THE PHONETIC STRUCTURE OP THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE

To the phonemic component also belong different meth­ods of joining sounds together in words and at the junction of words. Wemay speak of the following four types of sound transitions in English:

CV transitions, as in /ti:/, /mai/, /ka:/, etc.

VC transitions, as in /it/, /п/, /٨р/, etc.

CC transitions, аs in /lukt/, /in ðә/, /trai/, etc.

VV transitions, аs in /mai 'a:nt,', /ði ^‘æр1/, /wi ': I/,etc.

CV transitions in English are characterized by aspi­rated articulation of the voiceless plosive consonants /p, t, к/ before a stressed vowel.

e.g. /tu:/, /'taipiη/, /‘tounәgr æm/, /ta:sk/;

/'pә:sn/, /'peiрә/, /'!pl:tә/, /ра:s/;

/keik/, /kout/,/kа:m/, / ‘kaindli/, etc.

VC transitions are reflected in syllable division of English words. The short stressed vowels are always checked. They can only occur in closed type of syllable, as in the following: /'men-i/, /'st٨d-i/, /'bul-it/, /'n٨ө-iη/, /'lit-1/, /'dæd-i/, /'ht-ist/, etc.

Loss of plosion may serve an instance for CC transi­tions, as in Octobe, effect, helped, strict, next day, wanted to come, shookeeper, blackboard, a word before, etc. Compare the similar Kazakh combinations of two plosives, which are pronounced with two plosions, as in: өкпе„ қақпа, айтқай„ сатпақ, etc.

In VV transitions we may have two different ways of joining vowels, with and without the glottal stop between them.

e.g. /wi a-/ - /wi l?a:/,

/mai ٨ηkl/ - /mai .٨ηkl/,

/'ði ‘ould 'mæn/ - /ð 1 ?ould 'mæn/, etc.

The second component of the phonetic system of Eng­lish is the syllabic structure of its words in isolation and in phrases and sentences. This component may be viewed from two points - its syllable formation and its syllable division, (One term "syllabification" is often used for both of them.)

Different languages may differ from one another in sylla­bification. The difference lies in the fact that some speech sounds may be syllabic in different positions.

The consonants /m, n, 1, η/ in English are syllabic words like /'riðm/., /'litl/, /'i:tn/, /'beikη' and egz/,etc. In Kazakh such combinations of consonants are impossible.

Differences in syllable division include differences in the position of the syllabic boundary. Compare: in English /'реn-i/, in Kazakh /ба-ла/.

The third component of the phonetic system of Eng­lish is the accentual structure of its words. It may be stud­ied from three aspects:

the physical nature of word accent,

the position of word accent in different words,

the degree of word accent.

Languages may differ in the accentual structure of words

Lecture

It is fairly obvious that words are seldom pronounced by themselves, as vocabulary items. They are usually arranged into sentences in accordance with the grammatical and phonetic structures of the languages. And, as we know, one of the components of the phonetic structure of a 1anguage is its intonation. Intona­tion is the main factor that turns a word or group of words into a sentence.

Intonation is defined differently by different phoneti­cians here and abroad. Most foreign linguists consider intona­tion as variation in voice pitch. For instance, I.Armstrong and I.Ward make it clear that: “By Intonation we mean the rise and fall of the pitch of the voice when we speak".

Lecture

Questions to be discussed:

What is intonation.

The components of intonation.

The functions of intonation.

The phonological oppositions of , speech melody, sentence stress, tempo, rhythm, pauses etc.

It is fairly obvious that words are seldom pronounced by themselves, as vocabulary items. They are usually arranged into sentences in accordance with the grammatical and phonetic structures of the languages. And, as we know, one of the components of the phonetic structure of a 1anguage is its intonation. Intona­tion is the main factor that turns a word or group of words into a sentence.

Intonation is defined differently by different phoneti­cians here and abroad. Most foreign linguists consider intona­tion as variation in voice pitch. For instance, I.Armstrong and I.Ward make it clear that: “By Intonation we mean the rise and fall of the pitch of the voice when we speak".

Prof.D.Jones expresses his idea of intonation in the follow­ing way: "Intonation may te defined as the variations which take place in the pitch of the voice in connected speech, e.i. the variations in the pitch of the musical note produced by the, vibration of the vocal cords".

1)Another British linguist A.C.Gimson also treats intonation as variations of pitch and rises and falls in pitch level.

2)Among British phoneticians we may also mention R.Kingdon, 4)J.D.O'Connor and G.F.Arnold,5) D.Crystal, W.S.Allen 7)and others who share this point of view. They all agree that there is a close connection between intonation and stress.

American descriptivists speak of intonation and stress as different phonetic phenomena. Answering the question about the nature of intonation C.H.Prator writes: "Intonation is the tune of what we say. More specifically, it is the combination of musical tones on which we pronounce the syllables that make our speech. Then C.H.Prator adds that it is closely related to sentence stress.

Quite different in the opinion of the majority of Soviet linguists on the problem of intonation. The leading Soviet phoneticians state that intonation is a complex unity of (1) speech melody, (2) word prominence, (3) tempo, rhythm and pauses, and (4) voice-tamber. Variations in these four serve to express the communicative type of the utterance and the speaker's thoughts, feelings and attitudes towards reality.

The components of intonation all function together, they are inseparable from one another. But it is possible to single them out for the sole purpose of analysis.

Speech melody, or voice pitch is one of the leading com­ponents of intonation. It is closely connected with sentence-stress. Each intonation-group 2) may consist of the following sections: prehead, head, body (or scale), nucleus, tail. Graph­ically it may be represented in the following way:

prehead head body (scale) nucleus tail

There are two significant types of prehead: (1) low . . .(2) high . . . .

The head may be of three types (according to H. Palmer)

(1)Inferior , (2) superior , (3) scandent

There are six main types of body (or scale):(1) regular descending — . (2) broken descending-- f ' ' ■

(3) low--- ■ - . . . (4) ascending ' . (5) sliding

(6) scandent_ —' —• ■

There are eight main types of nuclear tones; (1) high fall

. (2) low fall _ (3) low rise . 4) high rise

, (5) fall-rise ., 7 V . (6) rise-fall (7)

rise-fall-rise . (8) level — _____________

The tail may be: (l) despending ~\ . (2) level -\ . . or — »• , (3) ascending „, or

The most important section of an intonation-group is the nucleus. It is the essential element. It is the nuclear tone that each intonation-group must have. Without a nuclear tone there may be no intonation-group. All the other sections are non-obligatory.

Different combinations of the nuclei, heads, bodies (scales), preheads and tails produce a great.variety of melodic patterns in English intonation. It is rather, difficult to learn all of them and evidently not necessary, as some melodic patterns ex­press identical meanings and that is why they may be grouped. For this purpose the number of Intonation patterns is reduced to the number of nuclear tones, which are: low fall, high fall, low rise, high rise, fall-rise, rise-fall, rise-fall-rise, level. These nuclear tones when combined with different preheads, heads bodies, and tails lead to a few significant variants in the in­tonation pattern of English.

Soviet phoneticians also distinguish the so-called ter­minal tones. Terminal tones are broader unite than nuclei, they indicate a change of pitch at the Junoture of two sentences or sense-groups. Terminal tones are (or may be) realized on the nuclei and the tails. The number of terminal tones is limited to falling, rising, rising-falling and falling-rising. On the con­trary, nuclear tones are more varied.

H.A.Gleason distinguishes three terminal tones in Amer­ican English (he calls them clause-terminals): (1) fading / ^ / - a rapid fall; (2) rising / / - a sudden rapid rise) (3) aus­tained / - / - a prolonged sustained pronunciation.

As far as the pitch levels nithin the intonation-group are concerned American descriptivists call them pitch phonemes and distinguish four such levels: low, mid, high, extra high. The usual pitches of the voice are mid, low and high. The extra high pitch is rarely used.

Closely connected with the pitch component of intonation is sentence-stress. Sentence-stress is a special prominence which is given to one or more words so as to single them out from other words in the same intonation-group or even in the whole sentence.

It is the sentence-stress that determines the pitch of the voice on the accentuated parts of an intonation-group. Modifications in speech melody generally take place within stressed syl­lables.

In unemphatic speech notional words are usually stressed (nouns, notional verbs, adjectives, numerals, adverbs and some pronouns), whereas form-words are unstressed (articles, preposi­tions, conjunctions, auxiliary and modal verbs and some pronouns).

The distribution of stresses in emphatic speech may be quite different with form-words stressed and national words unstressed.

Stress may be syntagmatic, syntactic and logical.

Syntagmatic stress is placed on the semantic centre of the sense-group which is the nucleus. For example:

You 'told me to ask her. She has 'never 'been to England. The words "ask" and "England" bear syntagmatic stresses.

Syntactic stress singles out the other semantically important words of the sentence. For instances:

I 'think you'd 'better 'stay home.

The words "think", "better", "stay" are said to have syntactic stress. (The word "home" has syntagmatic stress.)

When the semantic centre ie shifted from the last notional word of the sentence to some other words we get logical stress. For example: She turned away in silence. He's got a new job.

Ann ought to have a doctor. Where does Mike live?

In the above sentences the words “she", "new", "ought", "Mike" have logical stresses.

Tempo, rhythm and pauses are considered to be temporal components of intonation.

Tempo is the rate, or duration of speech. It may be slow, normal or quick. Through tempo we appreciate the relative impor­tance of sentences and' their sense-groups. The more important parts of a sentence are pronounced at a slow tempo, the less im­portant ones are said quickly.

Tempo is closely connected with rhythm. Our speech is subdi­vided rhythmically into units. Speech rhythm may be defined as a regular recurrence of stressed and unstressed syllables. Rhythmic characteristics of speech have been looked into by people for a long time. "Examples of Shakespeare's prose, ... all show that, while the English language may have changed to a certain extent in form and pronunciation and idiom, its speech rhythm has remained unaltered for throe hundred and fifty years".

Rhythm is closely connected with stress. Sense-groups in English are divided into rhythmical groups. Each rhythmical group consists of a stressed syllable alone, or combined with one or more unstressed syllables attached to it. For example:

I think it is impossible to come at once.

In this sentence there are four rhythmical groups:

the first is: I 'think it is im ( _ j____);

the second is: 'possible to ( _ _ );

the third is: come at ( );

the fourth is: 'once ( i ).

The length of the rhythmical groups of this sentence varies from one to five syllable. Each rhythmical group should last approx­imately the same time.

Pauses are closely connected with other components of intona­tion. Between intonation-groups there may be pauses of different lengths. At the end of a sentence the pause is long. It is indi­cated with a double vertical bar / /. A pause between clauses is short, it is indicated with a single vertical bar / /. There is a non-obligatory pause between parts of the sentence. It is a very short one and is indicated with a wavy vertical line / /.

The last component of intonation is voice-tamber, or voice quality. It is a common knowledge that sentences may be pronounced with different voice colouring expressing all shades, of emotions, such as joy, happiness, sadness, irony, indiffer­ence, indignation, hostility, and many others. Voice-tamber is connected with the pitch of the voice and the tempo of speech.

We do not know anything about the physical nature of this phenomenon, because the voice-tamber component has not been in­vestigated at all.

All the components of intonation exist and develop to­gether. English intonation as a whole carries important infor­mation and like all other phonetic phenomena (phoneme, syllable, accent) intonation also fulfils three main functions: consti­tutive, distinctive, recognitive. (See also 3.16. 4.21. Part Two and 9.17. Part One).

The constitutive function of intonation consists in the fact that:

1) each syllable of each section of an intonation-group has certain pitch and cannot exist without it;

2) the end of an intoration-group 'is marked by a change of pitch direction or pitch level. (This constitutive function is often called sentence-delimiting function.);

3) each intonation-group must have at least one prominent word which is pronounced with sentence-stress;

4) an intonation-group cannot exist without the temporal component either, because each intonation-group is pronounced at a certain tempo, it has its own rhythm, the end of an intonation-group is indicated by а pause, etc.

All these requisites prove that intonation (or rather all its components) fulfils the constitutive function. No sentence can exist without intonation. (Intonation is present in any written sentence as well.)

The most important is the distinctive function of into­nation which manifests itself in the fact that intonation as a whole is capable of differentiating one sense-group or sentence from another sense-group or sentence. The role of different com­ponents of intonation in differentiating sentences is not of equal importance, though. Some components play the leading role, while others play a subsidiary role.

The distinctive function of intonation is most vividly ob­served in phonological oppositions. The number of phonological oppositions is quite considerable. They may be achieved within each component of intonation, i.e. within the speech melody, within the sentence-stress, within the temporal component, and within the voice-tamber (or voice quality),

Consequently, the comparison of different types of speech melody, sentence-stress, tempo, rhythm, pauses, etc. may produce the following phonological oppositions:

falling tones vs. rising tones;

low falling tones vs. high falling tones;

low rising tones vs. high rising tones;

(1) low falling tones vs. falling-rising tones;

(2) low falling tones vs. rising-falling tones;

(3) regular descending body vi . low (or ascending) body;

(4) regular descending body vi . sliding body;

(8)regular descending body ve. scandent body;

(9)low prehead vs. high prehead;

(10)presence vs. absence of sentence-stress;

(11)presence vs. absence of pause, etc.

These phonological oppositions are illustrated below by some examples with minor explanations.

FALLING TONES vs. RISING TONES

Falling tones generally express finality, the categoric nature of the utterance, its independence and greater semantic weight.

Rising tones on the contrary express non-finality, the non-categoric nature of the utterance, its dependence and smaller semantic weight. For example:

(a) A categoric statement vs. a non-categoric statement:

I 'think you ought to apologize, (categoric),

I 'think you 'ought to apologize, (non-categoric);

(b) A categoric command vs. a polite request:

'Come along! (a ce tegoric command),

Come along! (a polite request);

(b) A simple categoric statement vs. a general question:

She was glad to 'find the key. (a statement),

She was 'glad to find the key? (a general question);

(d) A statement of fact,vs.' an exclamations:

We've passed our driving tests, (a statement),

We've passed our driving tests! (an exclamation);

(e) Ageneral question vs. an exclamation!

'isn't it wonderful? (a general question),

'isn't it wonderful! (an exclamation);

(f) An alternative question vs. a general question;

'Do you want some tea\ or coffee? (an alternative question),

Do you 'want some tea or coffee? (a general question, mean­ing "Do you want a drink?"). In the last case there is also another opposition of presence vs. absence of pause after the word "tea".

An unemphatic imperative vs. an emphatic imperative:

Let me show you how to do it. (unemphatic),

Let me show you how to do it. (emphatic);

(c) An unemphatic exclamation vs. an emphatic exclamation:

'Such a selfish 'young .man!unemphatic),

'Such a selfish young man! (emphatic).

LOW PREHEAD vs. HIGH PREHEAD

The low prehead indicates that the initial unstressed sylla­bles are unimportant. The high prehead fulfils a clearly emphatic function.

(a) An unemphatic statement vs. an emphatic statement:

He 'will be surprised. (unemphatic),

He will be surprised, (emphatic) '

(b) An unemphatic imperative vs. an emphatic imperative:

Do tell me about it. (unemphatic),

Do tell me about it. (emphatic) '

(c) An unemphatic exclamation vs. an emphatic exclamation:

'So long, old chap, (unemphatic),

"So long, old chap, (emphatic)

PRESENCE vs. ABSENCE OF SENTENCE-STRESS

Stressed words in a sentence are semantically important, unstressed words are semantically non-important. The degree of sentence-stress indicates the semantic weight of different words.
The position of the last sentence-stress determines the communicative centre of the utterance.

(a) An apposition vs. a direct address:

This is my 'niece Lucy, (an apposition),

This is my niece, Lucy, (a direct address)

b) Oppositions which are based on shifting the communicative centre of utterances:

His message 'reached me in Moscow, (an answer to the ques­tion: "Where did his

message reach you?"),

His 'message reached me in Moscow, (an answer to the ques­tion: "Whom did his message reach in Moscow?"),

His"message reached me in Moscow, (an answer to the question: "What reached

me in Moscow?”),

His message reached me in Moscow, (an answer to the question: "Whose message reached me in Moscow?").

PRES1MCE vs. ABSENCE OF PAUSE

Different positions of pauses in sentences may differentiate one meaning from another. For instance:

"One of the travellers," says Mr .Michael Collins , "was calm,| almost indifferent, throughout.|

One of the 'travellers says Mr.Michael "Collins| was calm, 'almost indifferent, throughout.

He would have his coffee and roll in the morning.

He would 'have his coffee) and roll in the morning.

The pons| raise meat. - The sun'e rays meet.

There was "no love Lost between them. (They loved each other.),

There was 'no love lost between them. (They hated each other.)

There may be some other oppositions as well which are based on different tempo in uttering a sentence and consequently on different rhythm, or on different voice-tamber (which R.Kingdon calls "voice quality" ), etc.

The above oppositions prove most vividly that intonation may distinguish one communicative type of a sentence from another and it may also express different attitudes of the speakers to­wards reality.

The third function of intonation is its recognitive function. It consists in the use of the right intonation pat­tern in the sentence. When a wrong intonation pattern is used we may get two kinds of mistakes: phonological (or tonemic) and phonetic (or allotonic). (See also 9.20. Part One and Э.18.,4,24. Part Two.)

If the right intonation pattern is substituted by a wrong one (also existent in the language) we have a phonological mistake which leads to misunderstanding. In this case the distinctive function is violsted. For example:

Correct Wrong

intonation pattern intonation pattern

A person wants to ex-
press his genuine Thank you ! Thank you!
gratitude.

Whose watch is My watch is being My watch is being

being repaired repaired. repaired.

Phonoligical mistakes may lead to possible embarrassment.

If the correct intonation pattern is substituted by one non-existent in the language we speak of a phonetic mistake. Forexample: