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The distinctive and non-distinctive features of English consonants.


distinctive = relevant / non-distinctive = irrelevant
Those of the feauters that remain constant despite the varying environment are distinctive, phonologically relevant ones.

*** Those of the features that remain unchanged despite the changing environment are distinctive, phonologically significant.
Distinctive features of English consonants are:

manner of articulation way in which the obstruction of the airstream is produced (occlusives – 2 articulators form a complete closure which is suddenly released, constrictives – the 2 articulators come close together forming a stricture, affricates)
place of articulation– the location in the vocal tract where a particular speech sound is produced (labial: bilabial/labio-dental, lingual: dental/interdental/alveolar/palato-alveolar/post-alveolar, glottal)
degree of noise – noise, sonorants
NON- DIST he following characteristics are not important from the phonological point of view but still very important for the articulation of sounds:
1) palatalization – softening of the consonants due to the rising of the back of the tongue to the hard palate

2) aspiration - puff of air following the release of a plosive

3) nasalization– pronounce or utter (a speech sound) with the breath resonating in the nose

4. 
   Problems of the phonemic inventory ['ɪnv(ə)ntrɪ] of English vowels.

There are 44 sounds ( or phonemes) In English, which are divided into 24 consonants (26 in some sourses) and 20 vowels, including 8 diphthongs.

Difficulties arise with weakened vowels in unstressed position. It primarily concerns the schwa [ʃwɑ:] "neutral" vowel /ə/ in English which occurs only in unstressed position. Scholars aren't in agreement on if there is a schwa vowel / ǝ / phoneme in English. this point.

• 
  From one side / ǝ / can be opposed only to weakened vowel in unstressed syllables (partially reduced due to their position);
• 
  From the other side it forms phonological oppositions with other phonemes and distinguishes words: accept [ək'sept] – except [ɪk'sept]; armor ['ɑ:mə] - army ['ɑ:mɪ];
• 
  It is sometimes considered that / ǝ / is an allophone of / ʌ /.

There are controversial views on if / j / and / w / in English are allophones of / ɪ / and / u / or they are separate phonemes. American linguists treat them as allophones on account of their weakness and unstable articulatory features. Other scholars treat / j / and / w / as phonemes, because

1) they can form phonological oppositions with each other and other phonemes (“yell” – “well”, “yet” – “met”, “wheat” – “meat ”);

2) / j / and / w / in English occur in phonetic positions that are generally occupied by consonant phonemes.
The phonemic status of the English diphthongs and the so-called "triphthongs".
From the articulatory point of view an English diphthongis an indivisible phonetic whole + neither the point of syllable division nor a morpheme boundary can separate the glide of an English diphthong from its nucleus. The syllabic and articulatory [ɑ:'tɪkjulət(ə)rɪ] indivisibility of English diphthongs and their duration which does not exceed the duration of English historically long vowels /i:, u:, ɔ:, ɑ:, ɜ:/, clearly determine their monophonemic character in English.

As for "triphthongs" /aɪǝ/, /aʊǝ/ should be regarded as biphonemic clusters of a diphthong with the schwa vowel. it has been proven that in English they cannot be considered monophonemic as diphtongs. They are not produced by a single articulatory effort, as there is an increase in the force of articulation and intensity not only for the first element, but for the last element as well. The syllabic division generally occurs in between the diphthong and the schwa vowel (as in "flier", "flower").

As the diphthong /ɒǝ/ is not used by all RP speakers (only some RP speakers differentiate words as "pour [pɔ: = pɒǝ] - paw [pɔ:]" “pour - paw”). It is called optional phoneme. But since it is used by many RP speakers as phoneme, VAVassilyev includes it into the phonemic inventory and states that in RP there are 21 vowel phonemes.

4. 
   Problems of the phonemic inventory of English consonants.

There are 44 sounds ( or phonemes) In English, which are divided into 24 consonants (26 in some sourses) and 20 vowels, including 8 diphthongs.

There are controversial views on if / j / and / w / in English are allophones of / ɪ / and / u / or they are separate phonemes. American linguists treat them as allophones on account of their weakness and unstable articulatory features. Other scholars treat / j / and / w / as phonemes, because 1) they can form phonological oppositions with each other and other phonemes (“yell” – “well”, “yet” – “met”, “wheat” – “meat ”); 2) / j / and / w / in English occur in phonetic positions that are generally occupied by consonant phonemes.

There are cases when the establishment of phonological oppositions is not sufficient to determine the phonemic status of a sound, especially with a complex nature.

In the English language the sounds /ʧ/, /ʤ/, /tr/, /dr/, /ts/, /dz/ form phonological oppositions and distinguish such words as "eat – each", "head – hedge", " tie - try", "die - dry", "hat - hats", "buzz - buds" But does that mean that all of them are monophonemic and should be included into the phonemic inventory? (N. Trubetzkoy) state that, firstly, a phoneme is indivisible, as no syllabic division can occur within a phoneme. Secondly, a phoneme is produced by one articulatory effort. Thirdly, the duration of a phoneme should not exceed that of other phonemes in the language. "the duration of a phoneme should not exceed the duration of other phonemes in the language."

Followed, /ʧ/ and /ʤ/ in words like "cheese, each, jail, hedge" are monophonemic: these sounds are produced by one articulatory effort, their duration does not exceed the duration of either /t/ (as in "tear "), or /ʃ/ (as in "share"), or /d/ (as in "dare"). + in words like "cheese, each, jail, hedge", no syllabic division occurs within the sounds /ʧ/and/ʤ/.

/ts/,biphonemic combinations (ie combinations of two phonemes), because their duration exceeds the average duration of either /t/, /d/, /s/ or /z/.

As for /tr/, /dr/ (as in "tree, dream") their phonemic status will remain undecided until special acoustic and physiological analysis is made. Most phoneticians regard /tr/ and /dr/ as biphonemic clusters . As /t/ - /r/ and /d/ - /r/ are so closely linked in the pronunciation, D.Jones calls them affricates . He distinguished them from sequences /t/+/r/ and /d/ + /r/ as in "rest-room, hand-writing".

As the labiovelar fricative /ʍ/is not used by all RP speakers (only some RP speakers differentiate words as "which - witch"). There is the distinction between the labiovelar glide [w] and the labiovelar fricative [hw] transcribed [ʍ]. It is called optional phoneme. But since it is used by meny RP speakers as phoneme, VAVassilyev includes it into the phonemic inventory and states that in RP there are 25 consonant phonemes.

4. 
   Types of phonetic transcription.

A transcription 1) is a visual system of notation of the sound structure of speech, 2) is a generalization of a great variety of sounds that are uttered by speakers of a given language. There may be different types of transcriptions depending on the degree of exactness required.
Broad transcription (or phonemic transcription): 1) represents only the phonemes of a language; 2) ignores as many details as possible, capturing only enough aspects of a pronunciation to show how that word differs from other words in the language. The phonemic data is usually enclosed between virgules ['vɜ:gju:lz]: / /.

Phonetic, or narrow transcriptiondifferents the allophones of each phoneme. It includes special symbols to denote particular allophones (members of phonemes). The phonetic data is customarily enclosed in square brackets: [ ].

A phonetic transcription is essential for scientific and practical use. One can hardly do without it in foreign language teaching, in studying spoken languages, dialects, accents. The modern phonetic transcription that is most widely used now is the International Phonetic Transcriptiondevised [dɪ'vaɪz] "invented" by the International Phonetic Association in 1904. This transcription is a phonetic alphabet, which may be applied to most of the languages. That is why it contains symbols that stand for "apply to" phonemes in different languages. For this reason the transcription is often referred to as the "universa I transcription" of the IPA (International Phonetic Association).

One of the principles of this transcription is to use the fewest possible symbols of the simplest possible shape. Most of the symbols it uses are letters of the Latin alphabet. Besides, it contains a series of diacritic marks.

4. 
   The syllable as a phonetic / phonological unit. Structural peculiarities of the English syllable.

Hierarchically [ˌhaɪǝ'rɑːkɪklɪ] speech is devided on the segmentation => utterance => intonation group => phonological word => syllable. The syllable is the smallest pronunciation (articulatory) unit. Boundaries between syllables are marked by the alternation of increases / decreases in articulatory tension.

• 
  As a phonetic unit the syllable is a minimal grouping of vowels and consonants necessary for articulation.

When we talk about phonetic definition of the syllable, we focus on its articulation and perception or, in other words, on its formation, identification and delimitation in connected speech. Thus the 2 aspects of the phonetic definition are syllable formation and syllable devision with universal application to all languages.

• 
  As a phonological unit the syllable can be defined as a minimal pattern of phoneme combination with a vowels as nucleus, preceded and followed by consonant or a permit-ted combination. It can be defined and described only with reference to a particular language.

Structural peculiarities of the English syllable.

Syllable formation in English is based on the phonological opposition of vowels and consonants. Vowels are always syllabic, they occupy a central position in the syllable. Consonants are non-syllabic.

1 . The sounds / w, r, j /, despite their strong vocalic features, function as consonants, occurring only before the vowel, eg /ˈwɪn-tǝ/, /'ri:-dǝ/, /jɑ:d/.

2. / I, m, n / normally function as consonants, in various sound combinations before the vowel. But in unstressed final position, when preceded by a noise consonant, they are syllabic, eg /petl/ "petal", /blɒsm/ "blossom',' /laɪtn/ "lighten".

3. Short vowels /ɪ, e, æ, ʌ, ɒ, ʊ, ǝ/ never occur in stressed final position without the following consonant. the vowels /ɪ, ǝ/ can occur as final in unstressed position.

4. Historically short vowels under stress (checked vowels) occur only in a closed syllable VC, are always followed by a consonant. So the syllabic boundary never occurs after these vowels.

• 
  it lies after the following consonant, as in lovely ['lʌv-lɪ], goodness ['gud-nɪs]
• 
  or within it, if it is the only consonant between the checked vowel and the succeeding vowel: letter ['letə], bigger ['bɪgə], shilling ['ʃɪlɪŋ]. The preceding and following vowels attract this consonant and consonant is split into two.

5. Historically long monophthongs, diphthongs and unstressed short monophthongs (free vowels) can occur both in the open CV and in the closed VC syllable: tiny ['taɪ-nɪ].

6. When a free vowel is separated from a succeeding vowel by only one consonant sound, syllable in which such a vowel occurs, is always open: idea [aɪ-'dɪə], cartoon [kɑ:-'tu:n], erect [ɪ-'rekt].

7. When a post-stressed short vowel is separated from a succeeding vowel by a single consonant, the boundary is most likely, before the consonant, because the short vowel is free in unstressed position: family ['fæm-ɪ-lɪ], policy ['pɔl-ɪ-sɪ], possibility ['pɔs-ɪ-'bɪl-ɪ-tɪ].

8.When there is a cluster of consonants between 2 vowels, the place of the syllabic boundary is conditioned by if this cluster is permitted at the beginning of words or not. If [gr] does occur in initial position in English in the syllabic boundary is before it: agree [ə'-gri:], regret [rɪ'-gret].

9. The clusters [dm], [dv] do not occur word-initially and cannot occur at the beginning of a syllable. The syllabic boundary is therefore between the consonants constituting the clusters: admit [əd'-mɪt], advice [əd'vaɪs].

10. When two vowels are separated by more than two consonants as in extra ['ek-strə] ['eks-trə] the boundary may be both before [s] and [t] because both [str] and [tr] occur at the beginning of words and [ks] can occur in final position.

11. The so called triphthongs in English are disyllabic combinations, because they contain two vowel phonemes: science ['saɪ-əns], flower ['flau-ə].

Depending on the position of consonants (C) in relation to the vowel (V), there are 4 types of syllables:

1) open syllable (CV), when there is no consonant after the vowel, e.g. be – [bi:], far – [fα:], tie – [tai], sea – [si:];

2) closed syllable (VC), when the vowel is followed by a consonant, e.g. art – [ɑ:t], sit – [sit], life – [laɪf];

3) covered syllable (CV(C), when the vowel is preceded by a consonant, eg say - [seɪ], like - [laɪk], shore - [ʃɔ:]; 4) uncovered syllable (V(C), when there is no consonant before the vowel, eg or [o:], I [aɪ], eat – [i:t]. Rhyme
[ raɪm ] – right branch splits into Nucleus a vowel or syllabic consonant and Coda consonant.

4. 
   Theories of syllable formation and syllable division.

The syllable is a complicated phenomenon, which gave rise to many theories.

The expiratory [ɪk'spaɪ(ə)rət(ə)rɪ], or chest pulse theory (by Stetson) defines the syllable as a sound or a group of sounds that are pronounced in one chest pulse, accompanied [ə'kʌmp(ə )nɪ] by increases in air pressure. *** A syllable is defined as a sound or group of sounds that are pronounced in one chest pulse, accompanied by an increase in air pressure.

According to this definition, there are as many syllables in a word as there are chest pulses (expirations) made during the utterance of the word. Each vowel sound is pronounced with increased expiration. consequently, vowels are always syllabic. Boundaries between syllables are in the place where there occur changes in the air pressure.

The relative sonority [sə'nɔrɪtɪ] of relative sonority theory, or the prominence theory, created by O. Jespersen, considers that sounds tend to group themselves according to their sonority. Pronounced with uniform force, length and pitch, speech sounds differ in sonority (prominence, audibility or carrying power - loudness, audibility or carrying capacity). O. Jespersen classifies sounds according to the degree of sonority in the following way beginning with:

• 
  the most sonorous ['sɒnərəs] sounds are: Open vowels /ɑ:, ɔ:, ɒ, æ/; Mid vowels /e, ə, ʌ, ɜ:/; Close vowels /i:, ɪ, u:, ʊ/
• 
  less sonorous are: Sonants /w, j/ and /l, r, m, n, ŋ/
• 
  the least sonorous are noise consonants: Voiced fricatives /v, z, ʒ, ð/; Voiced stops /b, d, g/; Voiceless fricatives and affricates /ʃ, ʤ, ʧ, Ɵ, f, s, h/; Voiceless stops /p, t, k/.

Sounds are grouped around the most sonorous ones, ie vowels (and sometimes sonants) which form the peak of sonority in a syllable. One peak of sonority is separated from another peak by sounds of lower sonority, ie consonants. Thus in the word /melt/ "melt" there is one peak of sonority /e/ and the word is monosyllabic. In the word /metl/ "metal" there are two peaks of sonority - /e/ and /I/, separated by the least sonorous /t/, and consequently, there are two syllables.

The most widespread among Soviet linguists is the muscular tension (or the articulatory effort) theorywhich is known as Shcherba's theory: a syllable is characterized by in muscular variations tension. The energy of articulation increases at the beginning of a syllable, reaches its maximum with the vowel (or the sonant) and decreases towards the end of the syllable. The boundaries between syllables are determined by the occurrence of the lowest articulatory energy.

Consonants within a syllable are characterized by a different distribution of muscular tension. In accordance with this, L. Schherba distinguished the following three types of consonants.

1) Initially strong consonants, the end is weaker (the end of a closed syllable - ɪt, ʌs, pɪn, sæd, pɑ:t).

2)Finally strong consonants, the end is more energetic (at the beginning of a syllable - mi:, taɪ, pɑ:t, sæd).

3) Double-peaked consonants, in the articulation of which both the beginning and the end are energetic, the middle is weak (pennaɪf, ðættaɪm, mɪddeɪ).

N. Zhinkin has worked out the so-called loudness theorywith 2 level where "the arc of loudness" and "the arc of articulatory effort" are involved. On the perception level the syllable is defined as an arc of actual loudness. The experiments showed that the organ responsible for the variations in loudness of a 555harynx ['færicks] throat. The narrowing of the pharyngeal [færin'dʒɪ:əl] passage and the resulting increase in muscular tension of its walls reinforce [ri:ɪn'fɔ:s] amplify the actual loudness of the vowel thus forming the peak of the syllable, while the loudness of the marginal consonants is weakened has been weakened.

14. The notion of the orthoepic [ˌɔːθəʊˈɛpɪk] norm. Received [rɪ'si:v] Pronunciation (RP). present-day situation.

The orthoepic norm (ON) of a language is the standard pronunciation adopted by native speakers as the right and proper way of speaking. Generally it's spoken by the educated people in the capital. 2 main conditions that are necessary for a variety of pronunciation to be accepted as the norm 1) wide currency, 2) conformity to the main phonetic tendencies and social acceptability.

ON is not constantconstant and fixed for all centuries and generations. The non-standard prosodic patterns and regional variants of pronunciation constantly influence the orthoepic norm. New pronunciations are included into the norm, some of the pronunciations fall out of use: "chemist" / 'kemɪst/, "chemistry" /'kemɪstri/ were pronounced as /kɪmɪst/, /'kɪmɪstri/.

The orthoepic norm always includes a set of stylistic variants of pronunciation, which are 'acceptable' only in certain circumstances (conversational style, official style, etc). The pronouncing dictionaries record the well-established pronunciations as first variants. The less frequent variants of pronunciation are generally recorded as secondary variants.

The prosodic normis an important component of the orthoepic norm. As we examine the prosodic features of speech we realize that there is a generally-agreed norm of loudness and a recognized norm of tempo which cultured speakers do not deviate from. But there are certain pitch patterns that give a local accent to speech. For example, short and sharp tones, stoccato [stə'kɔ:təʊ] delivery occur more frequently in the speech of Welshmen.

It is generally considered that the ON of British English is "Received Pronunciation" (RP) , though it is not the only variety of British English pronunciation that is recognized as the ON in present-day Britain.

Received Pronunciation (RP)was accepted as the phonetic norm of English about a century ago. It is mainly based on the Southern English regional type of pronunciation, but it has developed its own features which have given it a non-regional character, ie there is no region in Britain to which it is native.

RP is spoken all over Britain by a relatively small number of Englishmen – the most privileged ['prɪvɪlɪʤ] education, public school education, all the leading positions in the Cabinet, the armed forces, the judiciary. RP is actually a social standard pronunciation of English that is often referred to as the 'prestige accent'. Many features of RP have been studied in the Soviet Union. That is why it is RP, or Southern English Pronunciation, that is often accepted as the teaching standard in many countries where English is taught as a foreign language.

But there are many educated people in Britain who do not speak RP, though their English is good and correct. They speak Standard English with a regional type of pronunciation. D. Abercrombie divides English people by the way they talk into 3 groups:

1) RP speakers of Standard English (those who speak Standard English without any local accent);

2) non-RP speakers of Standard English (those who speak Standard English with a regional accent);

3) dialect speakers.

In present-day English the number of local dialects is being reduced to more or less general, regional types. Every regional type of pronunciation is characterized by features that are common to all the dialects used in the region. In British English phoneticians generally distinguish 3 main regional types of pronunciation: Southern, Northern and Scottish regional types of English pronunciation. Besides, there may by a non-regional type of pronunciation that is not native to any particular locality in the country. British English pronunciation is exposed to external influence. On British television and screen, there is a lot of American speech which works against the standardization of the pronunciation, especially among the younger generation.

15. Geographical factors of phonetic variation. National and regional variants of English pronunciation.

The pronunciation of almost every locality in the British Isles has peculiar features that distinguish it from the pronunciation of other localities. In British English phoneticians generally distinguish 3 main regional types of pronunciation: Southern, Northern and Scottish regional types of English pronunciation. There may by non-regional type of pronunciation that is not native to any particular locality in the country.

***Dialects have some peculiarities in pronunciation, vocabulary and grammatical structure (accent is an element of a dialect, it refers to how people pronounce words).

Among the most well-known dialects one should mention Cockney (spoken by the less educated part of the Londoners), Geordie ['ʤɔ:dɪ] (heard in Newcastle-on-Tyne), Scouse [skaus] (the Liverpool dialect), Cornish dialect (in Cornwall) and others.

One of the types of pronunciation, generally the one that is spoken by the educated people in the capital, is recognized as " Received Pronunciation" (RP). It is mainly based on the Southern English regional type of pronunciation.

The Standard Scottish English (SSE) is also based on the dialects spoken in Scotland which vary among themselves in some respects. Their common features, which distinguish the Scottish type of pronunciation from RP, are as follows:

VOWELS

• 
  PR 7 short, 5 long, 8 dipht, 5 thriph. / Scottish 10 short, no long (pairs like beat and bit are of the same length.) f/i/, /ɪ/, /ə/, /ɛ/, /ɑ/, /ɔ/, /ʉ/, /o/, /a/, /ə/ and /ʌ/, and 3 diphthongs of /aɪ/, /ʌʉ/ and /ɔe/).

• 
  / ɜ:/ is not used in the Scottish type of pronunciation, instead of RP /ɜ:/ they use the sequences /ir/, /er/ or /ʌr/ (e.g. "bird" /bird/, "heard /herd/, "word" /wʌrd/. Similarly monophthongs are used instead of diphthongs in "beard", "there", "pure", "poor", "sure", etc.
• 
  /u/ is used instead of /au/ (e.g. "down" /dun/).
• 
  The Scottish pronunciation does not distinguish between /æ/ and / ɑ:/; words like "bad", "path", "grass", "dance", "half", "part" are pronounced with /æ/, /a/ or /ɒ/.
• 
  All vowels are short. There is no distinction in the length of the vowels in words like "pull" and "pool", "cot" and "caught", with the exception that the vowel in inflected words is not as short as the vowel in non-infected words ("road" - "rowed", "greed" - "agreed")

CONSONANTS

• 
  Scottish type of pronunciation is a rhotic: /r/ is pronounced in the syllable coda as an alveolar flap after vowels as in "word", "born".
• 
  Plosives are generally less aspirated. /p/, /t/, /k/ are generally not aspirated.
• 
  Non-initial /t/ comes with /t/ glottalization. Thus the word like sentimental is pronounced /ˈsɛnʔɪˈmɛnʔl/.
• 
  In Urban Scots /θ/ has the traditional variant /h/ such as in think, which may also be completely deleted such as in the word both.
• 
  Onset /hw/ is still common in wh words. It is used to distinguish between "which" and "witch", "whine" and "wine", e.g. /hwiʧ/ for which, etc.
• 
  In the Scottish type of pronunciation, there appears a backlingual fricative /x/, which resembles the corresponding Russian sound (e.g. "loch"). There are certain peculiarities in the intonation of the Scottish type of English pronunciation, such as

(a) Special Questions may end with a high level tone after a fall on the interrogative word, eg

RP. 'Who's 'having the `grapefruit?

Scot. `Who's having the 'grapefruit?

(b) A final vocative does not necessarily continue the tune of the General Questions, eg

RP. ˈWill you ˈin to ˊlunch, Mr. Brown?

Scot. ˈWill you be ˌin to ˊlunch, ˌMr. Brown?


16. American English pronunciation. Peculiarities of General American pronunciation compared to British English.

American English (AE), which is a variant of the English language, has developed its own peculiarities in vocabulary, grammatical structure, and pronunciation. Today dialectal differences have been reduced to fewer, more or less general, regional types. The most widely used regional types of AE pronunciation are the Eastern, the Southern, and the General American types, the latter spoken mainly in the Middle Atlantic States Region.

The GA (General American) pronunciation is usually referred to as the standard pronunciation of AE. The GA has the greatest "acceptability" & prestige in the United States.

1. 
   Peculiarities of pronunciation of GA sounds and sound combinations as compared to those of RP.

CONSONATS

• 
  Rhoticity – GA is rhotic while RP is non-rhotic; that is, the phoneme /r/ is only pronounced in RP when it is immediately followed by a vowel sound.
• 
  /t/ is voiced between a vowel and a sonorant, or between 2 vowels the second of which is unstressed.
• 
  In GA a /t/ or a /d/ occurs between a sonorant phoneme (as in "battle", "twenty") and an unstressed vowel phoneme (as in "pity", better"), it is realized as an alveolar-flap allophone [ɾ]. This sounds like a /d/ to RP speakers.
• 
  Yod-dropping occurs in GA at the onset of stressed syllables: /j/ after /n/ “new” is RP /njuː/, GA /nu/; after /t/, /d/: e.g. due is RP /djuː/, GA /du/.

(c) /l/ is always dark, even before vowels (eg "film, look");

(d) /ʃ/ is voiced in words like "excursion" lʒnl, "version" /ʒn/;

(e) /h/ is often dropped in weak syllables, but it is retained when the syllable is stressed (eg "I saw him"/ai 'so :im/, but "him" /him/);

(g) /d/ is dropped after /l/ and /n/ ( eg "cold", "old", "individual");

(h) /k/ is omitted before /t/ (eg "asked" /ˈæst/);

(i) the glottal [glɔtl] stop /?/ is used instead of /t/ before /m, n, I, r, j, w/ (eg "certainly" / sɜ:? nli/, "that one" / ða?wan/, etc.).

VOWELS

• 
  RP has a marked degree of contrast of length between "short" and "long" vowels . In GA this contrast is somewhat less evident and non-phonemic, so the IPA length symbol (ː) is often omitted.
• 
  RP has the back unrounded open vowel /ɑː/ in many words, GA has a front open unrounded vowel /æ/; sound occurs typically when followed by: /nt/, /ntʃ/, /ns/, /s/, /f/, or /θ/ (e.g. aunt, pass, laugh, path). Exceptions: "father, palm, balm, alms")'.
• 
  GA speakers use /ɑ/ for both the RP /ɒ/ (spot) and /ɑː/ (spa): the father–bother merger. Nearly half of American speakers additionally use the same vowel for the RP /ɔː/.
• 
  The "long o" (as in boat) is realised differently: GA back first element [oʊ]; RP central first element [əʊ]. (n) /u ǝ/ tends to be monophthongized. (e.g. "usually" / juʒali/, "rural"/'rural/).
• 
  The GA /ǝ/ phoneme occurs both in stressed syllables (as in "but", "son", "blood") and in unstressed syllables (as in unstressed "of", "was", "does").

2) Peculiarities in the stress patterns of words in GA as compared to RP. American speakers make much greater use of secondary stress in polysyllabic words than British speakers do. In words which end in "-ary", "-ory". "-ery", "-mony", "-active" the first syllable in the suffix bears tertiary ['tɜ:ʃ(ə)rɪ] stress (ie stress which is somewhat weaker than secondary stress). Eg 'dictioֽˌnary, 'terriˌtory.

17. The syllable as a prosodic [prə'sɔdik] unit. Word stress, its nature and functions. Linguistically relevant types of word stress.

The SYLLABLE is the smallest prosodic unit. It has no meaning of its own, but it is significant for constituting hierarchically [ˌhaɪǝ'rɑːkɪklɪ] higher prosodic units (utterance => intonation group => phonological word => syllable). Prosodic features of the syllable (tone, stress, duration) depend on its position and function in the rhythmic unit and in the utterance.

A rhythmic unit is either 1 stressed syllable or a stressed syllable with a number of unstressed ones grouped around it. The stressed syllable is the nucleus of the rhythmic unit. There are as many rhythmic units in an utterance as there are stressed syllables in it. The unstressed syllables are called CLITICS. Those preceding the stressed syllable - PROCLITICS, those following it - ENCLITICS.

***

There may beone prominent, two equally, two unequally prominent syllables or more prominent syllables (inˈunreˌliaˈbility). And this correlation of degrees of prominence of the syllables in a word forms the stress pattern of the word, which is often called the accentual structure of a word.

Word stress should not be confused with utterance stress. The placement of utterance stress is primarily conditioned by the situational and linguistic context, conditioned by the speaker's intention, semantically important. As for the stress pattern of a word, it is conditioned only by pronunciation tendencies and the orthoepic norm.

• 
  a constitutive function, without a definite stress pattern a word ceases to be a word and becomes a sequence of syllables.
• 
  a distinctive function in English, because there exist different words in English with an analogous sound structure which are differentiated in speech only by their stress patterns.
• 
  an identifiсatогу function as well, because the stress patterns of words enable people to identify definite combinations of sounds as meaningful linguistic units.

The type of word stress in English

Instrumental investigations show that a polysyllabic word has as many degrees of prominence as there are syllables in it. The problem is to determine which of these degrees are linguistically relevant. There are two views on the matter. D. Jones, R. Kingdon, V. Vassilyev) consider that there are 3 degrees of word stress in English:

• 
  primary (or strong stress),
• 
  secondary (or partial stress, in words with 4 or more syllables:ˌqualifiˈcation)
• 
  weak (the so-called "unstressed" syllables have weak stress).

All these degrees of stress are linguistically relevant as there are words in English the meanings of which depend upon the occurrence of either of the three degrees in their stress patterns.

But auditory analysis shows that there are certain positions in the stress patterns of English words where the vowel generally remains unobscured and its duration is considerable, though the syllable it occurs in does not actually bear primary or secondary stress.

On this account some American linguists (G. Trager, A. Hill) distinguish four degrees of word stress:

• 
  primary stress (as in "cupboard"),
• 
  secondary stress (as in "discrimination"), occurs before the primary
• 
  tertiary stress ['tɜ:ʃ(ə)rɪ] (as in "analyze"), occurs after the primary stress
• 
  weak stress (as in "cupboard", but very often the weakly stressed syllable is left unmarked).

Though the second view seems to be more exact, the distinction between secondary and tertiary degrees of stress is too subtle to be noticed by an untrained ear.

Linguistically, tertiary word stress can be taken for a variant of secondary word stress, as there are no words in English the meanings of which depend on whether their stress pattern is characterized by either secondary or tertiary stress.

That is why the stress pattern of English words may be defined as a correlation of three degrees of stress.

18. 
    The accentual tendencies in English. Basic word stress patterns in English.

The stress patterns of most English words are regular & stable (is said to be free ). It is free in the sense that stress is not fixed to any particular syllable in all the words of the language. There are more than 100 stress patterns in English, which are grouped into 11 main types. The most common among them are:

• 
  ┴ (words with one primary stress as in “ˈafter”),
• 
  ┴ ┴ (words with two primary stresses as in “ˈweek-ˈend”),
• 
  ┯ and ┴ (words with one primary and one secondary stress as in “ˈhair-ˌdresser, ˌmagaˈzine”).

They are the most productive types of stress patterns too, as borrowings and new words that appear in English are generally stressed accordingly. The remaining accentual structures (┴ ┴ ┴ “ˈUˈSˈA”, ┴ ┴ ┯ “ˈunˈseaˌworthy” [ʌn'si:'wɜ:ðɪ], ┴ ┯ ┴ “ˈmisˌinˈterpret”, ┴ ┯ ┯ “ˈunˌcircumˌcision”, ┯ ┯ ┯ ┴ ┯ “ˌgingerˈbeer-ˌbottle”) are less common in English (alternation of primary and secondary stress in abbreviations, complex word etc). There are 2 main accentuation tendencies in English: the recessive [rɪ'sesɪv] and the rhythmic.

1. According to the recessive tendency, stress falls on the 1st syllable which is generally the root syllable ("mother", "father", "ready"), or on the 2nd syllable that has a prefix of no special meaning ("be'come", forˈgive, beˈhind" 2. In the English language a considerable part of the vocabulary consists of monosyllabic words, some of which are stressed, others not (in connected speech). This created the rhythmic tendency to alternate stressed and unstressed syllables. According to the rhythmic tendency, stress is on the 3rd syllable from the end (''in'tensity", possiˈbility"). It is the usual way of stressing 4-syllable words (eg "poˈlitical, deˈmocracy, iˈdentify, comˈparison").

In words with more than 4 syllables we very often find the influence ofboth the rhythmic and the recessive tendencies (eg ˌindiˈvisible, ˌineˌfficiency, ˌphysiˈology, ˌphonoˈlogical). In rapid speech the 2 tendencies very often coincide as one of the vowels is dropped (ˈterit(o)ry, 'diction(a)ry, 'lit(e)rature,ˈtemp(e)rature).

In some polysyllabic words, there is a tendency to avoid a succession of weak syllables, especially if these have /ǝ/ or /i/. As a result, there appears a stress shift with a rhythmic alternation of stressed and unstressed syllables. This tendency is clearly evident in the new pronunciation of the following words:

' exquisite or exˈquisite [ɪk'skwɪzɪt],

' precedence['presɪd(ə)ns] or preˈcedence,

ˈsonorous or soˈnorous ['sɒnərəs, sə'nɔːrəs],

ˈhospitably ['hɔspitəbli] or hosˈpitably

It has also been noticed that the stress of the parent word is often retained in the derivatives. cf. 'personal -ˌpersoˈnality, ˈnation - ˌnatioˈnality. This regularity is sometimes called the retentive tendency.

The tendency to stress the most important elements. Such meaningful prominence is given to:

• 
  negative prefixes "un-", "in-", "mis-" (eg "unknown", "inartistic", "misbehave"),
• 
  prefixes as "ex-", "vice-", "sub-", "under-", (e.g. "ex-president”, "vice-president", "sub-editor", "under-mine"),
• 
  suffix "-teen" (e.g. "thirteen", "fourteen"),
• 
  semantically important elements in compound words (e.g. well-known", "red-hot", "bad-tempered").

19. Speech prosody. Its acoustic properties and perceptible qualities.
Speech Prosody studies intonation and related phenomena, including pitch, stress, tempo, rhythm and timbre of a voice.

PROSODY studies properties of speech, not individual phonetic segments (vowels and consonants) but syllables and larger units of speech (intonational groups and utterances).

20. The notions of prosody and intonation. The linguistic functions of utterance prosody (intonation).

Phoneticians define intonation as a complex unity of speech melody, sentence stress, tempo, rhythm and voice timbre ['tɪmbə], which allows the speaker to express his thoughts, emotions and attitudes towards the contents of the utterance and the hearer. Speech melody, sentence stress, tempo, rhythm and timbre are all components of intonation.

Alongside the term " intonation " the term " prosody " is widely used. "Prosody" denotes non-segmental phenomena, ie those which do not enter into the system of segmental phonemes. It studies such parameters of speech as pitch, loudness, duration and silence. It can be applied to the utterance, intonation groups, the word, the syllable.

The prosody of the utterance performs a number of functions, the basic of which are constitutive ['kɔnstɪtju:tɪv] forming, distinctive and identificatory [aɪ'dentɪfɪ'keɪtrɪ].

1. The constitutive function is to form utterances as communicative units. Prosody unifies words into utterances, giving the final form without which they cannot exist. Prosody forms all communicative types of utterances - statements, questions, imperatives, exclamations and modal (attitudinal) types and phonetic styles of speech.

2. The distinctive function of prosody manifests itself in several particular functions. These are communicative-distinctive, modal-distinctive, culminative-distinctive, stylistic-distinctive functions.

• 
  The communicative-distinctive function is to differentiate the communicative types of utterances (statements, questions, exclamations, imperatives).
• 
  The modal-distinctive differentiates modal meanings of utterance.
• 
  The culminative-distinctive (logical) function of prosody manifests itself in differentiating the location of the semantic nucleus of utterances and other semantically important words. This function is often called, predictive and accentual.
• 
  Stylistic-distinctive function of prosody manifests itself in that prosody differentiates pronunciation (phonetic) styles.

3. The identificatory function of prosody is to provide a basis for the hearer's identification of the communicative and modal type of an utterance, its semantic and syntactical structure with the situation of the discourse.

All the functions of prosody are fulfilled simultaneously and cannot be separated one from another.

21. 
    The components (subsystems) of utterance prosody and units of their analysis.

One of the basic problems in the study of prosody is to determine the units in which prosodic features are actualized.

The syllable is widely recognized to be the smallest prosodic unit. It has no meaning of its own, but it is significant for constituting hierarchically [ˌhaɪǝ'rɑːkɪklɪ] higher prosodic units. Prosodic features of the syllable (tone, stress, duration) depend on its position and function in the rhythmic unit and in the utterance.

A rhythmic, or accentual, unit (or group) is either one stressed syllable or a stressed syllable with a number of unstressed ones grouped around it.

The stressed syllable is the nucleus of the rhythmic unit. There are as many rhythmic units in an utterance as there are stressed syllables in it. The unstressed syllables are clitics. Those preceding the stressed syllable are called proclitics , and those following it are enclitics.

The intonation group is higher than the rhythmic unit. Structurally it has some obligatory formal characteristics. These are the nuclear stress, on the semantically most important word and the terminal tone (ie pitch variations on the nucleus and the tail if any). The boundaries between intonation groups are marked by tonal junctures and pauses. All these features shape form the intonation group, delimit one intonation group from another and show its relative semantic importance.

The intonation group is a meaningful unit. Its structure varies depending on the number of syllables and rhythmic units in it. Minimally, an intonation group consists of one (stressed) syllable - the nucleus. Maximally, it contains the prehead, the head, the nucleus and the tail. H.Palmer was the first to single out the consecutive structural elements of the intonation group ("tone—group") — "head" (scale), "nucleus" and "tail".

21. 
    The tonal (pitch) subsystem of utterance prosody. Units of its analysis. tones and tonal contours.

The pitch component of intonation, or speech melody is the variations in the pitch of the voice which take place with voiced sounds. Acoustically, speech melody is the variations of the fundamental frequency, generated by the vibrations of the vocal cords of cords.

To describe the melody of an utterance it is necessary to determine the relevant pitch levels, pitch ranges, directions and rate of pitch movement in the terminal zone and pre-terminal part of each of its intonation groups.

The pitch level the level of the whole utterance (or intonation group) is determined by the pitch of its highest-pitched syllable. It shows the degree of semantic importance of the speaker attaches to the utterance (or intonation group) in comparison with any other utterance (or intonation group), and also the speaker's attitude and emotions. Semantically less important intonation groups of an utterance are characterized by a lower pitch level than the neighboring ones.

The number of linguistically relevant pitch levels in English has not been definitely established yet: in the works of different phoneticians it varies from three to seven. In unemphatic ['ʌnɪm'fætɪk] unstressed speech most phoneticians distinguish 3 pitch levels: low, mid and high. Some phoneticians distinguish the emphatic (higher and lower) and the emotional (higher and lower) pitch levels. American linguists distinguish 4 relevant pitch levels (low, mid, high, extra-high), which they term "pitch phonemes". The sequence of pitch phonemes in pronouncing an intonation group are called intonation contours.

The pitch range of an utterance is the interval between its highest-pitched syllable and its lowest-pitched syllable. According to circumstances the speaker changes his voice range. It may be widened and narrowed to express emphasis ['emfəsɪs] or the speaker's attitudes and emotions. For example, if "Very good" is pronounced with a narrow (high) range it sounds less enthusiastic. Pronounced with a low narrow range it sounds sincere [sɪn'sɪə] sincerely, but not emotional. If said with a wide range it sounds both sincere and enthusiastic. Most phoneticians distinguish 3 pitch ranges - wide, mid and narrow.

The rate of pitch variations may be different depending on the time, during which these variations take place, and on the range of the variations. Differences in the rate of pitch variations are semantically important. When the rate of the fall is fast, the falling tone sounds more categoric and definite than when the rate of the fall is slow.

The basic unit used to describe the pitch component is the tone. Depending on whether the pitch of the voice varies or remains unvaried tones are subdivided into kinetic and static. Static tones may have a different pitch level of the voice—the high static tone, the mid static tone, the low static tone. The differentiation of kinetic tones as high falling and low falling, high rising and low rising, etc. is also based on the differentiation of the pitch level of their initial and final points.

As to the direction of pitch movement, kinetic tones are subdivided into simple and complex. Simple tones are unidirectional: the falling and the rising tones. Complex tones are bidirectional: the falling-rising tone, the rising-falling tone, and the rising-falling-rising tone.

The most important from the functional point of view is the terminal tone of an utterance. The peculiarity of the terminal tone in English is that it may occur not only on the “nucleus” but may be extended to the tail. The pitch of the tail depends on the kind of terminal tone. *** Terminal or nuclear tone is a change in voice pitch occurring on the stressed and subsequent stressed syllables of the most important word in terms of meaning, which, as a rule, is located at the end of a syntagma/phrase.

21. 
    The structure of a tonal contour and the functions of its elements.

A tonal contour/intonation group is hierarchically [ˌhaɪǝ'rɑːkɪklɪ] higher than other prosodic units – a syllable and rhythmic group. It is a division in which not only stresses but pitch and duration play a role.

The intonation group has also been termed "syntagm" ['sɪntæm], "sense-group", "breath-group", "intonation contour", "divisible accentual unit", "tone-group", "tune", "tone -unit". The term "intonation group" better reflects the essence of this unit. It shows that the intonation group is the result of the division in which not only stresses but pitch and duration (ie intonation in the broad sense) play a role.

Structurally the intonation group has some obligatory formal characteristics. These are the nuclear stress, on the semantically most important word and the terminal tone (ie pitch variations on the nucleus and the tail if any). The boundaries between intonation groups are marked by tonal junctures and pauses. All these features shape form the intonation group, delimit one intonation group from another and show its relative semantic importance.

The intonation group is a meaningful unit. The most general meanings expressed by the intonation group are, for instance, those of completeness, finality versus incompleteness, non-finality.

It may be coextensive ['kəuɪk'stensɪv] of the same length with a sentence or part of a sentence. Eg ,Yesterday | they've passed their e'xam. They 'passed the e'xam 'yesterday.

The structure of the intonation group varies depending on the number of syllables and rhythmic units in it. Minimally, an intonation group consists of one (stressed) syllable – the nucleus. Maximally, it contains the prehead, the head, the nucleus and the tail. H.Palmer was the first to single out the consecutive singled out consecutive structural elements of the intonation group ("tone-group") - "head" (scale), "nucleus" and "tail".

The functional role of some of these elements is indisputable is undeniable. The most conspicuous [kən'spɪkjuəs] is the functional role of the nucleus: its prosodic features express communicative and attitudinal meanings, indicating the end of the intonation group. Different types of the head (scale) convey attitudinal meanings. Types of prehead differentiate emotional meanings.

But whether the first stressed syllable of an intonation group plays a functional role or not is a moot debatable point. Auditory observations and the analysis of acoustic data show that pitch characteristics attributed to the first stressed syllable are actually characteristic of the unstressed syllables following it. For instance, the effect of the rising tone on the first stressed syllable is frequently conditioned by the higher pitch of the following unstressed syllables.

It seems more consistent to treat the first stressed syllable as part of the functional whole — the scale or head (in the broad sense), admitting its role as the onset that determines the pitch movement within the intonation group.

It is also disputable that the tail is an independent functional element of the intonation group, since its pitch variations are determined by the nuclear tone.

The "prehead", "head" and "tail" are non-obligatory elements of an intonation group, whereas the nucleus is an obligatory and the most important functional element.

A higher unit (in which prosodic features are actualized) is the utterance. The utterance is the main communicative unit. It is characterized by a semantic entity which is expressed by all the language means: lexical, grammatical and prosodic. The prosodic structure of an utterance is a meaningful unit that contributes to the total meaning of the utterance. Each utterance has a definite prosodic structure which may be coextensive with a sentence (a formal grammatical structure), or with a word combination, or with a word.

| Count on| Jane's ability. Comprehensibility. comprehensibility, comprehensibility

The utterance may contain one intonation group, two or more. Eg 'Listening is an important 'process in 'learning a language. Besides the auditory'process| there are/speaking| reading| and writing of the language. Irrespective of its structural complexity, the prosodic structure of the utterance is viewed as a single semantic entity.

The utterance is not the ultimate unit of prosodic analysis. In speech single utterances are not very frequent. On the contrary, they are connected and grouped into still larger units - hyperutterances, phonetic paragraphs and texts. The prosodic features of these higher units indicate the relations between their constituents, the degree of their connectedness and interdependence, thus forming the prosodic structures of the hyperutterances, the phonetic paragraphs and texts. The study of these units in modern linguistics is in the forefront of scholars' interest.

To summarize, it is necessary to note that the syllable, the rhythmic unit, the intonation group, the utterance and the hyperutterance are taxonomical prosodic units: each higher unit consists of one or more units below it. Whereas the elements of the intonation group, considered above, ie prehead, head, nucleus and tail, are autonomous units, they are not related taxonomically.

24. Utterance stress in English, its phonetic nature and functions. The relationship between utterance stress and word 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 [ɪ'fekt] of utterance stress is created not by a single acoustic parameter but by a certain interaction of different parameters. That is why utterance stress is a structural phenomenon. The acoustic structure of stress varies depending upon the type of stress and its position in an utterance.

The subsystem of utterance stress in English includes 3 basic functional types: nuclear stress, non-nuclear full stress and partial stress.

The main difference between these 3 types of stress is the difference in how the syllables, that bear them, are marked. 1) The nuclear syllable is in most cases marked by a kinetic tone and is, therefore, perceived is perceived as the most prominent. 2) Non-nuclear fully stressed syllables are more often marked by static tones. Both are pitch prominent, both initiate tones. 3)

Partially stressed syllables are not pitched 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 3 types of stress has functionally significant degrees depending on the modal-stylistic factors of speech. Thus, stresses in emphatic speech (expressive, emotional) are stronger than those in unemphatic speech.

Each type of stress also has different positional variants: e.g. prenuclear and post-nuclear partial stresses. Their acoustic structure is different. The distribution of stresses in an utterance depends on several factors. G. Torsuyev points to the following factors: semantic, grammatical and rhythmical.

The crucial Ключевым 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 stands 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 (secondary accents) signal a 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. - "Are you ..., - "Let me ...

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. Due to the rhythmical organization of the utterance notional words may be unstressed, and form words, on the contrary, may be stressed: He 'went "out - 'John went "out.

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

The specific character of word stress and utterance stress is conditioned by the domain area of their functioning: word stress is an essential integral part of word shape, whereas utterance stress is a feature of an utterance.

Stresses in an utterance fulfill performsthe same 3 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 ['haɪ(ə)rɑ:kɪ] segment the speech continuum [kən'tɪnjuəm] 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 appears 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.

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 [ɪ'fekt] of utterance stress is created not by a single acoustic parameter but by a certain interaction of different parameters. That is why utterance stress is a structural phenomenon. The acoustic structure of stress varies depending upon the type of stress and its position in an utterance.

The subsystem of utterance stress in English includes 3 basic functional types: nuclear stress, non-nuclear full stress and partial stress.

The main difference between these 3 types of stress is the difference in how the syllables, that bear them are marked.

1) The nuclear syllable is in most cases marked by a kinetic tone and is, therefore, perceived as the most prominent.

2) Non-nuclear fully stressed syllables are more often marked by static tones. Both are pitch prominent, both initiate tones.

3) 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 3 types of stress has functionally significant degrees depending on the modal-stylistic factors of speech. Thus, stresses in emphatic speech (expressive, emotional) are stronger than those in unemphatic speech.

Each type of stress also has different positional variants: e.g. prenuclear and post-nuclear partial stresses. Their acoustic structure is different. The distribution of stresses in an utterance depends on several factors. G. Torsuyev points to the following factors: semantic, grammatical and rhythmical.

The crucial key 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 center of the utterance is singled out by the nuclear stress (or primary accent). This type of stress is opposed to non-nuclear stresses by its greatest semantic importance. In their turn non-nuclear full stresses (secondary accents) signal a 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. - "Are you ..., - "Let me ...

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. Due to the rhythmical organization of the utterance notional words may be unstressed, and form words, on the contrary, may be stressed: He 'went "out - 'John went "out.

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

The specific character of word stress and utterance stress is conditioned by the domain областью of their functioning: word stress is an essential part of word-shape, whereas utterance stress is a feature of an utterance.

Stresses in an utterance fulfill performs the same 3 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 ['haɪ(ə)rɑ:kɪ] segment the speech continuum [kən'tɪnjuəm] 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 appears 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. The English rhythm. Its phonetic nature and functions.

Rhythm has been defined as regularity or periodicity ['pɪ(ə)rɪə'dɪsɪtɪ] in the occurrence of a particular phenomenon in an utterance. Languages differ in their rhythm mainly because of this phenomenon. In some languages the recurring [rɪ'kɜ:rɪŋ] повторяющиеся phenomena are stresses, in others – syllables. So languages may be characterized either by stress-timed or syllable-timed rhythm. English is considered to be mostly a language with stress-timed rhythm. Though occasionally it may display syllable-timed character as well.

Stress-timed rhythm presupposes that utterance stress serves as a basis for the rhythmical organization of speech and that stresses segment ['segmənt] the speech continuum [kən'tɪnjuəm] into units of more or less equal length. ***stress serves as the basis for the rhythmic organization of speech and that stress segments the speech continuum into units of more or less equal length.

These are accentual, or rhythmic units. The units tend to follow one another in such a way that the lapse [læps] of time between the stressed syllables is somewhat uniform. Since the rhythmic units differ in the number of syllables (they are comprised of), the syllables of the longer groups are compressed by very rapid pronunciation and those of the shorter ones are lengthened to conform match to the same interval ['ɪntəv(ə)l] of time. This produces perceptible isochrony [aɪ'sɒkrəni] of rhythmic units within the limits within of a given intonation group.

But there is no direct relation between perceptible (subjective) distinguishable and acoustic (objective) isochrony. Regarding isochrony as a characteristic feature of English rhythm G. Torsuyev points out that this rhythmic tendency of the English language does not mean mechanical equality of intervals ['ɪntəv(ə)l] between peaks of prominence even within one and the same intonation group.

A number of special investigations show that isochrony of rhythmic groups is rather approximate. The lapses of time between stressed syllables (peaks of prominence) are not absolutely equal. Perfect isochronism can be realized very rarely, only when definite conditions are fulfilled. So English rhythm can't be said to have objective isochrony of its units. One can only speak about a tendency to isochrony, which results in leads to the modifications of the length of syllables and vowels and in modifications of the stress patterns of words.

Since the approximate isochrony of intervals between stressed syllables is regarded considered as a measure of English rhythm, a great number of phoneticians (A.CIasse, D.Abercrombie, H.Halliday, J.Pring) define the unit of rhythm as a sequence of syllables from one stressed syllable to another. But this formal rhythmic division does not reflect the relations between prosodic units and the units of the other subsystems of the language, as the syllables of one and the same word may be parts of different rhythmic units. E.g. Se|mantic im|portance.

Scholars represent another approach to rhythmic division. According to this approach the boundaries between rhythmic units are determined by the semantic and grammatical relations between the words of an utterance. With such rhythmic division the syllables of a word always belong to the same rhythmic unit, form words join the stressed syllable as proclitics and enclitics, depending on their semantic links.

When analyzing periodicity ['pɪ(ə)rɪə'dɪsɪtɪ] frequency of rhythm in particular, both the formal and the semantic approaches may be accepted. Perceptible isochrony is characteristic of formal rhythmic units as well as those based on the semantic principle. But the second definition seems more correct and consistent for its reference to meaning. Correct rhythmic division is of great importance since division of utterances into rhythmic units can play a distinctive role.

To single out highlight rhythmic units one should be also guided by their perceptual prosodic structures. The rhythmic unit is a perceptible unit which can be isolated due to its prosodic features and meanings.

We have been considering English rhythm in its auditory (perceptual) aspect. What is rhythm from the point of view of its acoustic structure? A great number of phoneticians believe, that certain temporal modifications, though they are very important, cannot be treated be considered as the only characteristic feature of English rhythm. Acoustically, rhythm is a complex of variations in frequency, intensity and duration. Since the basis of rhythm is stress, which is a structural acoustic phenomenon, rhythm is a structural acoustic phenomenon too and it is achieved by the same acoustic parameters that produce the effect of stress.

Rhythmic units form a certain hierarchy ['haɪ(ə)rɑ:kɪ], since stresses, on which they are based, are not equal in their prominence, position and function. The most prominent, as a rule, and functionally more important is the nuclear stress. Therefore the nuclear rhythmic unit is the most important in an utterance. A rhythmic unit formed by full stress together with partial stress can be defined as a complex rhythmic unit. A sequence of full and partial stress indicates closer semantic relations between the words than a sequence of 2 full stresses. Rhythmic units formed by post-nuclear (partial) stress may be regarded as weak.

Prosodic characteristics of rhythmic units are determined by their position and function in an intonation group or in an utterance. The prosodic structure of the nuclear rhythmic unit differs from that of the onset rhythmic unit, the rhythmic unit within the head (scale) is different in its prosodic features from that of the tail and so on. D.Bolinger has described three pitch patterns of rhythmic units, or pitch accents, as he calls them, with the relevant falling, rising and level direction of pitch movement. These pitch accents are differentiated by their meanings and possible position in higher level units. D. Abercrombie has analyzed three duration patterns of the formal bisyllabic rhythmic unit (foot). However, the full inventory of prosodic characteristics as well as the number and types of rhythmic units in English has not been established so far.

Rhythmic units are nothing but elements of rhythm. Rhythm as regularity of occurrence of stressed syllables manifests itself in hierarchically higher prosodic units - intonation groups and utterances.
It has been shown by a large number of works that rhythm performs important linguistic functions. It is the most important organizing factor which makes for the exposure of exact sense of speech and its maximum perceptibillty. It unifies smaller language units into utterance, hyperutterance and text, and indicates relations between them. It also performs a distinctive role due to the prosed ic characteristics of its units.

27. The accentual-rhythmic group as basic unit of the rhythmic organization of speech. Problems of its delimitation in an utterance.

A rhythmic, or accentual, unit (or group) is either one stressed syllable or a stressed syllable with a number of unstressed ones grouped around it. The stressed syllable is the nucleus of the rhythmic unit. There are as many rhythmic units in an utterance as there are stressed syllables in it. The unstressed syllables are clitics. Those preceding the stressed syllable are called proclitics, and those following it — enclitics.

Depending on the position of the stressed syllable and the number of proclitics and enclitics in the rhythmic group there exist various accentual-and-rhythmic patterns of it.
E.g. / ᵕ − /, / ᵕ ᵕ − /, / − ᵕ ᵕ /, / ᵕ − ᵕ /, etc.

Besides a definite accentual-and-rhythmic pattern, the rhythmic group is characterized by a pitch pattern (or tonal contour) and duration pattern (temporal structure). These prosodic characteristics make it possible to perceive the rhythmic unit as an actual discrete [dɪs'kri:t] unit of prosody. The rhythmic unit may be singled out of an utterance also due to the meanings expressed by its prosodic features.

According to D. Bolinger these may be:

- the meanings of assertiveness [ǝ'sɜːtɪvnɪs], separateness, newness (when the pitch falls within the stressed syllable or within the enclitics or within both) as in the first rhythmic unit of the following utterance: But ˋnobody | ˋknew about it;

- the meaning of connectedness and incompleteness (when the pitch rises within the stressed syllable, or the pitch of the stressed syllable is higher than that of the proclitics) as in the second and the first rhythmic units of the utterance:

The 'brighter | they ˏare the | ˋbetter.

The rhythmic unit should, therefore, be considered a meaningful significance, though this viewpoint is not unanimously accepted. Not passed unanimously.

28. Speech rhythm as a universal phenomenon. Types of speech rhythm. Peculiarities of the English rhythm.

There may be different rhythmic patterns in a language depending on the number and types of stresses in an utterance as well as on the degree of prosodic contrasts between its stressed and unstressed syllables. In the English language prosodic contrasts between stressed and unstressed syllables are sharper than, for example, in Russian and Byelorussian. But in the English rhythmicality system these contrasts vary as well.

On account of the prosodic characteristics of English rhythm D.Crystal distinguishes 3 pairs of contrastive rhythmic structures. These are: rhythmic /arithmetic, spiky/glissando, staccato/legato. Rhythmic utterances are very common in everyday speech.

Rhythmic utterances are very common in everyday speech. They are used when the speaker rephrases a particularly important point of information. Arhythmical utterances, on the contrary, are rather rare. They result from certain variations in tempo and hesitation pauses.

Spiky ['spaɪkɪ] rhythm is characterized by sharp and rapid pitch transitions between stressed and unstressed syllables, whereas glissando [gli'sændəu] is characterized by smooth and usually slow glides between them. E.g.: Who would come on a night like this.

In staccato and legato the transition between stressed and unstressed syllables differs in their loudness and duration. Staccato is analogous to spiky as it is characterized by sharp contrasts between heavily prominent stressed syllables and very light unstressed syllables. Legato is analogous to glissando in the smooth transition between the loudness and duration characteristics of stressed and unstressed syllables.

The types of rhythm mentioned above (except arhythmicality) are typical manifestations of English rhythm. It is quite evident from the analysis of the rhythmic contrasts that English rhythm is determined by all the prosodic features: duration, loudness and pitch.

29. Speech tempo and pausation.

The tempo of speech is the rate of speed at which utterances and their smaller units are pronounced. On the acoustic level tempo is generally measured by the number of syllables per second.

Tempo of speech may be determined by different factors. It may vary de­pending on the size of audience, the acoustic qualities of the room, the indi­viduality of the speaker and other extralinguistic factors. But most significant for the linguistic study is how variations in tempo correlate with changes in meaning.

It is common knowledge that by slowing down the tempo of speech we can make an utterance or part of it more prominent, thus underlining the se­mantic importance of it.

On the contrary, by increasing the speed of utterance we diminish [dɪ'mɪnɪʃ] prominence and, as a result the actual semantic importance of what we say.

Tempo can also be used to express the speaker's attitude or emotion. For example, fast tempo may express excitement, joy, anger, etc. Slow tempo shows relaxation or calmness, reserved and phlegmatic attitude on the part of the speaker.

Everybody's speech has some norm of tempo, deviations from which affect meaning. Phoneticians generally distinguish normal tempo and two de­partures from the norm: fast and slow.

D.Crystal gives a more detailed classification of variations of tempo. He distinguishes between simple and complex tempo systems. The simple tempo system is manifested both in monosyllables and polysyllabic stretches отрезках of utterance. The complex tempo system is realized in polysyllabic stretches.

In monosyllables the speeding up and slowing down of the duration of the syllable is perceived as clipped, drawled [drɔ:l] and held syllables which are generally used for emphasis. "Clipped syllables are articulated at a more rapid speed than normal, in a very tense way; drawled and held syllables are articulated less rapidly than normal, and very lax".

The distinction between drawled and held syllables is that in the former a sound is lengthened as in [ff ain] and in the latter a sound is articulated with the onset of articulation delayed, so that the auditory impression of length is produced through unexpected silence, for example, in stop consonants as in "Perfectly" [pp3:fiktli] or "Quite, quite blue" [kkwait].

In polysyllabic stretches of utterance D.Crystal distinguishes two degrees faster than the norm - allegro, allegrissimo, and two degrees slower than the norm – lento, lentissimo. In the complex tempo system there are accelerando [ək'selə'rændəu] – a gradual increase in tempo, and rallentando ['rælən'tændəu] – a gradual decrease. These cont­rasts of tempo correlate with changes in meaning. They may also serve as a style-forming and style-differentiating device.
Pausation [pɔ:zeɪʃ(ə)n]

The speech continuum is divided into units of different length and hierarchy ['haɪ(ə)rɑ:kɪ] by means of pauses. It is the main function of a pause to segment connected speech into utterances and intonation groups to delimit one utterance or intonation group from another. Pauses are closely related with tempo: the number and length of pauses affect ['æfekt] the general tempo of speech.

Phoneticians distinguish 3 main types of pauses: silent pauses, pauses of perception and voiced (or filled) pauses.

A silent pause [pɔ:z] is a stop in the phonation background formation (a stop of the work of the vocal cords, which results in the cessation [se'seɪʃ(ə)n] of sound).

Pauses of perception are not a stop in phonation, as there is no period of silence. The effect of a pause is produced by a sharp change of pitch direction, or by variations in duration, or both. Pauses of perception are generally marked by a wavy line which is used at the junction of intonation groups.

Voiced pauses have usually the quality of the central vowel [ ɜː (ə) ] with or without nasalization [ ə (m) ]. They are used to signal hesitation or doubt and are therefore called hesitation pauses.

Silent pauses are subdivided into several types according to their length: short, long and extra-long. The short pause is mainly used to separate two in­tonation groups. The long pause which is approximately twice as long is gene­rally used to delimit two utterances. The extra-long pause is used as a rule to separate two paragraphs. But the main factors that determine the occurrence of the type of pause are the semantic relations between the prosodic units. Short pauses indicate closer relations than long ones.

It should be noted that the duration of pauses is relative, not absolute. It may vary depending on the general tempo of speech.

Pauses are very important constituents of intonation. Besides their segmentative and delimitative functions they also perform a unifying function showing the relations between utterances or intonation groups.

30. Social factors of phonetic variation. The notion of speech style. Phonetic style-forming means in English.

The styles of the spoken lange are not as yet unanimously [ju:'nænɪməslɪ] defined (apart from a few studies of oratorical ['ɔrə'tɔrɪk(ə)l] & conversational styles). Though we are well aware [ə'weə] of the phonetic differences between a casual conversation & an official exchange of views.

A close examination of the speech characteristics of one & the same person easily reveals that each native speaker uses several varieties of the lan-ge. He uses one at home, another with his colleagues, a third when addressing an audience & so on. At home he usually speaks rather carelessly, with colleagues his speech, though rapid at times, is less careless & when addressing an audience his speech is more careful.

Each of these varieties may differ in the usage of items of vocabulary & in grammatical structures, but the most striking distinctions are phonetical. At times these varieties differ only phonetically, nevertheless they are easily identified by all the native speakers. E.g. “Do you know her?”, when pronounced as [dʒə`nɜʊ ә], or again “come here”, when pronounced [k'miә] are easily identified as belonging to informal conversation.

The main circumstances of reality that cause phonetic modifications in speech are as follows:

a) the aim of speech (which may be to instruct, to inform, to persuade, to narrate [nə'reɪt], to chat etc.;

b) the extent [ɪk'stent] of spontaneity ['spɔntə'ni:ɪtɪ] of speech (unprepared speech, prepared speech, etc.);

c) the nature of interchange, i.e. the use of a form of speech which may either suggest only listening, or both listening & an exchange of remarks (a lecture, a discussion, a conversation, etc.).

d) social & psychological factors, which determine the extent of formality of speech & the attitudes expressed (a friendly conversation with close friends, a quarrel, an official conversation, etc.).

These circumstances, or factors, are termed extra linguistic factors.
The notion of speech style?

There is evidently a correlation between phonetic & the ‘speech styles’. ‘Speech styles’, just as phonetic styles, are conditioned by the circumstances of reality in which lan-ge functions, by the kind of situation the speaker happens to be in & by the aims of the speech situations. They may be a great variety of situations, aims & circumstances (the situation may be private or public, the speaker may be informing, entertaining, persuading, advertising, he may be excited, friendly etc.).

The question remains open whether there are just as many phonetic styles as there are speech styles.

Phonetic investigations of some of the speech styles have shown that there also exists definite phonetic distinction between lecturing, reading aloud, responding in an interview, casual conversation, official talk & other speech styles.

Phonetic style-forming means in English

Until now it was considered that the phonetic style-forming means are the degree of assimilation, reduction and elision, all of which depend on the degree of carefulness of pronunciation. That means that nothing but changes in the sound structure and the syllabic structure of speech were taken into consideration. But the investigations mentioned above show that phonetic styles differ prosodically too.

It should be emphasized that assimilation, reduction and elision are natural phonetic phenomena, which occur in any pronunciation style. These phenomena are caused by an unconscious economy of effort, known as 'the law of least effort',which is universal for all languages. The position and the nature of the adjoining sounds determines the character of the modifications that sounds undergo.

Besides that, the speaker is to a definite extent governed by his audience in his choice of vocabulary units, grammatical structures, tempo of speech, distinctiveness of articulation, and so on. He has to make sure he is understood. That is why he speaks more carefully when addressing a large audience, or people whom he is not on familiar terms with. Whereas he is less particular about the distinctiveness of his pronunciation when talking to those who know him well enough to 'tune in' very easily to his individual manner of speaking. For example, ['lemi`si:] for "let me see", [dn'nou] for "don't know” in a free chat are 'acceptable' (though non-obligatory) assimilation and elision, but in other more official situations they are 'unacceptable'with those who speak the orthoepic norm. It appears that the use of one phoneme for another as often as not is a style-forming means. It may have a stylistic colouring and produce a striking effect.

Elision, reduction and assimilation may, therefore, signal stylistic differences. Take the sentence "We can trust him to do it well" said in two different ways.

O'Connor states that they belong to different styles: the first being appropriate to colloquial conversation, the second to a political speech delivered to a large audience. On account of all that, the degree of assimilation, reduction and elision may serve to distinguish phonetic styles.

Besides these segmental features, there are prosodic features which enable people to distinguish between different phonetic styles.

Each speaker has a norm of loudness which may depart from in different circumstances. His speech is generally characterized by a more or less regular usage of certain tones. But there are circumstances when he introduces into his speech tonal variations, variations of pitch levels & ranges specific for definite styles of pronunciation (either to awaken enthusiasm & interest in his audience, or to acquire an authoritative tone, or, v.v., to sound informal, etc).

Each speaker has a norm of speech tempo as well. And he may depart from it in different circumstances. E.g., when reading aloud the tempo is more or less even, when chatting freely the variations in the tempo appear to be considerable. Pauses also help to distinguish different varieties of speech. E,g. the character of pauses shows striking differences between written En-sh read aloud & informal conversation. In the former the pauses are closely related to the grammatical structures, but in conversation they may & do appear in between words in close grammatical connection. Some of the pauses are often replaced by the so called ‘silence-fillers’ such as “I mean”,”sort of”, “kind of”, “well”, “Shall I say” & others. E.g.”It ‘was a… ‘sort of…conversation & it, went like, this…”

Some speakers, when they are greatly involved in what they say & are very emphatic, introduce no pauses until they run out of breath. Their speech sounds abnormal & careless: “He 'said he was 'going but he didn’t do 'anything to get ‘under `way & he came to the ‘door. He ‘stood there like a `dunce. He just `watched ‘other people ‘pack their ‘things. He 'didn’t 'help at `all”.

Experimental investigations show that duration of pauses & tempo of speech depend largely on the extent of creative activity that takes place during speech production. When a native speaker uses a great deal of automatized & well learned sequences, commonplace utterances, professional jargon & clichés, the tempo of his speech is higher than when he has to take serious decisions concerning the content of his speech & its form (the vocabulary, the grammatical structures, the conciseness of expressions). The tempo of speech also depends on whether the audience is large or not. The speaker usually slows down his tempo of speech when addressing a large audience. Thus, each phonetic style is characterized by a specific combination of segmental & prosodic features.

The En-sh phonetic styles have been left unexplored as yet. Most of the research work concentrated mainly on distinctions between different types of speech activities: reading aloud as contrasted to spontaneous conversation. E.g. D.Crystal & D.Davy have noted that informal conversational En-sh as opposed to written En-sh read aloud is characterized by:

• 
  a high proportion of hesitation features of all kinds, e.g. [m’m], [әm], [ә];
• 
  a substantional amount of overlapping & simultaneous speech;
• 
  a great amount of non-obligatory assimilation;
• 
  a very high frequency of simple falling tones, a high frequency of ‘stepping down’ head & almost complete absence of ‘stepping up’ head; a high frequency of compound tunes, especially the fall-rise; a frequent use of low rising tones on statements; the occasional use of very emphatic tones such as: rise-fall & fall-rise; a common use of high unstressed syllables especially in the prehead; a tendency to make frequent use of a small number basic prosodic configurations;
• 
  a strong tendency to use short intonation groups & to break up lengthy intonation groups;
• 
  a frequent use of pauses which occur in places where they are not regular in formal conversation.

D.Davy, when opposing different intonation patterns for conversation & reading aloud, has found that the rising tones are used much oftener in reading.