Static and kinetic tones differ not only in form but also in function. Static tones give prominence to words. The degree of prominence is proportional to the pitch height of the static tone: the higher varieties are usually associated with greater prominence. Kinetic tones are more important for the utterance. Alongside with stressing the words they
1) indicate the communicative type of an utterance;
2) express the speaker’s attitude towards the subject-matter, the listener and the situation;
3) single out the center of new information in an utterance or the point of greater semantic importance as viewed by the speaker.
The total number of tones (both static and kinetic) in an utterance is determined by the number of important (prominent) words; most typically there are from 1 to 5 tones. The tone carried by the most important word (which is generally the last notional word) is called the nuclear tone, it is always a kinetic tone.
The term “tone” should be distinguished from the term “tune” which is used to refer to the pitch pattern of the whole intonation group. The notion of tune is wider than that of tone. A tune may comprise several tones. A tune of a minimal size coincides with a tone realized in a monosyllabic utterance, e. g.: ‵Yes. ,Well.