The definitions of intonation and the syntagm and their interconnection.

Intonation is a complex unity of communicatively relevant variations of non-segmental, or prosodic features of speech which include melody, or the changes of the pitch of the voice, sentence stress, or the greater prominence of some words among other words of the utterance, tamber, or the special colouring of the voice and temporal characteristics. The latter comprise tempo, or relative speed of pronunciation, rhythm, or the regular occurrence of stressed and unstressed syllables, duration and pausation. This complex unity serves to express adequately, on the basis of the proper grammatical structure and lexical composition of the sentence, the speaker’s thoughts, volition, emotions, feelings and attitudes towards reality and the contents of the sentence. Each component of intonation has its own peculiarities, but in spoken language they cannot be separated from one another and function as a whole. They are equally important and mutually dependent.

Intonation is a language universal as there are no languages spoken in monotone, that is, without any change of prosodic parameters. Sequences of words, intoned on one note, with the same degree of stress, without any pauses between words and sentences and with the same rhythm and tempo, cannot be used to transmit any information as they are not organized into meaningful groups. At the same time, an isolated word cannot be regarded as a communicative unit performing a definite linguistic function without a special intonation.

Nowadays in linguistic literature the term “prosody” can be found which embraces the prosodic components and substitutes the term “intonation”.

Successive contours of intonation singled out of the speech flow are referred to as syntagms (syntactic approach) sense-groups (semantic approach), breath-groups (extra-linguistic approach), tone (intonation) groups (phonological approach).

The term “breath-group”is employed by some linguists to denote a complete sentence that can conveniently be said with a single breath, or in the case of very long sentences, the longest portions that can conveniently be said with single breaths. A breath-group usually coincides with a sense-group because pauses for breath are normally made at points where pauses are necessary or allowable from the point of view of meaning. But the term “breath-group” is ambiguous because in fluent speech an intake of breath does not necessarily indicate a sense-group; while, if the tempo of speech is slow, a new breath is usually taken after every sense-group. Moreover, words are joined together into groups by sense, and not because they are followed by a new intake of breath. The term “intonation group” reflects only prosodic feature of the group of words, but suggests neither the semantic nor the syntactic functions. The term “sense-groups” calls attention to the fact that such group of words makes sense when put together. It is not suggestive of the syntactic relations within the group, but it goes without saying that a group of words joined syntactically makes sense. The term “syntagm” suggests a syntactic relationship of a group of words, without indicating any semantic relation; yet it is quite clear that what is joined syntactically must make sense. Thus, the terms “sense-group” and ‘syntagm” are practically equivalent. However, the term “syntagm” is preferable, for it is connected with L. V. Shcherba’s syntagm theory that has exercised a great influence on several branches of linguistics, and has many followers among Russian linguists. According to this theory the syntagm is understood as the syntactic and semantic relations of words which are expressed phonetically. So a syntagm can be defined as the shortest possible unit of speech from the point of view of meaning, grammatical structure and intonation. Consequently, there are three main criteria to be used in dividing sentences into syntagms: semantic, grammatical and phonetic.

The syntagm is an indispensable feature of intonation. Syntagms are distinguished in connected speech by definite intonation patterns; no syntagms exist without certain intonation patterns, at the same time, no intonation patterns are possible without syntagms. Syntagms play a very important role in a language; they are responsible for the syntactic structure of the sentences we utter, as well as for the information they carry.

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Agree or disagree with the statements and correct the false ones.	\|	General characteristics of a syntagm and elements of its intonation pattern.

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