Stress:
Language is a system of communication and we all serve the purpose of communication through words or combination of words. We do communicate to convey meaning and the meaning on some scale is dependent on clarity of speech i.e. pronunciation. There is much more to the pronunciation of English than its individual sounds. The organizations of sounds play a greater role in communication than the sounds themselves. Sound system involves not only vowels and consonants but also stress and intonation.
Daniel Jones (1983) describes ‘Stress’ as the degree of force with which a sound or syllable is uttered. In fact, in English and many other languages, one or more of the syllables in each content word is stressed. When words are combined into phrases and sentences, one of the syllables receives greater stress than all others. Whereas T.Balasubramanian (2002) is of the view that, of course, the greater prominence of a syllable may be due to stress or greater breath force, but often the length of the vowel in a syllable, stress and pitch change work together to render a syllable more prominent than its neighbouring syllables. In short, one can say that the English language derives much of its rhythm and clarity from the use of stressed syllables within the words and across the word boundaries. Thus, stress is important in bringing out meaning. As R.K. Bansal (1988) rightly pointed out when talking to native English speakers, most frequent cause of the unintelligibility of Indian English lies in the use of wrong word accent. And so, stress in the wrong place can play havoc with clarity of speech and can become the barrier or hindrance in communication.
Intonation:
Intonation is not a separate phenomenon and depends on the pitch of the voice i.e. frequency of vibration or the rate at which the vocal cords vibrate. Generally when we speak, we do not always speak on the same note. That is to say, sometimes the pitch rises, falls, and remains level or high or low. The patterns of variation of the pitch of the voice constitute the ‘intonation of a language’. But these changes in vocal pitch are not haphazard. The factors that chiefly determine the choice of one pattern as against the type of utterance (statement vs. question, command vs. request, simple vs. complex) is important, and subjective in that the speaker’s mood and his attitude to what he is saying are also significant. In short, intonation helps us to understand the meaning, the attitude of the speaker, the relationship between the speaker and the ‘spoken to’ and the situation.
Normally, a syllable on which a pitch change takes place is usually marked with one of the following signs, depending upon the type of pitch-change.
i. [ \ ] high fall
ii. [ ] law fall
iii. [ / ] high rise
iv. [ ] low rise
v. [ v ] fall rise
vi. [ ^ ] rise fall
It is essential in a study of speech in English to understand the four basic variations in intonation.
1) Rising intonation
2) Falling intonation
3) Falling rising intonation
4) Rising falling intonation
1.Rising Intonation is used in
· Questions, which demand an answer yes/no
e.g Do you agree?
Are you coming?
· Polite requests:
e.g. Would you switch on the fan?
· Exclamations, Greetings:
e.g. Good evening (cheerful greeting)
Best of luck (cheerful good wishes)
· Wh-questions: (asked in a friendly manner)
e.g. How’s your brother?
· Incomplete utterances:
e.g. It’s already 12’O clock. (But the show has not started yet)
2.Falling Intonation is used in
· Commands
e.g. Come here.
· ‘Wh’ questions in a neutral or unfriendly way
e.g. When are you coming?
· Ordinary statements without emotional implications
e.g. It’s 11’O clock.
· Tag questions
e.g. (It’s a lovely day.) Isn’t it?
· Exclamations, Greetings
e.g. How surprising!
Good morning (routine sort of greeting)
3.Falling rising tone is used in
· Special implication such as insinuations, apology, unpleasant news, happiness, reassurance or doubt on the part of the speaker.
e.g. I saw you at the cinema. (You said you had to study)
Sir’s here already. (So hurry up)
4.Rising falling tone is used in
· Reinforcing, indication warmth, anger or sarcasm
e.g. It was frightful.
How interesting.
Language is a system of communication and we all serve the purpose of communication through words or combination of words. We do communicate to convey meaning and the meaning on some scale is dependent on clarity of speech i.e. pronunciation. There is much more to the pronunciation of English than its individual sounds. The organizations of sounds play a greater role in communication than the sounds themselves. Sound system involves not only vowels and consonants but also stress and intonation.
Daniel Jones (1983) describes ‘Stress’ as the degree of force with which a sound or syllable is uttered. In fact, in English and many other languages, one or more of the syllables in each content word is stressed. When words are combined into phrases and sentences, one of the syllables receives greater stress than all others. Whereas T.Balasubramanian (2002) is of the view that, of course, the greater prominence of a syllable may be due to stress or greater breath force, but often the length of the vowel in a syllable, stress and pitch change work together to render a syllable more prominent than its neighbouring syllables. In short, one can say that the English language derives much of its rhythm and clarity from the use of stressed syllables within the words and across the word boundaries. Thus, stress is important in bringing out meaning. As R.K. Bansal (1988) rightly pointed out when talking to native English speakers, most frequent cause of the unintelligibility of Indian English lies in the use of wrong word accent. And so, stress in the wrong place can play havoc with clarity of speech and can become the barrier or hindrance in communication.
Intonation:
Intonation is not a separate phenomenon and depends on the pitch of the voice i.e. frequency of vibration or the rate at which the vocal cords vibrate. Generally when we speak, we do not always speak on the same note. That is to say, sometimes the pitch rises, falls, and remains level or high or low. The patterns of variation of the pitch of the voice constitute the ‘intonation of a language’. But these changes in vocal pitch are not haphazard. The factors that chiefly determine the choice of one pattern as against the type of utterance (statement vs. question, command vs. request, simple vs. complex) is important, and subjective in that the speaker’s mood and his attitude to what he is saying are also significant. In short, intonation helps us to understand the meaning, the attitude of the speaker, the relationship between the speaker and the ‘spoken to’ and the situation.
Normally, a syllable on which a pitch change takes place is usually marked with one of the following signs, depending upon the type of pitch-change.
i. [ \ ] high fall
ii. [ ] law fall
iii. [ / ] high rise
iv. [ ] low rise
v. [ v ] fall rise
vi. [ ^ ] rise fall
It is essential in a study of speech in English to understand the four basic variations in intonation.
1) Rising intonation
2) Falling intonation
3) Falling rising intonation
4) Rising falling intonation
1.Rising Intonation is used in
· Questions, which demand an answer yes/no
e.g Do you agree?
Are you coming?
· Polite requests:
e.g. Would you switch on the fan?
· Exclamations, Greetings:
e.g. Good evening (cheerful greeting)
Best of luck (cheerful good wishes)
· Wh-questions: (asked in a friendly manner)
e.g. How’s your brother?
· Incomplete utterances:
e.g. It’s already 12’O clock. (But the show has not started yet)
2.Falling Intonation is used in
· Commands
e.g. Come here.
· ‘Wh’ questions in a neutral or unfriendly way
e.g. When are you coming?
· Ordinary statements without emotional implications
e.g. It’s 11’O clock.
· Tag questions
e.g. (It’s a lovely day.) Isn’t it?
· Exclamations, Greetings
e.g. How surprising!
Good morning (routine sort of greeting)
3.Falling rising tone is used in
· Special implication such as insinuations, apology, unpleasant news, happiness, reassurance or doubt on the part of the speaker.
e.g. I saw you at the cinema. (You said you had to study)
Sir’s here already. (So hurry up)
4.Rising falling tone is used in
· Reinforcing, indication warmth, anger or sarcasm
e.g. It was frightful.
How interesting.
Rhythm
English is said to have a stress-timed rhythm. This means that in an English utterance, the strong or prominent or accented syllables have the tendency to occur at regular intervals of time, irrespective of the number of weak or unaccented syllables between any two accented syllables. Another important aspect of English rhythm is weak forms. The weak forms exhibit reduction of the length of sounds, weakening of the vowels in them and also in the elision of vowels and consonants.
Juncture
The difference between nitrate, night rate and Nye trait is juncture. It is the combination of sounds into syllables that allows us to distinguish between ‘a nice man’ and ‘an iceman’ or between ‘keepsticking’ and keeps ticking. Usually context is sufficient to clarify the meaning. But as an effective speaker one needs to be aware of this feature to avoid ambiguity on the part of the listener.
Articulation and pronunciation
It is very much true that an intelligible speech is an asset to one’s personality; it increases one’s effectiveness as a speaker and is invaluable in professional relationships. As a learner in a speech course, one should be aware that one couldn’t afford to have speech that is substandard in anyway because of its influence upon one’s own oral communication. Lilywhite, Phelps, and Bosye, who surveyed 1,004 successful teachers on this point, found that 80.5 percent regarded “ speaking with correct articulation and pronunciation ” as the most significant aspect of speech ability in influencing their pupils to speak correctly and clearly.
Robinson,K.F. and A.B. Becker in ‘Effective Speech for the Teacher’ describes three main types of articulatory errors:
1) Omissions: leave out sounds
e.g. dint for didn’t
Goverment for government
2) Substitutions: replace a correct sound with an incorrect one.
e.g. dis, dat instead of these, that
3) Distortion: approximate the correct sound but fail to produce it exactly.
They have also identified some mistakes or misuses of speech sounds in pronunciation that are the same as these in articulation.
A) Stress the wrong syllable.
B) Place the sound in the wrong syllable.
C) Misuse one or more consonant sounds
English is said to have a stress-timed rhythm. This means that in an English utterance, the strong or prominent or accented syllables have the tendency to occur at regular intervals of time, irrespective of the number of weak or unaccented syllables between any two accented syllables. Another important aspect of English rhythm is weak forms. The weak forms exhibit reduction of the length of sounds, weakening of the vowels in them and also in the elision of vowels and consonants.
Juncture
The difference between nitrate, night rate and Nye trait is juncture. It is the combination of sounds into syllables that allows us to distinguish between ‘a nice man’ and ‘an iceman’ or between ‘keepsticking’ and keeps ticking. Usually context is sufficient to clarify the meaning. But as an effective speaker one needs to be aware of this feature to avoid ambiguity on the part of the listener.
Articulation and pronunciation
It is very much true that an intelligible speech is an asset to one’s personality; it increases one’s effectiveness as a speaker and is invaluable in professional relationships. As a learner in a speech course, one should be aware that one couldn’t afford to have speech that is substandard in anyway because of its influence upon one’s own oral communication. Lilywhite, Phelps, and Bosye, who surveyed 1,004 successful teachers on this point, found that 80.5 percent regarded “ speaking with correct articulation and pronunciation ” as the most significant aspect of speech ability in influencing their pupils to speak correctly and clearly.
Robinson,K.F. and A.B. Becker in ‘Effective Speech for the Teacher’ describes three main types of articulatory errors:
1) Omissions: leave out sounds
e.g. dint for didn’t
Goverment for government
2) Substitutions: replace a correct sound with an incorrect one.
e.g. dis, dat instead of these, that
3) Distortion: approximate the correct sound but fail to produce it exactly.
They have also identified some mistakes or misuses of speech sounds in pronunciation that are the same as these in articulation.
A) Stress the wrong syllable.
B) Place the sound in the wrong syllable.
C) Misuse one or more consonant sounds
D) Misuse one or more vowel sounds.
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