American English Speech
Patterns
Chapter One
Intonation and Stress
- In verbal communication, we don’t
express ourselves with words alone.
In addition to our facial expressions,
gestures, and other body
movements, our vocal patterns add
underlying meaning to what we say.
Intonation and Stress
-Intonation:
The changes in voice
during speech.
Pitch inflections: the changes
in our pitch tones on intonation.
Intonation and Stress
• Stress: it makes certain parts in a message
clearer and more distinct by increasing their
loudness and length.
- Primary Stress
- Secondary Stress
Stressed Syllable is spoken longer and louder
with higher pitch.
Unstressed Syllable is spoken shorter and
quicker.
Intonation and Stress
• At the word level:
Pitch rises with its highest level on the
syllable with primary stress.
- Step inflection
- Gliding inflection
Intonation and Stress
• Beyond the word level:
In phrases and sentences, only certain words are
normally given stress. (content words).
- Content words: like nouns, verbs, adjectives
and adverbs
- Function words: serve more to provide
grammar structure. They include articles,
conjunctions, pronouns, and prepositions.
Function words are normally reduced and
spoken quickly.
Intonation and Stress
• Falling and rising inflection:
-Falling pitch indicates that the speaker has
finished a thought.
- Rising pitch indicates that the speaker intends
to continue on the thought.
Example:
Wh-questions are spoken with a falling inflection.
Yes/No questions are normally spoken with a rising
inflection
Primary Stress and Final Inflection:
Primary stress is normally placed on
the last content word.
-Stress for Emphasis:
Stress is shifted in a sentence to emphasize the
words that mean more specifically what the
speaker wishes to express.
Rhythm
Rhythm in speech results from timing in
connected segments.
- Function words are unstressed and therefore
are often spoken with the same timing as
unstressed syllables.
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