INTONATION PLAN 1 Prosodic features of the

INTONATION

PLAN: 1. Prosodic features of the language. 2. Tone Languages. 3. Approaches to the Intonation study. 4. Functions of Intonation. 5. Stylistic use of Intonation.

Prosodic Features No language is spoken on a flat monotone. All languages are characterized by rises and falls or by steps from one pitch level to another.

The fluctuations in pitch are called melody or intonation. Intonation may affect the meaning of what we say in a variety of different ways.

Will you marry me ? Ways of saying “Yes”

Nine ways of saying “Yes” Low fall High fall Mid fall Low rise High rise Level Fall-rise Rise-fall ?

Intonation is a complex unity of nonsegmental, or prosodic features of speech: • melody, pitch of the voice; • sentence stress, or accent; • temporal characteristics (duration, tempo, pausation); • rhythm; • tamber (voice quality). How are intonation and prosody related?

Prosodic Features Prosodic elements are derived from the acoustic characteristics of speech. They include: the pitch or frequency, the length or duration, the loudness or intensity Prosodic functions are many & varied. Prosody can indicate syntax turn-taking in conversational interactions, people’s attitudes & feelings.

Prosodic hierarchy Utterance Intonation Phrases Intermediate Phrases Accentual Phrase Foot Syllable

Prosodic functions Chunking Focus

What is chunking? One function of prosody is to divide speech into chunks, so that each chunk sounds complete. Prosodic chunks are variously known as: information-units, tone-groups, intonation phrases, or word groups. Chunking prosody can be done in various ways.

Chunking prosody can be done in various ways, but the sound of it and its communicative function can be recognized when it shows different meanings of two otherwise identical utterances. e. g. coffee cake and honey coffee- cake and honey coffee, cake and honey

Prosodic functions Chunking Focus

What is Focus ? Focus may be described as the most important item in an utterance. Focus is signalled by prominence or highlighting. There are many terms for this prominence: accent, nucleus, stress, emphasis.

The focal word or syllable will stand acoustically from the rest of the utterance. e. g. I wanted chocolate and cake.

Contrastive focus Focus can be broad or narrow. Narrow focus is contrastive: it is used when one part of the utterance is particularly emphasized, at the expense of the rest. e. g. A: So you went for two weeks? B: Bill went for two weeks and I went for three weeks.

Tone Languages that allow changing the meaning of a word simply by changing the pitch level at which it is spoken are known as tone languages, and the distinctive pitch levels are known as tones or tonemes. The tones themselves are of two kinds: some stay at a single pitch level, others involve a change of pitch level. They are called ‘gliding’ tones.

Tone Languages. Tone languages are usually classified into: a). Contour tone languages (those that use gliding tones) e. g. Thai and Mandarin Chinese b). Register tone languages (those that do not change the pitch level) e. g. Zulu

Grammatical uses of tone are also common. In some languages of West Africa a change of tone signals the difference between certain tense forms. In Bini, for instance, LOW TONE is used for Present tense, and a HIGH or HIGH-LOW TONE - for the Past tense.

Tonal differences might affect either the grammar or the vocabulary of a language. e. g. Mandarine Chinese has four tones. High level High-rising Low-falling-rising High-falling

Tone Example Meaning High level ma (1) mother High-rising ma (2) hemp Low-falling-rising ma (3) horse High-falling ma (4) scold

Many tongue-twisters have been devised based on this feature of the language. e. g. 1 3 3 1 4 3 Mama qi ma. Ma man. Mama ma ma. Mother rides horse. Horse slow. Mother scolds horse.

Approaches to the Intonation study. Contour analysis approach Grammatical approach Functional approach Contextual approach

The Contour analysis approach is represented by a large group of phoneticians: H. Sweet, D. Jones, G. Palmer, J. O’Connor, A. Gimson According to this approach the smallest unit to which linguistic meaning can be attached is a tone-group (sense-group). The theory is based on the assumption that intonation consists of basic functional “blocks”. Intonation is treated as a layer that is superimposed on the lexicogrammatical structure. This approach is traditional and widely used.

The Grammatical approach was worked out largely by M. Halliday. The main unit of intonation is a clause. The theory is based on the syntactical function of intonation.

The Functional approach J. O’Connor, L. G. Alexander

The Contextual approach D. Brazil, B. Bradford Intonation is viewed as a feature of discourse and the developing interaction between speakers. The major components for the system are: prominence, tone & key.

Functions of Intonation. Emotional Grammatical Information structure Textual Psychological indexical

Which of the Intonation functions helps to … ? organize language into units that are more easily perceived & memorized express a wide range of attitudes & meanings understand what is new & what is already known in the meaning of an utterance identify such major units as clause & sentence Identify people as belonging to different occupations, social groups

Stylistic Use of Intonation cannot be judged in isolation. The choice of a speech style is situationally determined.

Any act of verbal communication is characterised by certain intonational peculiarities which depend on such extra-linguistic factors as: · the purpose of communication · social setting or circumstances · social identity of the speaker /age, sex, status, occupation, personality traits/ · individual speech habits · emotional state of the speaker

Extra-linguistic factors & Intonational peculiarities · the purpose of communication · social setting or circumstances · social identity of the speaker(s) /age, sex, status, occupation, personality traits/ · individual speech habits · emotional state of the speaker(s) Recording 1 Recording 2 Recording 3 Recording 4 Recording 5

An intonational style may be defined as a system of interrelated intonational means which is used in a certain social sphere and serves a definite aim in communication.

The problem of intonational styles classification is not regarded as settled yet. What does the correlation between Intonational Styles & Speech Typology depend on ? 1. Varieties of language : spoken or written; 2. Forms of communication: monologue, dialogue, polylogue; 3. Degree of speech preparedness: prepared, spontaneous, extemporaneous; 4. Number of participants: public, non-public; 5. Character of participants’ relationship: formal, informal.

Four-stage classification of phonetic styles by Sh. Bally : I. Highly elevated style /торжественное произношение/ II. Elaborate pronunciation /тщательное произношение/ III. Slow colloquial pronunciation. IV. Fluent colloquial pronunciation.

M. Sokolova, K. Gintovt, L. Kanter distinquish the following intonational=functional styles 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. informational (formal) style; scientific (academic) style; declamatory style; publicistic style; familiar (conversational) style.

The distinction is based on the assumption that there are three types of information present in communication: a. intellectual information; b. emotional or attitudal information c. volitional information. Three types of information are conveyed by various types of intonational patterns. Where are these styles used?

Informational style (formal) : • stylistically neutral, • used in radio and TV announcements, • press reporting

Informational style Phonostylistic characteristics loudness normal or increased; pauses are rather long; rhythm is stable, properly organized; falling tones on the semantic centres, falling- rising in the initial intonation groups.

Academic style: • scientific reports, • reading of lectures, • scientific talks and explanations, • examination answers.

Academic style Phonostylistic characteristics loudness increased; pauses are rather long; rhythm is properly organized; high proportion of compound terminal tones (high fall + low rise, fall – rise, rise-fall-rise); a great number of high categoric falls.

Publicistic style (oratorial): publicistic speeches

Publicistic style Phonostylistic characteristics loudness enormously increased; pauses are definitely long between the passages; rhythm is properly organized; tones mostly emphatic, especially emotionally underlined semantic centres; in non-final intonational groups falling-rising tones are frequent.

Declamatory style (artistic, stage): stylistically highly emotional and expressive, used on the stage, on the screen, in public recitations.

Declamatory style Phonostylistic characteristics loudness varied according to the size of the audience and to the emotional setting; pauses are long especially between the passages, prolonged emphatic pauses are used to underline the emphasis; rhythm is properly organized; common use of categoric low and high falls in final and initial intonation groups and on semantic centres.

Conversational style: natural, spontaneous, everyday speech

Conversational style Phonostylistic characteristics depend on: · the purpose of communication · social setting or circumstances · social identity of the speaker /age, sex, status, occupation, personality traits/ · individual speech habits · emotional state of the speaker

IATEFL, Liverpool 2013 Here's the link to the plenary lecture by David Crystal http: //iatefl. britishcouncil. org/2013/sessi ons/2013 -04 -09/plenary-session-davidcrystal