI’CAL- but later it received the recessive stress on the initial syllable, while the final stress was still retained. The result of it was the typically English alternation of a stressed syllable with an unstressed one. For some time this and similar words had two stresses but gradually the word-final stress began to weaken and disappeared. Thus in tri-syllabic words there remained only one strong stress on the third syllable from the end of the word. The tendency to stress the third syllable from the end was extended to four-syllable words as well, and this stress is called RHYTHMICAL. Strictly speaking, the stress in such words as RADICAL, FAMILY, CINEMA, is rhythmical only in its origin, because in Modern English there is no alternation of a stressed syllable with an unstressed one in these words. The stress here is called HYSTORICALLY RHYTHMICAL In Modern English there is also GENINELY RHYTHMICAL stress. This is the secondary stress on the second PRETONIC syllable in words like PRO,NUNCI’ATION, E,XAMI’NATION, RE,LIA’BILITY, etc. There is also a RETENTIVE tendency which consists in the retention of the stress of the parent word in the derivatives. More commonly it is kept in the parent word as a secondary accent, e.g., ‘PERSON – ‘PERSONAL –,PERSO’NALITY.

The SEMANTIC factor can also condition the place and the degree of stress. The meaningful prefixes UN-, MIS-, EX-, UDNER-, etc, (UNKNOWN, EXWIFE, UNDERESTIMATE), or semantically more important part of a compound word get more prominence: BUTTONHOLE, TONGUETWISTER.

WORD STRESS RULES.

There are some fairly regular word stress patterns (although there will often be exceptions)
1. In two-syllable verbs: a/ if the second syllable of the verb contains a long vowel or a diphthong, or if it ends with more than one consonant, the second syllable is stressed.

Examples: A’PPLY, COM’PLETE, A’RRIVE, RE’SIST, OB’JECT
b/ if the final syllable contains a short vowel and one (or no) final consonant, the first syllable is stressed. Examples: ‘ENTER, ‘OPEN, ‘EQUAL, ‘BORROW, ‘PROFIT
Exceptions to this rule include AD’MIT and PER’MIT (verb).

 

2. There are some suffixes (or word endings) that usually carry stress.
Words with these endings usually carry stress on the last syllable:
- ain ENTER’TAIN /// - ee REFU’GEE /// - eer MOUNTAI’NEER /// - ese PORTU’GUESE
- ette CIGA’RETTE (NB American English would stress the first syllable)

 

3. The suiffixes –ion, -ious/-eous, -ity, -ify, -ive, -ible, -igible, -ish, -graphy, -meter, -logy, require stress to be on the preceding syllable:
-ion/-ian DE’CISION, E’DITION, MA’GICIAN, CA’NADIAN; -ious /-eous CON’TENTIOUS, COU’RAGEOUS; - ity ‘QUALITY, SIM’PLICITY, NATIO’NALITY; -ify ‘TERRIFY, ‘JUSTIFY, I’DENTIFY; -ive EX’TENSIVE -ible IN’CREDIBLE, ‘TERRIBLE, -igible NE’GLIGIBLE, IN’TELLIGIBLE; -ish PUBLISH, FINISH, FURNISH, - graphy PHO’TOGRAPHY, BI’OGRAPHY
-meter THER’MOMETER /// -logy BI’OLOGY, TECH’NOLOGY, IDE’OLOGY

4. Words of two syllables ending in -ate place the accent on -ate eg,: TRAN’SLATE, DIC’TATE, DE’BATE, whereas words of three or more syllables ending in -ate have the main accent on the third syllable from the end. E.g.: NE’GOTIATE, ‘INDICATE, ‘IRRITATE.

5. In compound words or words made up of two elements, there are again some general patterns.: If the first element of the word is a noun, then the stress normally goes on the first element: ‘TYPEWRITER, ‘FRUIT-CAKE, ‘SUITCASE, ‘SCREWDRIVER, ‘TEACUP, ‘SUNRISE. If the first part is an adjective, then the stress goes on the second part: ˌLOUD’SPEAKER, ˌBAD-‘TEMPERED,

UTTERANCE STRESS

 

Words grouped into an utterance are not equally important. Depending on the context or the communication situation some words appear to contribute more information than others. Those that are semantically more impor­tant are made prominent. The special prominence given to one or more words in an utterance is called utterance stress.

Stress is part of the phonetic structure of the word. We always know the place of stress in a word. When the word is made prominent in an utterance, stress becomes a feature of the utterance.

The means, with the help of which the special prominence is achieved and the effect of stress is produced, are variations of pitch, loudness, length and quality. Acoustically, utterance stress is determined by variations of frequency, intensity, duration and formant structure.

The role of each of these acoustic parameters in creating the effect of ut­terance stress has been studied experimentally by a number of phoneticians in this country and abroad. It appears that frequency is more effi­cient in determining stresses in an utterance than intensity. Duration also appears to play a greater role than intensity.

As a rule the effect of utterance stress is created not by a single acoustic parameter but by a certain interaction of different parameters.

The subsystem of utterance stress in English includes three basic functio­nal types: nuclear stress, non-nuclear full stress and partial stress.

The main difference between these three types of stress is the difference in how the syllables that bear them are marked. The nuclear syllable is in most cases marked by a kinetic tone and is, therefore, perceived as the most pro­minent. Non-nuclear fully stressed syllables are more often marked by static tones. Both are pitch prominent, both initiate tones. Partially stressed syllab­les are not pitch prominent, they do not initiate tones and their pitch charac­teristics depend on the pitch pattern of the preceding fully stressed syllables.

Each of the above three types of stress has functionally significant degrees depending on the modal—stylistic factors of speech. Thus, stresses in emphatic speech are stronger than those in unemphatic speech.

The distribution of stresses in an utterance depends on several factors. G. Torsuyev points to the following factors: semantic, grammatical and rhythmical.

The crucial factor in determining the location, type and degree of stress in an utterance is the semantic factor, i.e. the meaning which the utterance is intended to convey. The semantic centre of the utterance is singled out by the nuclear stress (or primary accent). This type of stress is opposed to the non-nuclear stresses by its greatest semantic importance. In their turn non-nuclear full stresses signal greater semantic value of the words than partial stresses.

Notional words, due to their function in the language, are usually stressed in an utterance. Form words are likely to be unstressed. But in special conditions, when they are semantically important, form words may be­come stressed, e.g. "It is 'not at 'all interesting". - "It is interesting". On the other hand notional words, if the meaning requires, may become unstressed, e.g.

The grammatical structure of the utterance also determines its accentual structure. For instance, the inverted word order requires stress on the auxiliary verb.

The distribution of stresses in an utterance is also affected by the rhyth­mical laws of the English language. Due to the rhythmical organization of the utterance notional words may be unstressed, and form words, on the contrary, may be stressed.

The semantic, grammatical and rhythmical factors are closely connected with one another, the semantic factor being the main one.

Stresses in an utterance fulfill the same three functions as other compo­nents of prosody - constitutive, distinctive and identificatory. In their con­stitutive function stresses form the utterance by integrating words. They form the accentual structure of the utterance, which is the basis of its rhythm and part of its prosodic structure. While integrating words into utterances, stresses of different hierarchy segment the speech continuum into rhythmic (accentual) units, intonation groups and utterances, and delimit them one from another thus carrying out the segmentative and delimitative functions. The distinctive function of stresses manifests itself in differentiating utterances as to their meaning, which is conditioned by the position and type
of stress. E.g. Don't you 'find it /difficult" and Don't /you find it difficult?" The opposition of degrees of utterance stress carries out a modal—stylistic function.

In its identificatory function utterance stress provides a basis for the hearer's identification of the important parts of the utterance and for his understanding of the content.

25. Types of utterance stress. Factors conditioning the location of utterance stress.

 

UTTERANCE STRESS

 

Words grouped into an utterance are not equally important. Depending on the context or the communication situation some words appear to contribute more information than others. Those that are semantically more impor­tant are made prominent. The special prominence given to one or more words in an utterance is called utterance stress.

Stress is part of the phonetic structure of the word. We always know the place of stress in a word. When the word is made prominent in an utterance, stress becomes a feature of the utterance.

The means, with the help of which the special prominence is achieved and the effect of stress is produced, are variations of pitch, loudness, length and quality. Acoustically, utterance stress is determined by variations of frequency, intensity, duration and formant structure.

The role of each of these acoustic parameters in creating the effect of ut­terance stress has been studied experimentally by a number of phoneticians in this country and abroad. It appears that frequency is more effi­cient in determining stresses in an utterance than intensity. Duration also appears to play a greater role than intensity.

As a rule the effect of utterance stress is created not by a single acoustic parameter but by a certain interaction of different parameters.

The subsystem of utterance stress in English includes three basic functio­nal types: nuclear stress, non-nuclear full stress and partial stress.

The main difference between these three types of stress is the difference in how the syllables that bear them are marked. The nuclear syllable is in most cases marked by a kinetic tone and is, therefore, perceived as the most pro­minent. Non-nuclear fully stressed syllables are more often marked by static tones. Both are pitch prominent, both initiate tones. Partially stressed syllab­les are not pitch prominent, they do not initiate tones and their pitch charac­teristics depend on the pitch pattern of the preceding fully stressed syllables.

Each of the above three types of stress has functionally significant degrees depending on the modal—stylistic factors of speech. Thus, stresses in emphatic speech are stronger than those in unemphatic speech.

The distribution of stresses in an utterance depends on several factors. G. Torsuyev points to the following factors: semantic, grammatical and rhythmical.

The crucial factor in determining the location, type and degree of stress in an utterance is the semantic factor, i.e. the meaning which the utterance is intended to convey. The semantic centre of the utterance is singled out by the nuclear stress (or primary accent). This type of stress is opposed to the non-nuclear stresses by its greatest semantic importance. In their turn non-nuclear full stresses signal greater semantic value of the words than partial stresses.

Notional words, due to their function in the language, are usually stressed in an utterance. Form words are likely to be unstressed. But in special conditions, when they are semantically important, form words may be­come stressed, e.g. "It is 'not at 'all interesting". - "It is interesting". On the other hand notional words, if the meaning requires, may become unstressed, e.g.

The grammatical structure of the utterance also determines its accentual structure. For instance, the inverted word order requires stress on the auxiliary verb.

The distribution of stresses in an utterance is also affected by the rhyth­mical laws of the English language. Due to the rhythmical organization of the utterance notional words may be unstressed, and form words, on the contrary, may be stressed.

The semantic, grammatical and rhythmical factors are closely connected with one another, the semantic factor being the main one.

Stresses in an utterance fulfill the same three functions as other compo­nents of prosody - constitutive, distinctive and identificatory. In their con­stitutive function stresses form the utterance by integrating words. They form the accentual structure of the utterance, which is the basis of its rhythm and part of its prosodic structure. While integrating words into utterances, stresses of different hierarchy segment the speech continuum into rhythmic (accentual) units, intonation groups and utterances, and delimit them one from another thus carrying out the segmentative and delimitative functions. The distinctive function of stresses manifests itself in differentiating utterances as to their meaning, which is conditioned by the position and type
of stress. E.g. Don't you 'find it /difficult" and Don't /you find it difficult?" The opposition of degrees of utterance stress carries out a modal—stylistic function.

In its identificatory function utterance stress provides a basis for the hearer's identification of the important parts of the utterance and for his understanding of the content.

26. Speech rhythm and utterance stress.

Rhythm

An essential feature of connected speech is that the peaks of prominence - the stressed syllables - are inseparably connected with non-prominent syllables. The latter are attached to the stressed syllables, they never exist by themselves. The simplest example of a close relationship between the stressed and unstressed syllables is a polysyllabic word-utterance which is a phonetic and semantic entity incapable of division, e.g.:

`Excellent. To`morrow. `Certainly.

Thus an utterance is split into groups of syllables unified by a stressed syllable, i.e. stress-groups, each of which is a semantic unit - generally a word, often more than a word.

An important feature of English pronunciation is that the prominent syllables in an utterance occur at approximately equal periods of time. It means more or less equal time for each of the stressed groups:I'd 'like to 'give you a 'piece of ad`vice. When the number of syllables in adjacent stress-groups is not equal, the speed of utterance will be the highest in the group having the largest number of syllables and, vice versa, the tempo is noticeably slower in a group having fewer syllables. Thus the perceptible isochrony of stress-groups is based on the speakers tending to minimize the differences in thelength of stressed groups in an utterance.

Thus it has been shown that stress in English performs an important function of 'organizing' an utterance, providing the basis for its r h у t h m i с structure which is the realization of rhythm as a prosodic feature of speech.

Rhythm is defined in different languages in largely the same terms. The notion of rhythm implies, first of all, a certain periodicity of phonological events. For an English utterance these events, as has been made clear, are the stressed syllables. Such a periodicity is a peculiarity of English. English speech is therefore often described as more 'rhythmic' than, for example, Russian.

It follows that the units of the rhythmic organization of an utterance are stress-groups, which may be as well called rhythmic groups.

The distribution of stresses in an utterance is also affected by the rhyth­mical laws of the English language. Due to the rhythmical organization of the utterance notional words may be unstressed, and form words, on the contrary, may be stressed.

The semantic, grammatical and rhythmical factors are closely connected with one another, the semantic factor being the main one.

The RHYTHMIC tendency can be accounted for the presence in English of a great number of monosyllabic words, some of which are stressed (notional) words, others are not (form words). Such phenomenon has created the English rhythm, consisting of alternating stressed and unstressed syllables This tendency has caused the appearance in borrowed polysyllabic words of a secondary stress on the syllable separated from the word-final principal stress by an unstressed syllable. The words began to be pronounced in isolation on the model of short phrases in which a stressed syllable alternated with an unstressed one. Thus the word ‘RADICAL originally had a stress on the final syllable – RADI’CAL- but later it received the recessive stress on the initial syllable, while the final stress was still retained. The result of it was the typically English alternation of a stressed syllable with an unstressed one. For some time this and similar words had two stresses but gradually the word-final stress began to weaken and disappeared. Thus in tri-syllabic words there remained only one strong stress on the third syllable from the end of the word. The tendency to stress the third syllable from the end was extended to four-syllable words as well, and this stress is called RHYTHMICAL. Strictly speaking, the stress in such words as RADICAL, FAMILY, CINEMA, is rhythmical only in its origin, because in Modern English there is no alternation of a stressed syllable with an unstressed one in these words. The stress here is called HYSTORICALLY RHYTHMICAL In Modern English there is also GENINELY RHYTHMICAL stress. This is the secondary stress on the second PRETONIC syllable in words like PRO,NUNCI’ATION, E,XAMI’NATION, RE,LIA’BILITY, etc. There is also a RETENTIVE tendency which consists in the retention of the stress of the parent word in the derivatives. More commonly it is kept in the parent word as a secondary accent, e.g., ‘PERSON – ‘PERSONAL –,PERSO’NALITY.