PHONOLOGY II

Prof Cecilia Schumacher

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INTONATION

A brief introduction

The voice pitch varies continuously. We don´t speak in a monotone. The pitch variation extends
over single phonemes, sequences of phonemes and whole utterances. So Intonation refers to the
patterns that can be found within this pitch variation.

Definition: patterns of pitch variation over an utterance or series of utterances.

These patterns may be personal but they are also conventional and systematic.

Prominence and rhythm are inseparable parts of intonation.

O´Connor: The pitch patterns of spoken English, the speech tunes or melodies, the musical
features of English.

Account for this quotation:

“It is not what you say, but the way you say it” (not the choice of words, but the manner in
which the words are used. The way of saying something may depend on gesture, facial
expression and voice quality, but usually most significant factor is intonation (e-mail)

Characteristics of intonation:

1. Intonation is significant: brings about a change of meaning

2. Intonation is systematic: We do not invent tunes as we go along. We use tunes which we
originally learned as children, and we do not choose them or use them at random. There is
a limited number of speech patterns in any one language, and we use them to produce
definite meaningful effects. It is possible to give rules.
3. Intonation is characteristic: each language has its own intonation. The use of a tune which
is not normally used in English will give a foreign accent to the speech and may make
understanding difficult or lead to misunderstanding
Wells: intonation is the melody of speech; the study of the way in which the voice rises and falls
and why the speaker does so. Intonation involves the study of the rhythm of speech and the study
of how the interplay of accented, stressed and unstressed syllables functions as a framework onto
which the intonation patterns are attached.)

Importance of common ground or experience “It´s eight o´clock” Different interpretations.

There has to be a context and an understanding of common ground or experience between
speaker and hearer

English speakers face 3 types of decision as they speak:

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 1. Tonality: the first matter a speaker has to decide is the division of the spoken material into
chunks. There will be an intonation pattern associated with each chunk. These chunks are
known as Intonation Phrases or IP. Each IP has its own intonation pattern or “tune”.
IP= word group= tone group= intonation group= tone unit

2. Tonicity: speakers use intonation to highlight some words as important for the meaning
they wish to convey. To highlight an important word we accent it, i.e., we accent its
stressed syllable, i.e., we add pitch prominence (= a change in pitch, or the beginning of a
pitch movement. (tonicity= nucleus placement)
3. Tone: what kind of pitch movement
PITCH: Three variables of pitch:

1. Direction of the pitch movement (i.e. whether the pitch falls, rises, falls and then rises,
etc.
2. The degree of pitch movement: does the pitch move a lot or a little. How much does the
pitch fall or rise
3. The placement of this pitch movement within the speaker´s own voice range

Choice of words can be fairly conscious, but intonation seems much less conscious.

What happens when a non-native speaker uses inappropriate intonation? :obscuration of meaning,
perception of a quite different message. Native speaker can make allowance for grammar
mistakes, mispronunciations, choice of vocabulary, but intonation is different.

Why is it more difficult to teach intonation? Partly because we are not in control of a
practical, workable, system through which we can make intonation comprehensible to
ourselves or to our learners. But then this may be due to the nature of intonation: less
perceptible, less tangible than other areas of language.

Anatomy of an IP:

EX: '

Tonic syllable= The Tonic= The nucleus: the most important accent in the IP. It is the place
where the pitch changes or the pitch movement for the nuclear tone begins. It carries the main
pitch change. A tone unit must contain a tonic syllable, otherwise it is incomplete

The tonic syllable is often the LLI in the tone unit, owing to the tendency in English for new
information or the focus of information to be placed at the end of a sentence.

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The tonic syllable may be placed earlier in the tone group, where there is a word of greater
importance to the message

Occasionally the tonic syllable may be a non-lexical word, as when some contrast is made

Onset: the first accent before the nucleus IMPORTANT: is the pitch of the onset syllable
significant? Low bounce vs Take Off

Head: the part extending from the onset to the last syllable before the nucleus

Pre-head: part before the head. Contains only unstressed syllables

Tail: The part of the IP that follows the nucleus. It contains non-prominent syllables. It may contain
a word stress.

Different approaches of intonation:

Attitudinal: usually isolates certain intonation contours. Cannot isolate phrase from larger context.

Grammatical: disadvantage. BUT most important contribution of grammatical approach is a) the

correlation between intonation and sentence type and b) the correlation between tone unit divisions
and syntactic boundaries

Discoursal: treating intonation within a larger context

Tone unit represents focus of information. Where is usually the focus of information in
English? Content words vs function words.

LLI rule: when the IP contains information which is new only we generally place the
nucleus on the LAST LEXICAL ITEM

Functions of intonation

1. Attitudinal: to express attitudes or emotions

2. Grammatical or syntactic: to identify grammatical structures, to mark off syntactic structures
3. Focussing= accentual= informational : to show what is new and what is already known.
4. Discourse= cohesive: it signals how sequences of clauses and sentences go together in
spoken discourse, to contrast or cohere. It functions like the division of written text into
sentences and paragraphs. It enables us to signal whether or not we have come to an end
of the point we are making.
5. Psychological: it helps us organize speech into units that are easy to perceive, memorize
and perform.
6. Indexical: it may act as a marker of personal or social identity (mother, lover, lawyer, etc.)

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Rhythm: English is a stressed- time language: the stressed syllables tend to recur at regular
intervals regardless of the number of unstressed syllables in between.

Say this rhyme

Ten green bottles

Hanging on the wall

And if one green bottle

Should accidentally fall

There would be nine green bottles

Hanging on the wall

According to the principle of stress timing these lines each occupy approximately the same
amount of time. The more unstressed syllables there are the quicker you have to say them in
order to fit them into the beat. In other words the time taken to speak each utterance depends
on the number of stresses and not on the number of syllables. This means that maintaining
regular stress depends on maintaining irregular syllable length. This is in contrast to the
phenomenon of syllable timings where the time taken to speak an utterance depends roughly
on how many syllables there are. English, Dutch and German are examples of languages said
to be stress timed. Spanish, Japanese and French are said to be syllable timed.

Is English a Tone Language?

English does not use tone lexically. English is not a tone language, but English does use tone
for intonation. English makes use of tone intonationally, but not lexically. In fact the intonation
system of English constitutes the most important and complex part of English prosody. By
combining different pitch levels we express a range of intonational meanings: breaking the
utterance into chunks, perhaps distinguishing between clause types (such as statements vs.
questions) focussing on some parts of the utterance and not on others, indicating which part of
our message is background information and which is foreground, signalling our attitude to what
we are saying.

Sources:

Underhill, A. (2005) Sound Foundations. Oxford: Macmillan

Wells, J. C: (2006) English Intonation – An Introduction. Cambridge: CUP

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SUPRASEGMENTAL FEATURES

Suprasegmental (also called prosodic) means “superimposed on the basic sound segments of
language”, so suprasegmental features are phenomena which are spread over more than one
sound segment. Intonation , for example, is the melodic pattern which extends over a whole
utterance, and stress, less obviously, is a property of a whole syllable.

Stress is the degree of force with which a sound or syllable is uttered. In popular usage, it is
associated with a general notion of emphasis; it gives PROMINENCE to some syllables, and
hence words, and in combination with intonation helps to avoid monotony and make speech more
interesting for the hearer. The strong stresses of an utterance provide it with its rhythm (rhythm:
perceived regularity of prominent units in speech).

Stress is not the only factor involved in producing the auditory effect of prominence. The
concomitants of stress are one or more of the following:

a) Loudness
b) Greater length
c) Higher pitch
d) Difference in quality and inherent sonority
After stress, the effect of prominence is achieved first by pitch, and then by length; loudness and
quality have less effect.

Source: Mott (2005) English Phonetics and Phonology for Spanish Speakers

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English Intonation - An introduction. J. C. Wells

Chapter 1

Intonation: the melody of speech. The study of pitch variation of the voice and how speakers use
this pitch variation to convey linguistic and pragmatic meaning.

It also involves the study of the rhythm of speech, and the study of how the interplay of accented,
stressed and unstressed syllables functions as a framework onto which the intonation patterns are
attached.

Intonation: also known as prosody or suprasegmentals

Prosodic features → pitch, loudness and speed: they combine together to make the rhythm of
speech.

Stress: realized by a combination of loudness, pitch and duration

Tone: realized mainly by differences in the pitch of the voice

Tone languages: English makes use of tone intonationally, but not lexically

The three Ts: three linguistic intonation systems: speakers of English face three types of decisions
as they speak

1) Tonality (chunking): division of the spoken material into IPs, word groups, tone groups,
intonation groups

IP: onset → head / prehead / tail

2) Tonicity: nucleus placement: to highlight an important word, we highlight it: we accent its
stressed syllable, that is to say, we add pitch prominence to the rhythmic prominence that a
stressed syllable bears.

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Nucleus: the most important accent in the IP. It indicates the end of the focused part of the
material. It is the place where pitch movement for the nuclear tone begins.

3) Tone: pitch movement

Functions of intonation:

Attitudinal: to express attitudes or emotions

Grammatical or syntactic: to identify grammatical structures, to mark off syntactic structures
Focussing= accentual= informational: to show what is new and what is already known.
Discourse= cohesive: it signals how sequences of clauses and sentences go together in spoken
discourse, to contrast or cohere. It functions like the division of written text into sentences and
paragraphs. It enables us to signal whether or not we have come to an end of the point we are
making.
Psychological: it helps us organize speech into units that are easy to perceive, memorize and
perform.
Indexical: it may act as a marker of personal or social identity (mother, lover, lawyer, etc.)

Rhythm: English is a stressed- time language: the stressed syllables tend to recur at regular
intervals

Is English a Tone Language? English does not use tone lexically. English is not a tone
language, but English does use tone for intonation. English makes use of tone intonationally,
but not lexically. In fact the intonation system of English constitutes the most important and
complex part of English prosody. By combining different pitch levels we express a range of
intonational meanings: breaking the utterance into chunks, perhaps distinguishing between
clause types (such as statements vs. questions) focussing on some parts of the utterance and
not on others, indicating which part of our message is background information and which is
foreground, signalling our attitude to what we are saying.

Chapter 2: Tone

Fall, rise and fall-rise

It is useful to apply the notion of a default tone: the default tone is the most frequent, the expected
tone for an IP

(= unmarked tone, neutral tone):

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Fall for: statements, exclamations, wh- Non Fall for: Yes- No questions
questions and commands

Fall on the main parts of an utterance

Non-Fall on the subordinate or dependent part

Which tones to which IPs?

Statements: a)Fall: what we say is potentially complete. It is expressed with confidence, definitely
and unreservedly. It signals finality.

b)Rise: what we say is potentially incomplete.

Fall: endpoint always low. After a falling nucleus, the tail is always low. There is very often a step
up in pitch as we reach the beginning of the nuclear fall.

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Rise: if there is a tail, the rising pitch movement does not happen wholly on the nuclear syllable.
The rise is spread over the nuclear syllable and all the following syllables. Last syllable: highest
pitched.

Fall-rise: falling part takes place on the nuclear syllable or between that syllable and the next and
the rise begins on the last stressed syllable. It may express the following:

non finality (when I opened the door, │I saw...)

implication (who´s that? Well, I know her face)
Contrast (expressed or implied)
Reservations about what is said (I can come on Monday)
Tentative remark (I think so → but I´m not so sure)
Polite corrections
Partial corrections (green and blue are primary colours. Blue is )

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Declarative questions: grammatically like statements. Identified as questions only by their
intonation, or by the pragmatics of the situation where they are used

usually said with the rise (You´ll be coming to dinner?), a fall-rise ( You didn´t go and tell
him?) or even a fall (So, she´ll be free by \six then?).

Practise these exchanges:

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Yes-no and elliptical answers: the answer to a yes-no question is usually not a complete
statement. Rather, it is just yes or no (or an equivalent). Quite often we support the yes or no
by an elliptical verb phrase. Or we may just use the elliptical verb phrase on its own. The tones
for these answers may be any of the tones that can be used in full statements: fall, rise, fall-
rise:

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15
Questions

Wh-questions: default tone is a fall: definitive fall. The speaker knows and tells.

A wh question, however, can also be said with a rise or, (less commonly with a fall-rise). This
is the encouraging rise. This has the effect of making it more gentle, kindly, encouraging,
sympathetic or deferential, as opposed to the businesslike fall.

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 Yes-No questions: the default tone is the rise.

Requests are usually said with a rise too: 'Will you send him the letter?

A fall (“insistent fall”) is also possible: this makes the question more insistent, more businesslike,
more serious, more threatening perhaps: ex: I´ll 'ask you once more. 'Did you take the money?
(“insistent fall”). This “insistent fall is often used in guessing games:

Ex: A: 'Guess where I come from.

B: From France?
A: No.
B: From Italy then?
A: No.
B: D´you come from Spain?
The insistent yes-no fall: also regularly used when a speaker repeats a question because the other
person did not hear properly:

Ex: A: 'Have you come far?

B: Sorry?
A: 'Have you come far?

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Tag question – reverse polarity

→ genuinely asking, we use a rise

→ expecting the other person to agree: “insistent fall” ( appeal for agreement). In some cases the
falling tone has the force of an exclamation. Exclamations always have a fall.

→When attached to an exclamation a tag virtually always has an insistent fall:

Ex: 'What a surprise, │ wasn´t it?

→When attached to a command, a tag often comes in the tail rather than having its own intonation
phrase:

Come over here a minute, will you?

Open the window, would you please?

→ If the tag after a command does have its own IP, the tone is usually an encouraging rise, giving
a softening effect:

Come over here a minute, will

→After a command, a tag with a fall sounds very insistent (not all speakers find this construction
intonationally well-formed): 'Answer the phone, │ will you?

→Tag questions are sometimes included as parentheses within a statement:

Ex: We 'find it difficult, │ don´t we, │to 'live a virtuous life.

Constant-polarity tag (= Tench: “copy tag”): main clause: positive, tag: positive.

This kind of tag implies a sudden realization of the significance of the proposition:

Ex: They lost, did they

If there is no separate tonality for the copy tag, there is added a note of irritation:

Ex: They lost, did they

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Independent elliptical questions → default tone: yes-no rise. Function: keep the
conversation going:

Ex: I´m 'thinking of taking a break. Are you?

 can also be said with an insistent fall (slight surprise or

scepticism, but accepting that the other speaker has expressed an opinion. This tone can
sound hostile:

Ex. I 'really like it here. Do you? (I was afraid you wouldn´t)

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Checking → interjections such as OK? Or Right? : usually said with a rise

 Pardon question rise: What? Sorry? Pardon? (with this question you can query about
the entire previous utterance or just one element in it.

A different kind of pardon question is the please- repeat wh-question: it involves changing the
focused element into a question word. Tone: always a rise

She took a tonga. She took what? (no fronting of the question word)

What did she take? (fronting)

 Echo question: uses some or all of the same words as used by the previous speaker,
but with a “pardon-question rise”. This may be a simple request for repetition or clarification, or it
may also express surprise and amazement at what the other speaker has said:

Ex: You´ll 'have to do it a \gain. I´ll 'have to do it a gain?

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 Other sentence types

Exclamations → exclamatory fall: 'What a pity!

Commands → the default tone: definitive fall: ex: 'Stop that noise.

The rise is also possible (encouraging) : ex. 'Go on.

Warnings may be said with a fall-rise (if said with a fall tone, these would indeed be not as much
warnings as straight-forward commands): ex: Watch out.

* The implication here is something like this : 'Do as I say, │or 'something bad happens.

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Like negative statements, negative commands often have a fall-rise without necessarily implying a
warning: ex: 'Don´t forget the salt.

Said with a rise, the sentence may sound soothing and kind (we use this tone when speaking to
children, for example. To adults, it can sound patronizing): 'Come to Daddy.

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Interjections and greetings → default tone: fall:

Ex: Thank you. 'Oh, good. Sure

Many short interjections can be said with an encouraging rise, inviting the other person to speak or
to continue speaking: (answering the phone) Hu llo.

A: Oh Mary. B: Yes.

The interjection oops, whoops (uttered when you have just made a mistake or dropped something)
seems always to have a rise and mid level.

In other cases a rise on an interjection signals no more than a routine acknowledgement:

Ex: Here is your change. Thank you (to express genuine gratitude, it is necessary to use a fall)

In calling someone by name, we normally use a rise or fall-rise if trying to get their attention. A fall,
on the other hand, is a straightforward greeting (or, of course, an exclamation)

For most greetings, both falls and rises are perfectly possible and acceptable. A definitive fall is
more formal, an encouraging rise is more personal:

Hel lo! Vs Hel lo..

Good \morning! (just greeting) 'Good morning (added interest)

A vocative after hello or hi usually has its own rising tone. Hello may be shift-stressed so
that the accent falls on the first syllable.
Whereas Hello may have any tone, hi can only have a fall

Farewell: goodbye and its equivalents have a rise , expressing good will. The same applies when
a TV presenter signs off . To get rid of an unwelcome guest, we would use a fall: 'Good bye

The informal See you tends to have a fall-rise rather than a rise: See you.

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Sequencing of tones: leading and trailing tones

Many phrases or clauses do not stand alone, but are attached to some other element. They are not
complete in themselves, but are dependent on some other (independent) structure. If a dependent
element precedes the main element, we say it is leading. If it follows the main element, we say it is
trailing. In either case, the unmarked tone for a dependent element is a fall-rise or a rise. With a
leading dependent element, this non-fall is usually a fall-rise.

Ex: After lunch, │we could 'call on Mary

Alternatively, a leading dependent element may have a rise (including the possibility of a mid-level
tone):

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Ex: 'After lunch, │ we could 'call on Mary.

With a trailing dependent element, the most usual tone is a rise:

Ex. We´re 'going to Spain │ in August.

So, the typical patterns are:

Fall-rise (less commonly rise) + fall → for the order: dependent (leading) –independent elements

Fall + rise (less commonly fall-rise) → for the order independent – dependent (trailing)

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Topic and comment:

We can divide an assertion into two parts:

Topic: (subject or theme): typically said with a non-falling tone (dependent fall-rise or rise)

Comment (the thing we say about the subject or topic, a “rheme”: fall

1. Your 'passport will be ready to morrow. (straightforward, typical of rapid, routine style of
speech)

2. Your passport / will be ready to morrow. (slower, more deliberate form of delivery)

3. Your passport / will be ready to morrow (like version 2 + the fall-rise adds emphasis to the
topic as against the comment. It can also be a signal of contrast

The relationship between non-falling topic and falling comment is preserved if we change the
sentence structure so as to reverse the order of the two parts:

Ex: , (topic) │ we´ll 'do some sightseeing (comment)

We´ll 'do some sightseeing │ in the morning

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29
Open and closed lists

Lists show a clear distinction between fall and non fall:

You can have coffee or tea.

You can have coffee or tea.

→ It is also possible to avoid giving each item its own IP: openness of a list can be signalled simply
by not having reached the nucleus:

You can have 'coffee or milk.

Alternative questions → sets of two or more yes-no questions linked by “or”. They are treated as
lists:

Ex: Is 'Mary ready, │ or does she 'need some more time?

Adverbials → if placed at the beginning, they usually have a leading non-final fall-rise (or rise). If
placed at the end, they tend to have a trailing rise.

Ex: Un fortunately, │ I´ve 'lost your letter.

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 Un fortunately, │ I´ve 'lost your letter

I´ve ' lost your letter, │un fortunately.

Some limit the sense of the main clause: limiting non-fall

Frankly, / I´m rather an noyed.

Some reinforce the sense of the main clause (“Of course, for ever”) : reinforcing fall:

Ex: Do you 'think I ough to say something? Of course, │ you must pro test.

Some can be used in either way (“clearly, on the contrary, I think”)

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Fall plus Rise

particularly common where the first nucleus goes on a word referring to a mental state or on an
intensifying word:

Ex: I hope │you´ll be able to come. / Please │shut the window.

also found in cases where the second nucleus falls on information that is new though fairly
predictable:

Ex: A: How can we get there? Maureen´s │got a car.

The part with the fall contains the most important idea, while the part with the rise contains an idea
of secondary importance

Commands said with a fall-plus-rise pattern are pleading requests, rather than orders that are
expected to be obeyed:

Ex: Do │ keep it short. (pleading)

'Do keep it short (authoritative)

a)fall-rise vs b) fall-plus-rise:
↓ ↓
Implication no implications or reservations. Straightforward
definitive fall
for the major focus, followed by a dependent rise for
minor
focus

a) A: I´ve got some chocolate here B: I like chocolate (but I´m on a diet)

b) A: I´ve got some chocolate here B: Oh good. │I like │ chocolate . 'Pass it over.

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33
Chapter 3

Basic principles

Nucleus = nuclear accent → syllable that bears the nuclear tone: We accent a syllable by giving
it a prominent change in pitch, or movement in pitch, or the start of a pitch movement. An accented
syllable is always also rhythmically stressed, i.e. it has a rhythmic beat. Pragmatically, we accent a
word by accenting its stressed syllable (or at least one of them if it has more than one). This
indicates the importance or relevance of the word for what we are saying.

Choice of nucleus (tonicity): most important decision a speaker makes

Lexical stress: part of the basic pattern of a word´s pronunciation, as shown in dictionaries.

In an IP there may be other accents in addition to the nuclear accent. If so, the nucleus is the last
accent in the IP. Any other accents come earlier in the IP and are “prenuclear”. The first is known
as the onset.

To make a word the nucleus of an IP, we put a nuclear tone on (or starting on) its lexically stressed
syllable. To produce an English intonation pattern correctly it is essential, therefore, to know which
syllable in each word bears the stress.

Content words and function words. Generally speaking, we accent content words but no function
words. Hence the nucleus is typically placed on the last content word. To refine our tonicity rule
so as to allow for compounds, we need to change “on the last content word” to an expression
covering both simple words and compound words: lexical item

Default tonicity (neutral, unmarked) The nucleus typically falls on the Last Lexical Item (LLI
Rule)

The Old and the New

We deaccent (=remove potential accents from) old information. If all the information is new, then
we can accent all the lexical items. So the nucleus is placed on the last lexical item.

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Old information:

repeated words: A: How about a gin and tonic? B: Oh I´d prefer a vodka and tonic
synonyms: A: shall we wash the clothes? B: Oh I hate doing the laundry
hypernyms (words of broader meanings): A: do you like football. B: Yes, I like sports
(“sports” is a hypernym of football and so treated as old information)
hyponyms count as new information: A: Do you like sports? B. Yes, I 'like football

“ minutes”, “days”, “o´clock”, “woman”, “dollars”, “hours” → words that are not
deaccented

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 Prospective and implied givenness:

Prospective givenness: important idea: accentuation and tonicity depend on the speaker´s
mental planning. Words that are about to be repeated are aften deaccented:

Ex: A 'red triangle │ and a 'blue square

but

A red triangle │ and a blue triangle

Focus: the concentration of attention on a particular part of the message

Broad (we bring everything into focus )and narrow focus (we can focus selectively on one part of
the message)

 Focus domain: the part of the IP that is placed in focus. The nucleus tells us where the focus
domain ends. Broad focus means that the focus domain is the whole IP. Everything in the IP is
brought into focus. We use broad focus, for example, in answer to the question What happened?

In narrow focus only part of what we say is brough into focus:

Ex: Who brought the wine? Mary brought the wine.

 Contrastive focus (narrow focus): the nuclear accent draws attention to a contrast the
speaker is making. Any following material within the same IP is unaccented and forms part
of the tail of the IP.

Ex: You 'may have started the essay, │but 'have you finished it? (explicit contrast)

I 'don´t knoe what you are complaining about. ( implicit contrast: the hearer is left to infer
the other part of the message)

**sometimes a ↓pattern of contrastive focus is lexicalized. (ex: monosyllable, high jump, long
jump). London Underground lines have lexicalized contrastive focus: the Central Line, the
Northern Line

Double contrast: several options:

Ex: Arsenal │ two, │ Fulham │ two. Or 'Arsenal two, │ Fulham two.

Or

'Arsenal two, Fulham two.

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Pronouns and demonstratives

Explain the treatment of pronouns in these examples:

Example

Are you going to tell him?

He was there, but there was no sign of her!

If you ask me….

It’s me.

A: Who’s there? B: I am

Follow me.

Good for you!

Give me hers and take his

Look at this!

Hold it right there!

Look at that parakeet there.

He is a friend of mine

Reflexive, reciprocal and indefinite pronouns

We do not usually accent personal pronouns. However, we do accent a pronoun if it is

placed in contrastive focus (ex: 'I´m as surprised as you are.) Pronominal determiners
(my, your, his, etc.) may be made nuclear for the same reason (ex: In my opinion...)

The complement of the verb to be regularly receives the nucleus, even if it is a pronoun.
(ex: A: who´s that? B: it´s me. / A: who´ll be on next? B: It´ll be you, I think)
English has a number of idioms involving fixed tonicity: fossilized idiomatic expressions said
with a particular intonation:
Ex: 'Good for you! (genuine congratulation)

'Bully for you ! (sarcastic congratulation)

37
 'Blow me! (= I am very surprised)

'Get her ! (= look at her putting on airs)

'Search me! Or 'Search me! (= I´ve no idea)

In clause-final position the possessive pronouns (mine, yours, etc.) tend inherently to
convey new information, and attract the nucleus ( ex: 'give me hers, │ and 'I´ll take his.)
(ATTENTION: ex: I´ve been talking to a friend of mine)

Reflexive pronouns →True reflexive (the object of a verb or after a preposition: not
accented because it is not usually contrastive . Ex: She is very pleased with herself)

→Contrastive: ex: Do you like the dress? I 'made it my self

Reciprocal pronouns each other and one another: not contrastive, and therefore not
accented.

Indefinite pronouns: someone, somebody, something, anyone, anybody, anything : not

contrastive, therefore not accented

Contrastive focus → overrides other factors

a. Givenness (because it is in contrast, the repeated material receives the nuclear

accent (ex: A: He´s a 'famous actor. B: Well, 'not exactly an actor, │ 'more a
singer.)
b. lexical stress (for example, 'birthday card and 'birthday present have lexical stress
on the first element. Yet, with contrastive tonicity we might say: I 'got her a
birthday present, │ but I 'didn´t get her a birthday card)

Contrastive focus on polarity or tense

Sometimes the speaker wants to emphasize the polarity( =the quality of being either positive or
negative) of a verb or its tense. In both cases this may cause the nucleus to go on an auxiliary or
modal verb

a) Marked negative: ex: A: I think they´ll just surrender. B: They won´t

surrender.
b) Marked positive: ex: A: You are not involved. B: Oh but I am involved.
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 c) Polarity with tense: ex: A: Are you a vegetarian? B: I used to be a
vegetarian, but...
.

Nucleus on a function word

Narrow focus: yes-no answers and tags

Yes-no question: The nucleus goes on the word yes or no (or a synonymous adverb) if they are the
only answers. If they are followed by a short sentence fragment involving a verb, the nucleus falls
on the operator (=auxiliary or modal verb):

Different options:

A: Have you finished? B: yes.

B: Definitely

B: 'Not really.

B: Yes, │ I have.

B: Yes, │ I have finished.

B: Yes, I have.

B: No, I haven´t.

elliptical constructions like:

A: Are you coming with us? B: I’m afraid I’m not →Accent: on NOT

A: Is she coming with us? B: I´m afraid she isn´t → Accent on contracted form

Prepositions

Cases in which prepositions get the nucleus:

a) Wh- questions in which there is no lexical material(= content words). What´s it

for?/Who´s she with?
b) Preposition immediately following a wh- word: What of it? / What a bout it?

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Wh + to be

►A sentence such as “How are you?” consists of function words only. There are no lexical items.
Yet the nucleus has to go somewhere:

If a direct or indirect wh-question has the pattern wh-word- be- pronoun, then the nucleus goes on
the verb “be” itself: ex: ' Tell me how you  are. 'Who is it? 'Tell me who it is. This need not
involve narrow or contrastive focus of any kind.

A: How are you? B:  Fine. 'How are you?

►If a speaker answers the question “How are you?” by repeating the same words back, there is
normally a change of tonicity. The answer has contrastive focus on “you”

►If the verb “be” consists of more than one word (e.g. has been, will be), the nucleus goes on the
second of them. The same applies in the corresponding indirect questions

Ex: 'welcome back. 'How´s it been?

►If the word following “be” in a wh-question of this type is a demonstrative rather than a pronoun,
then the nucleus tends to go on the demonstrative:

Ex: 'Who´s that?

►Intonational idioms:

 Here you are! There you are! Here it is

  Here it  is (more emphatic)

Other function words that attract the nucleus

Words such as “too, as well, either, anyway, anyhow” and synonyms attract the nucleus despite
being function words:

Ex: A: I´m going to the library. B: Oh, 'I´ll come too.

Final but not nuclear

►Empty words (such as: things, people) do not attract the nucleus

►Pro-forms: “one” used as a pronoun: not accented. With plural or mass noun, the pro-form
corresponding to “one” is “some” or “any” . When used in this way, they are not accented either:
40
Ex: 'I´ll get one. 'I´ll get some.

►Treatment of these items:

a)Some and any b)Numerals c)One d) So e) Do f) There (not accented when used a a pro-
form: “China? I´ve always wanted to go there)

One is usually accented in the expressions the one, the right, wrong, first, last, only one, which one:

Vocatives

☺A vocative at the beginning of an utterance is accented, and normally has its own IP, thus
becoming nuclear. (fall or fall-rise)

☺We also accent a vocative when we want to indicate who we are talking to, perhaps when there
are other people within earshot: 'Hi, Peter!

☺Final vocatives are not accented but attached to the preceding IP as (part of) the tail. Even if a
final vocative appears to include new information directed towards the known addressee, it remains
unaccented (or it may be uttered as a separate IP in low key (e.g. “you´ve missed it, you fool”)

Reporting clauses

When reporting clauses follow quoted words, they are usually out of focus. The nucleus goes on
the appropriate item among the quoted words, and the reporting clause forms a tail to the IP. There
is often a rhythmic break between the quoted words and the reporting clause.

Ex: 'How are you doing?  he asked. (rhythmic break + silent beat)

Reporting clauses bring about a problem of analysis. Rhythmically, the reporting clause may
indeed be separated from the preceding reported matter, so that it seems to be like a separate IP. But
tonally if we were to treat reporting a clause as a separate IP, we would have to say that the IP was
anomalous in having no nuclear tone. The reporting clause is intonationally tail-like: low after a
nuclear fall on “from” or continuing the rise after a nuclear rise after a nuclear rise or fall-rise on
“from”. Longer reporting clauses may need to be broken up into more than one IP. Any additional
nuclei copy the same nuclear tone as the tone on the quoted material. Exceptionally, where the
reporting clause is immediately followed by further material, it may have its own IP, usually with a
rise to indicate non- finality.

41
Adverbs of time and place

Although adverbs in general are usually accented, adverbs and adverbial phrases of TIME and
PLACE are often not accented (=unfocused) when at the end of an IP, even if they contain new
information. They therefore form part of the tail. This does not apply in sentences where the sense
of the verb would be incomplete without the final adverbial. Such adverbials are typically in focus,
and therefore bear the nucleus. (ex: Put it on the table)

╙Alternatively, in statements, final adverbs and adverbials of time and place may bear the nucleus
in a separate IP, typically making with the preceding IP a fall-plus-rise pattern:

Ex: I had an 'unexpected letter, │ yesterday.

╙Naturally, there are also many cases in which final adverbs and adverbial phrases of time and
place are important to the message, and are therefore brought into focus and receive a nuclear
accent:

Ex: He´s got a tat 'too on his arm, │ 'not on his leg.

Other unfocused adverbs and adverbials

Adverbs of manner do tend to bear the nucleus if they are at the end of the clause.

There are several types of adverbs and adverbial phrases that- contrary to the general rule- do not
get accented when at the end of a clause. They remain out of focus. Like adverbs of place and
manner , they go in the tail, with the nucleus on some earlier word. We can divide them into two
lists:

Alternatively accented (i.e. they can be Generally unfocused

accented, taking the nucleus in their IP
(usually a rise)

If necessary, of course Then (when it is inferential, not when it

42
Please, thanks, thank you means “at that time”)

In a way Though

Or thereabouts Or so, even

For a change, for…´s sake Sort of(thing), as it were

In fact, as a matter of fact A bit

I would/ should have thought, I imagine You know

enough

In general the adverb “indeed” is accented (however , if used in a short response question with a
fall, to show surprise or annoyance, it is not accented : ex: “Quentin´s won a prize. Has he indeed?

The word “again” is accented if used in its basic sense of “one more time”, since it is contrastive. It
is not accented when it means “back to a previous state”:

Ex: 'Could you say that a gain?

'This is how you close it │and ' this is how you open it again.

Etcetera and its synonymous (“approximatives”) (and so, and so forth, and whatnot, and stuff, and
things, and the like, and such like) are usually kept out of focus.

Phrasal verbs

Verb plus adverbial particle → verb + a particle, which may be an adverb. General rule: phrasal
verbs are lexically double-stressed. (exceptions: e.g.: 'pour down: It was 'really pouring down.)

Verb plus prepositional particle → verb + a particle which is clearly a preposition. Mostly
lexically single-stressed: primary stress on the verb.

43
►Certain constructions leave the preposition stranded. Typical cases are passivization, relative
clauses and wh-questions. The preposition then goes in the tail, although phonetically it retains its
strong form:

Ex: It 'needs to be thoroughly looked at.

Are 'these the books I sent for?

'Which of them can you really re ly on?

(exceptions: prepositions of more than one syllable tend to be stressed: look after, do without, bump
into)

►There are phrasal verbs that include both an adverbial particle and a preposition, e.g: go along
with, look down on. These are double stressed: go a long with

Adverb or preposition?

Adverbs and adverbial particles are usually accented, prepositions and prepositional particles are
not.

English has several words that can function both as prepositions and as adverbs (in, on , by). They
are typically accented when they are used as adverbs but not when used as prepositions. If they are
at the end of the clause, adverbs attract the nucleus, but prepositions repel it.

Tests used to define whether a word is a preposition or an adverbial particle:

Ex: a) She sat in a comfortable chair. (preposition or adverb?)

c) She took in the information. (preposition or adverb?)

1. constituents in each of the sentences: [She sat] [in a comfortable chair] vs [She took in] [the
information]
2. Replacement of the lexical NP by a pronoun: She sat in it. Vs She took it in.
3. Single-stressed vs double-stressed in final position: 'What did she sit in? Vs 'How much
did she take in?

44
Separated particles= extraposed particle

In the case of a lexical object and a separate particle, the nucleus goes by default on the object
(Take your shoes off). However, if the object is a pronoun (i.e. not lexical) the nucleus goes on the
adverbial particle in the regular way (Take them off). This also applies if the object is lexically
filled but is already given, and therefore out of focus.

*** The adverb may well not be accented after a lexically filled subject in sentences such as:

Is the television on? (or Is the television on?)

'What´s Peter´s book about? Or 'What´s Peter´s book a bout?

But inevitably accented after a pronoun: (talking about the television) 'Is it on?

Nucleus on the last noun

Final verbs and adjectives

Constructions and idiomatic expressions in which final verbs and adjectives tend to be deaccented:

Verb at the end of a sentence or clause. A final verb is usually deaccented and the nucleus goes on
the preceding noun

Ex: How´s the homework going?

This applies in particular to final defining relative clauses:

Look at the tie he´s wearing!

The same deaccenting applies to the final adjective in sentences such as: we are going to get the
table ready.

And to the “up to” in:

I wonder what Eleanor is up to.

45
HAVE or GET + noun + verb: nuclear accent on the noun ( except when the NP is a pronoun or
empty word, so the nucleus goes on the verb

I have some work to do.

But

I ´ve got things to do. (empty word)

Events

Event sentences: these are sentences describing an event, misfortune, appearance or disappearance,
where the verb is intransitive. The nucleus tends to be located on the subject, provided it is lexically
filled, even if the verb contains apparently new information. Descriptions of the weather count as
event sentences. So do statements relating to unpleasant bodily sensations (My arm´s hurting).
Possible explanation: verb: predictable form the context.

Explain the ambiguity in:

a)'Dogs must be carried. (if you have a dog with you, you must carry it)

b) Dogs must be carried (everyone must carry a dog)

Accenting old material

►Reusing the other speaker’s words:

Sometimes the echoed word, although repeated, nevertheless clearly conveys new information:

You say your name´s Smith? Yes/ Smith.

The first speaker asks the second for information. Supplying that information involves repeating a
word just used by the first speaker. Thus the same word is reused by the second speaker and the
information it conveys is new. So it has to be brought into focus.

►Reusing your own words

We can also repeat ourselves for emphasis giving the same information more than once and
presenting it afresh each time, focusing on it anew:

It´s true, / it´s true!

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Idiomatic expressions in which repeated words get accented: more and more, hours and hours,
again and again, face to face, from day to day

What is known?

Knowledge: common, shared and imputed

a. Shared knowledge (known by speaker and listener)

b. Common knowledge (known by people in general)
c. Imputed knowledge (the speaker assumes the listener knows)

It must be admitted that there are various cases where an item which might logically be supposed to
be common knowledge is nevertheless focused on by the speaker.
Mary is a nice girl

That´not good news.

It´s a beautiful day

These cases should be treated as idiomatic.

What does accentuation allow a speaker to do? To make it possible for the speaker to impute
knowledge and opinions to the addressee

What is the effect when accentuating an intensifying word (= adverbs of degree, such as very,
extremely)? The speaker is imputing to the hearer implicit knowledge of the out-of-focus material
located in the tail of the intonation pattern- or at least treating it as background material that can be
left out of focus: ex: 'That´s very interesting.

Difficult cases of tonicity:

From about 1980 people in Britain- not only phoneticians- have been noticing a tendency for
speakers to accent function words where there seems to be no pragmatic reason for doing so. For
example, an announcement heard on a railway station ran as follows:

'Customers waiting for this service │ are advised │ that the service will be arriving │ in a 'few
minutes.
47
Chapter 4

Signalling the structure: Tonality

►Essentially the intonation structure reflects the grammatical structure. An intonation break (= the
boundary between two successive intonation phrases) generally corresponds to a syntactic
(=grammatical) boundary. We regularly place an intonation break between successive phrases, and
occasionally between successive words. We can even break a word

The presence or absence of an intonation break can resolve a possible ambiguity.

Help keep the dog off!

Help │ keep the dog off!

►The location of an intonation break can also resolve a possible ambiguity:

The competitors who finished │ first received a goody bag.

The com petitors who finished  first │ re ceived a goody bag.

►In the case of lists, all the items tend to be treated equally: either none of them is followed by an
intonation break or they all are.(ex: the flags are 'red, white and blue. Vs. The 'flags are red, │
white │ and blue.

►Tonality in speech plays a role similar to the role of punctuation in writing. Intonation breaks
often correspond to punctuation marks. However, the two do not always go in parallel. There are
many cases where a punctuation mark is used, but an intonation break is optional or even unlikely.
In particular little words such as well, yes, no, oh at the beginning of a sentence, although set off by
a comma in writing, are not usually followed by an intonation break in speech:

Oh, I quite understand.

►Sometimes an optional punctuation mark corresponds to an optional intonation break:

In August I come in late.

48
In August │I come in late.

(both versions are quite possible)

►Some words such as then, though, even, you know, are preceded by a comma in writing but have
no intonation break in speech: ex. We´ll 'see you on Tuesday, then.

Choosing the size of the chunks

Each IP presents one piece of information. The speaker has to break the message up into chunks of
information – into IPs and has considerable freedom of choice to do so. Typically, an IP lasts for
between one and two seconds. The chunks also reflect the speaker´s decisions about focus. Each IP
covers a single focus domain (culminating in the nucleus) and the associated out-of-focus material

Tonality varies considerably according to the style of speech. In some styles IPs may be very short,
with nearly every accent being nuclear.

Chunking and grammar

Basic rules:

There is normally an intonation break at every sentence boundary. This is a major break (//)
more important than the intonation break within a sentence.
Each clause tends to be said as a separate IP: So if a sentence consists of several clauses,
there will usually be an intonation break at each clause boundary.
If a new sentence involves a change of grammatical subject, the subject (particularly if it is
not a pronoun) tends to have its own IP (ex. We´ll ar 'rive at about ten. The children │ can
'come along later.
There is usually an intonation break between coordinate clauses. If however the subject of
coordinate clauses is ellipted, there is usually no intonation break after the first verb,
providing the subject is unchanged:
I washed │ and ironed the clothes. (no ellipted object)

I washed and ironed the clothes. (ellipted object)

49
 Simple structures like the following count as a single clause, and are usually said as a single
IP:
I want to apologise. I think he is wrong. He said he was sorry. I hope you haven´t forgotten

Vocatives and imprecations

►Vocatives are treated differently depending on where they come. In initial position, they tend to
form a separate IP. When no initial, they are usually attached to what precedes, forming part of the
tail of the IP.

►Imprecations (= calling on God) can form a separate utterance. But if part of a larger utterance,
they usually have their own IP when initial, but otherwise are attached to the preceding IP:

Ex: In 'heaven´s name, │'why not!

'Why not in heaven´s name?

Adverbials

Their behaviour varies depending on their relationship to the rest of the clause.

►Ordinary adverbs and adverbials – those that modify the verb or an adjective – are typically not
given their own IP (ex: she quickly picked up the pencil). However, adverbials at the beginning of
the clause are usually followed by an intonation break and thus form a separate IP:

Ex. On 'Thursday evening │ I´m having 'dinner at Patsy´s.

►In the middle of a clause, an adverbial is often a kind of parenthesis. It may have its own IP, with
separate IPs before and after:

We  could │  this year │ 'do something different.

This year │we could 'do something different.

We could 'do something different this year.

We could 'do something different │ this year.

50
►Adverbs of manner at the end of a clause tend to bear the nucleus:

Ex: She 'dances beautifully.

►Sentence adverbials (adjuncts) that modify the whole clause or sentence, typically have their own
IP. They are set off from the surrounding material by an intonation break

Apparently │ she is 'getting di vorced.

Heavy noun phrases

►A noun phrase (NP) is particularly likely to have its own IP if it is heavy (=long, consisting of
several words). A separate IP for the subject of a clause is more frequently found in reading aloud
and in formal speeches to an audience than in everyday conversation:

Ex: The 'head of a large school │ has a 'lot of response bility.

►The grammatical subject is particularly likely to have its own IP if it is different from the subject
of the preceding sentence or clause.

►Making the subject NP into a separate IP has the advantage of allowing the speaker to place
contrastive focus on it by locating a nucleus there. Even very light (=short) NPs can be made into
separate IPs to allow this:

The children │ say they don´t like her. │ But I │think she´s wonderful.

►Objects , too, are followed by an intonation break if they are heavy:

I gave the book you asked about │to the girl at the checkout.

Topics

►The first element in a clause is typically the topic (or “theme”), while the remainder is the
comment (or “rheme”). This first element is most often the grammatical subject. We can signal its
status as topic (a) in various syntactic ways, (b) by choosing an appropriate tone and (c) by giving a
separate IP

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Martha │ will have to wait

►We can also topicalize other clause elements. A topicalized object or complement is usually
followed by an intonation break:

His rudeness │ I shall ignore . │But his actions │I cannot for get.

►In cleft sentences one constituent of the sentence is fronted and introduced by it is (or it was, etc).
This topicalized constituent must include focused material and therefore and intonation nucleus. If
there further focused material to follow, then there must be an intonation break:

Ex: It was Ve ronica that I chose.

►Pseudo cleft sentences involve “what”. There is usually an intonation break between the two
halves of the construction:

Ex: 'what they didn´t like │ was the noise.

Defining and non-defining relative clauses

►A defining relative clause does not have its own separate IP. A non-defining relative clause does.

There may well be an intonation break after a defining relative clause when the NP is heavy.

►The distinction between defining and non-defining applies to certain other constructions as well:

Look at that house near the bus stop (=not the other houses)

Look at that house, │near the bus stop

►In particular, it applies to phrases in apposition:

This is my colleague Charles.

This is my colleague, │ Charles ( I have only one colleague)

Parallel structures

►The items in a list are sometimes separated by intonation breaks, sometimes not. This applies
more generally to parallel grammatical structures, including (a) parallel words or phrases, whether
or not coordinated, and (b) strings of letters or numbers.

52
►Some coordinated structures are potentially ambiguous, and can optionally be disambiguated by
the insertion of an intonation break. (ex: old men and women).

►With a string of letters or numbers there are equally two possibilities. If we think they will be
familiar to the hearer, or if there is no need to be particularly explicit, we run them together in the
same IP. If we think they may be unfamiliar to the hearer or need to be made especially clear, we
can make the message easier for the hearer to process by placing an intonation break after each
item.

A: How do you spell “seize”?

B: S, E, I, Z, E.

A: What was that again?

B: S,/ E,/ I,/ Z,/ E.

Tag questions

►Tag questions tend to have their own IP. This applies particularly to reverse-polarity tags
(=checking tags).

►A tag is sometimes incorporated as a tail into the IP of the main clause, if it has a rising tone.
This does not happen with reverse-polarity tags after a fall:

The boys can´t have for gotten, can they?

►In constant polarity tags (=copy tags) it is quite usual for the tag not to have its own IP. If a
constant-polarity tag does have its own IP, the tone must be a rise.

Chapter 5

Prenuclear patterns

The anatomy of the prenuclear part of the IP

►If there are any accents before the nucleus, the first such accent (=the onset) constitutes the
beginning of the head of the intonation pattern.

►The syllables (if any) before the first accented syllable are called the prehead.

53
The reason we recognize prehead, head and nucleus as separate parts of the IP is that the speaker
makes separate tonal choices at each of these points. The choice of prehead tone (high or low), the
choice of head tone (high or low), and the choice of nuclear tone (rise, fall. Fall-rise) are all
independent of one another. There is, however, no such choice in the tail. The pitch characteristics
of the tail are determines by the choice of nuclear tone.

Simple heads

High level [ ' ]

High falling [ ]

Low level [  ]

Low rising [  ]

Complex heads

►Complex high level head: successive accented syllables form a series of level steps, each one
lower pitched than the preceding. Any unaccented syllables are at the same pitch height as the
accented syllable they follow. For this reason this is sometimes known as a “stepping head”: You
'really must 'make up your mind.

►In a complex falling head, there is a series of falls, one from each accented syllable, and each one
starting at a slightly lower pitch than the preceding one. Each fall is spread over the accented
syllable and any unaccented syllables that may follow. The complex falling head is sometimes
known as a “sliding head”: You really must make up your mind.

►In a complex low rising head, there is a series of rises, one from each accented syllable. Each
may start at a slightly higher pitch than the preceding one; or each may start again at the same low
pitch. Each rise is spread over the accented syllable and any unaccented syllables that may follow.
The complex low rising head is sometimes known as the “climbing head”: You really must
make up your mind.

Preheads

►Preheads usually consist of nothing but lexically unstressed syllables. Sometimes, however, they
may include a syllable that is lexically stressed but that the speaker chooses not to accent- i.e. in a
word that the speaker chooses not to accent. Such syllables usually carry a rhythmic stress (beat).

54
►Speaker can add emphasis to an IP by using a “marked” (= distinctive) prehead. In a high prehead
all the syllables are said on the same high pitch, usually higher than any pitch within the rest of the
IP- sometimes up in a falsetto range. These syllables are not accented. High preheads are usually
quite short (not more than two or three syllables).

►Using a high prehead adds emphasis to the whole IP.

Finer distinctions of tone

Varieties of fall

►Three particular varieties of fall: a high fall, a low fall and a rise-fall. A rise-fall involves a
complex pitch movement, starting with a rise from a mid pitch to a high pitch and then a fall from
high to low, finishing on a low pitch. The most prominent part is the initial rise. If there is a tail, the
rise-fall pitch movement is spread over the nuclear syllable and the first or first two syllables of the
tail.

All falling nuclear tones finish low; the final tendency in the tail after a falling nuclear tone is
always low level

►The difference of tone meaning between the high fall and low fall is the degree of emotional
involvement. The high fall implies greater interest on the part of the speaker, greater excitement,
greater passion, more involvement. The low fall implies relative lack of interest, less excitement, a
dispassionate attitude, less involvement. The higher the starting point of a simple fall, the greater
the degree of emotional involvement; the lower the starting point, the less the emotional
involvement.

►Rise-fall: 2 meanings a) the speaker is impressed. This tone meaning is found with statements,
exclamations and yes-no question, but not with wh-questions or commands. This meaning is
sometimes reinforced by using a breathy voice. The result can sound gossipy (ex: A: She 'came
top of the class. B: Did she just!

b) challenge, even disapproval. This meaning is found with all clause

types, including wh-questions. With commands the rise-fall suggest that the speaker refuses
responsibility, refuses to be involved(ex: A: I 'need a break. B: 'Don´t we all!)

With commands, teh rise-fall suggests that the speaker refuses responsibility, refuses to be involved
(ex: A: What colour shall I choose? B: Please your self.)
55
Varieties of fall-rise

►Mid fall-rise (default fall-rise pattern):

► Rise-fall-rise (keeps the same implicational meaning of the fall-rise but adds in the”impressed”
meaning of the rise-fall: Wonderful!

►High fall-rise (tone meaning similar to the high rise. It is used with questions (particularly echo
questions), where it adds animation or intensity and has the effect of making the question more
specific. It can suggest astonishment:

You´ll have to do it again. Do it a gain?

Varieties of rise

►High rise: checking, pardon questions, echo questions. Also tone for uptalk statements.

►Low rise: supportive, showing interest, routinely encouraging further conversation

►Wide rise: combines the special characteristics of the low rise and the high rise, since it has a
rising pitch movement that starts from a low pitch and moves to a high pitch. It is associated with
the non-solidarity of indignant or truculent disagreement

►Mid level: leading dependent tone

In the case of yes-no question, the differences between these possibilities are subtle. A high rise
signals informality; a low rise signals polite interest (at least British English; Americans may
perceive it as patronizing); a wide rise adds a note of surprise:

Would you like some more tea? (casual, airy)

Would you like some more tea? (polite)

Would you like some more tea? (surprised)

Both the low rise and the high rise can be used as leading dependent tones.

56
The difference in tone meaning between these four tone varieties is not great. Sometimes speakers
just seem to ring the changes between them to avoid repetition. The low rise is perhaps more
formal, more oratorical; the high rise is more casual; and the mid level has no special tone meaning
except non- finality: The fall-rise may factor in its usual meaning of implication or contrast.

American English differs from British English in making little or no use of the low rise as leading
dependent tone – one of the reasons, perhaps, that British English may strike Americans as stuffy
and formal.

Prenuclear and nuclear tone meaning

►Low rising head: tone meaning: protest.

►With an independent rise, the choice of prenuclear pattern may affect the tone meaning. In a
statement or command, a high head or prehead with a low rise creates a soothing and reassuring
effect: ex: 'Don´t worry.

►A low level head before a rise, on the other hand, may sound defensive, grudging or generally
non-supportive: ex: A: The top´s fallen off. B: I don´t suppose it matters.

►With yes-no questions, a high head plus low rise is the usual one in RP and similar kinds of
British English. To Americans it sounds formal. A low prenuclear pattern plus high rise suggest
informality.

►Before a high fall-rise, the usual head is a high head.

Non-nuclear accenting

Lexical stress and downgrading

►Any lexically stressed syllables that do not receive an accent may bear a rhythmic stress.

►Downgrading principle (deaccent): it is sometimes known as the rule of three, since it weakens
the middle accent or stress of three. It applies in strings of letter names or numbers:

A, B, C

But it also applies to any kind of material:

Abig bad wolf

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►With longer strings of potential accents, the speaker has considerable freedom over which ones to
downgrade. But the onset accent and the nuclear accent are always unaffected.

Two or more lexical stresses

Stress shift (=iambic reversal):

Ex: She´s 'aged six teen. Vs. There were 'sixteen people there.

Focus domain: it is the part of the IP that is in focus

Major and minor focus: ex: it was an excellent │ meal.

Unimportant words at the beginning: there are various words and phrases that are regularly left
unaccentednat the beginning of an utterance. That is to say, they form part of the prehead. This
applies, obviously, to function words such as articles, pronouns, conjunctions and modal or
auxiliary verbs:

Ex: I was 'just going to call you.

Onset on a function word

Among those regularly accented are:

interrogative wh- words (relative wh-words, however are not usually accented: “When
planning a meal, first you…”)
Demonstratives are accented to draw attention to a new topic (the demonstrative “that” is
readily accented, but the conjunction “that” is not)
As an adverb of place, initial “there” is accented. Ex: 'There he sat. As a pronoun
(“existential there”) it is not.
In yes-no questions, accentuation of an initial auxiliary or modal verb is optional.
The modals “ought, used, need, dare” are usually accented even in statements.
An initial contracted negative verb is almost always accented, so too is the word “not”.
We often accent auxiliaries and modals if by doing so we avoid an awkwardly long prehead
(They are going to be late for work)

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 Other modals that are usually accented include “may, might, could” in most cases. “Must” is
accented to express an inference, but usually not when it expresses obligation
Pronouns are accented not only when contrastive, but also when coordinated to signal a
change of grammatical subject or object.
When you is used as an overt subject of an imperative, it is implicitly contrastive and
therefore accented.
The words “even” and “only” are accented when they point forward to the item that bears
the nucleus (when used as a synonym of “but”, “only” is not accented.
Prepositions and subordinating conjunctions (if, when, although) can go either way. If they
have considerable semantic content, or are polysyllabic, then they may well be accented;
otherwise they are not accented.
When prepositions or other grammatical items are coordinated they are usually accented
(although the second accent may then be downgraded)

Further considerations

Stylization: As well as the intonation patterns described so far, English also has a few stylized
patterns. These patterns are used rather rarely, and their pitch and rhythmic characteristics differ
from ordinary patterns. They are used for short utterenaces in circumstances that are routine and
predictable, typically to repeat something you have said many times before.

The stylized high-mid pattern consists of a high level pitch followed by a mid level pitch: Jim my!

59
Discourse Intonation and Language Teaching - David Brazil, Malcolm Coulhard and
Catherine Johns

Some crucial terms:

Pitch (David Crystal: the attribute of auditory sensation in terms of which a sound may be
ordered on a scale from “low” to “high”. Physiologically, pitch is primarily dependent on the
rate of vibration of the vocal cords within the larynx. As a perceptual term, it relates to the
listeners´ judgements as to whether a sound is “high” or “low”.

Any vibrating object emits a sound or note whose perceived pitch can be for all practical purposes
be regarded as directly related to the frequency of the vibrations; for instance, vocal cords, piano
wires or anything vibrating 262 times or cycles a second will produce the sound we hear as middle
C. The variation in pitch of the voice is achieved by tightening and slackening the muscles to alter
both the length and the thickness of the vocal cords and thereby the frequency at which they
vibrate Men´s vocal cords are heavier and appreciably longer than women´s and thus vibrate on
average more slowly and produce a range of pitches roughly an octave lower

Stress: degree of force used in producing a syllable. From the speaker´s point of view, it is
the pushing out of more air from the lungs. The listener perceives this as an increase in
loudness. Stressed syllables tend to be longer- a fact additionally emphasized in English by
the tendency to change the vowel quality of unstressed syllables towards schwa.

Experimental evidence confirms the interrelation of the three parameters of

loudness, pitch and duration in the creation and perception of stress.

Rhythm: Abercrombie (1961) argues that speech is inherently rhythmical. Rhythm is

created by the regular occurrence of particular items and in speech there are two possible
bases – the syllable and the stressed syllable. Abercrombie argues that all languages fall
into one of two groups depending on whether their speech rhythm is syllable- timed like
Spanish, or stress-timed like English. In a syllable-timed language the syllables tend to
occur at regular intervals of time, whereas in a stress-timed language, the stressed
syllables tend to occur at regular intervals of time regardless of the number of intervening
unstressed syllables . This characteristic is referred to as “isochronism”.

The TONE GROUP (= Tone Unit): the phonological unit set up to handle the structure of
tunes. It can be usefully analysed into four separate components:

(Prehead) (Head) Nucleus (Tail)

60
 The Nucleus is the label widely given to the syllable on which the major pitch movement
begins. The tail carries the continuation and completion of the pitch movement begun in the
nucleus.

The head of the tone unit consists of the stretch of utterance from the first stressed syllable,
the onset, up to but not including the nuclear syllable. The prehead comprises all other
unstressed syllables.

The approach outlined in this book: the description of intonation is seen as one aspect of
the description of interaction. Intonation choices carry information about the structure of the
interaction, the relationship between and the discourse function of individual utterances, the
interactional “given-ness” and “newness” of information and the state of convergence and
divergence of the participants.

Discourse Intonation

Language → 2 main functions

Transactional Interactional

↕ ↕

Message oriented Listener oriented

Old information New convergent divergent

information

REFERRING TONES (R) PROCLAIMING TONES (P)

REFERRING TONES (R) PROCLAIMING TONES
r r+ p p+
(P)

(fall-rise) (rise) (fall) (rise-fall)

r r+ p p+

(fall-rise) (rise) (fall) (rise-fall)

Actually the two functions work together

Tone: the major pitch movement, the distinctive pitch level of a syllable.

Five tones: falling, rising-falling, rising, falling-rising and level.

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Some parts of what the speaker says merely make reference to features which he takes to
be already present in the interpenetrating worlds of speaker and hearer (referring tone).
Others add new information to the message (proclaiming tone). Decisions about what
information to proclaim and what to refer to are a speaker´s constant concern and are
made in the light of the moment by moment assessment of the state of the play. Tone
choice depends solely on the speaker´s assessment and not on any real world truth.

Key:

There are three factors which affect the pitch range exploited by a particular speaker on a
particular occasion:

a) Idiosyncratic: the nature of an individual´s vocal cords determines the absolute limits of
his pitch range within which he exploits a much narrower range for speaking.

b) Socio-cultural: the pitch range chosen by a whole social group.

c) Emotional: frequently speakers extend their “normal” range to express excitement,

surprise, anger, and narrow it to express boredom and misery.

However much the speaker widens or narrows the pitch range, he will still exploit the
same small number of pitch contrasts to convey linguistic meaning. English speakers
only exploit linguistically three pitch contrasts: high, mid and low. There are no absolute
values for high, mid and low key, even for a particular speaker; in fact a given high key
tone unit may well be lower than an earlier mid key tone unit. It is the pitch level of one
crucial syllable, relative to the height of the same crucial syllable in the preceding tone
unit, which is significant.

For each and every tone group the speaker must select high, mid or low key.

►By choosing high key, the speaker marks the matter of the tone unit as contrastive:

High BOGnor

Mid // p we´re going to MARgate this year // p/r not //

Low

Bognor and Margate are mutually exclusive.

In addition to the selected key, the speaker must also mark the tone unit as proclaiming
or referring;that is to say as new information or information that belongs to common
ground.

►A speaker uses low key for different purposes:

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 a) to mark an equivalent relationship which he assumes or asserts exists, in a given
conversational context, between items in successive tone units:

High eVENtually

Mid // r //p we gave it to our NEIGHbours //p //

Low the ROBinsons

Here the speaker chooses low key to mark the matter of the two tone units as
existentially equivalent- low key conveys the information that the speaker has only one
set of neighbours, that “the Robinsons” and “our neighbours” are, in this context,
synonymous.

b) to imply causal or “because” relationship:

High

Mid // p the lecture was CANcelled // p the speaker was //

Low ILL

One statement is implied by the other – the two are existentially equivalent for the
speaker at this time

c) to offer a more circumscribed formulation of what went before. It is useful to

characterize such uses of low key as restrictive:

High WIMbledon

Mid A: // p what happened at //

Low

High

Mid B: // p no PLAY // p //

Low RAINing again

►A speaker uses mid key to imply addition:

High

Mid A: // r he GAMbled // p and LOST

Low

*** Analyse this sentence said with high key and low key .

The choice of tone can also carry the more general social meanings of convergence
/divergence, or solidarity/separateness. By choosing proclaiming tone, the speaker places himself
outside the area of convergence: he is heard to be reserving his position in some general way or

63
perhaps staking a proprietory claim to the view expressed in the ensuing discourse, or simply
emphasizing the likely lack of agreement on a point:

//but a Tyrant // p SUREly // p is a form of LEADership //

r+(rise) and p+(rise-fall) :

They are variants of the referring and proclaiming tones respectively. In all situations there are
social rules which determine who speaks when and to whom, and in many situations speaking
rights are distributed differentially. The term dominant is proposed in a technical sense to indicate
the person who has the greater freedom in making linguistic choices, and it is argued that the
freedom to make choices in the r/r+ system is only available to a dominat speaker, or, as ever, to
one who is using the system to claim dominance.

Ex: (patient to doctor) p WELL // r i´ve come to SEE you // p with the RASH // r i´ve GOT on my
CHIN //…

If the patient began his speech in this way:

// r+ i´ve come to SEE you // p with the RASH // r+ i´ve GOT on my CHIN //…

he would be certainly giving an aggressive opening to his speech.

p (fall) and p+ (rise-fall):

By choosing p tone, the speaker presents the information as new to the hearer.

// p it´s RAINing//

By choosing p+ tone, the speaker signal that he is simultaneously adding information to the
common ground but also to his own store of knowledge. In this case, the information is doubly
new: both to the hearer and to the speaker.

Key and Termination:

The pitch of the onset syllable determines the key of the tonic segment and the meaning of this
choice applies to the whole segment; but the pitch of the tonic syllable realizes a choice in an
independently meaningful system called termination, and in which there are also three significant
constrasts: high, mid and low. All combinations of key and termination are possible, with the
exception of high key with low termination and low key with high termination:

Key Termination

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High (a) GO

Mid // p he´s Going (b) GO

to

Low (c) GO

Pitch sequence: a phonological unit larger than the tone unit: it begins immediately following a tone
unit. It begins immediately following a tone unit with low termination, and includes all succeeding
tone units until the next one with low termination. The boundaries of pitch sequences are marked
by low termination, and the separation of key and termination allows the speaker to select low key
for its equative meaning and then move to mid termination to avoid the sequence-ending
implications of low termination.

Reading Intonation:

What is the role of the reader aloud?

Obviously he is translating the written text into a spoken one, but in doing so he is forced to make
choices in the intonation systems as well, and thus adds some information to the text. On what
grounds does he make these choices? It seems to us that he has two entirely different options: he
can either enter into the text, interpret it and “perform” it as if he himself were speaking to the
listener, saying as it were, “this is what the text means”; or he can stand outside the text and simply
act as the medium, saying “this is what the text says” . So we must distinguish two modes of
speaker-orientation: The speaker may orientate towards the hearer in the sense that tone choices
are made in the light of assumptions he makes about a state of convergence; or he may orientate
towards the language of the utterance, without regard to any such assumptions. A set towards the
hearer is called direct orientation; a set towards the language, oblique orientation.

One way of thinking about oblique orientation is to see it s representing minimal reader-
involvement. To exemplify the opposite pole of maximum involvement, we might consider the case
of an adult reading aloud to a small child. There will be frequent use of referring tone to insinuate
social intimacy. And the reader´s role will be a dominant one, in the technical sense:

//r+ ONCE upon a TIME // r+ in an OLD HUT // r+ IN the MOUNtains // p+ lived a GIant //

The conventions of story-reading permit the fiction that “new” matter is as new to the reader as it is
to the hearer.

65
Direct orientation involves the speaker in choices between referring and proclaiming tones (and in
the associated secondary systems) and oblique orientation involves him in choosing between
proclaiming and neutral tones.

The Intonation Systems of English Paul Tench

Intonation: the linguistic use of pitch in utterances (by saying “linguistic” we hope to avoid
reference to other cases of pitch such as singing, and to the subjective , aesthetic evaluations
about how “nice” and “pleasant” and accent´s intonation is.

Pitch → the essence of intonation

Intonation has two dimensions → linguistic: concerns the message itself: how many pieces of
information there are; what information is new; whether the message is complete or incomplete;
whether the speaker is telling you something or asking, or whether the speaker is turning to a new
topic or finishing off an old one.

→ paralinguistic: concerns the messenger rather than the

message: the speaker´s state of mind, their degree of politeness and their effort to associate or
dissociate from you.

If a language uses pitch variation to differentiate between words, we call that language a tone
language.

English is not a tone language. Although the differences of pitch can fall on a single word in
English, it is a distinctly different matter from the lexical tone of a tone language.

Intonation is tied to utterances, rather than sentences.

Halliday introduced the notion of a trio of systems operating in English intonation:

Tonality: the system by which a stretch of spoken text is segmented into a series of discrete units
of intonation which correspond to the speaker´s perception of pieces (or “chunks”) of information.

Tonicity: the system by which an individual, discrete unit of information is shown to have a
prominent word which indicates the focus of information.

Tone: the system of contrasting pitch movements in each unit of intonation, which, among other
roles, identifies the status of the information, e.g. major, minor or incomplete.

66
►The description of the intonation in terms of systems shows that intonation is as systematic as
other parts of the phonology. And because it is systematic, it can be presented in terms of
differences in meaning and that in turn implies that intonation can be taught and learnt.

►Each language has its own system of intonation. It seems inevitable that each language will
manifest tonality, tonicity and tones, but the way they do so will vary considerably.

Functions of intonation:

1. The organization of information → to present the management of information as the speaker

perceives it. (this is handled by tonality)

→ to decide what should be made prominent in any piece of

information. This is usually discussed in terms of “new” and “given” information (handled by
tonicity)

2. The realization of communicative function (= discourse function, speech function,

illocutionary function) → the intended effect that the speaker wishes to produce on those who are
being addressed.. Thus intonation can distinguish between statements and queries, orders and
requests, exclamations and questions and the like

3. Attitudinal function → considered the primary function of intonation in the older , more
traditional studies of intonation.

4. Syntactic → relates intonation to the syntax of clauses (compare: she washed /and brushed her
hair. Vs She washed and brushed her hair. He asked himself vs. He asked himself)

5. Textual → this function concerns longer structures than single units of intonation and individual
pieces of information. An intonation unit and a piece of information do not usually appear in
isolation. The topic of the message is one factor that binds the intonation together; another is the
grammatical systems of reference and conjunction that show that clauses and sentences belong
together; and a third factor is intonation (phonological paragraphing)

6. The identification of speech styles

Tonality:

Tonality is the system in intonation that divides spoken discourse into its separate individual
intonation units. The whole text is composed of many intonation units, each bearing a single piece
of information and representing the speaker´s management of the information of the whole
message. Each intonation unit contains one piece of information- as the speaker perceives it.

67
Neutral tonality: very useful starting point: one-to-one correspondence between clause, intonation
phrase and unit of information. (two main reasons for individual diversity: one is the imagined
speed of delivery: the slower the pace, the shorter the unit; and the second is people´s perception
of the organization of information)

Marked tonality: intonation units do not coincide with whole clauses: two or more clauses fit into a
single intonation unit (He did. I saw it), or two or more intonation units are needed to cover a single
clause.

►Analyse these examples:

I´m going to town this morning. (one clause, one IP) or I´m going to town │ this morning. (one
clause, two IPs)

He spoke to me honestly. (neutral tonality). He spoke to me │ honestly (marked tonality)

►Long subjects are separated intonationally (marked tonality)

The train arriving at platform two │is the ten twenty from Swansea to London Paddington.

►Lists: a special kind of long clause. Each item may be contained in a separate unit.

We want red, │white │and blue flags, please. (marked tonality)

We want red, white and blue flags, please (neutral tonality since the intonation unit contains the
whole clause)

Will it be more or less on time?

Do you want one or two lumps of sugar?

►Marked theme: the theme – the starting-point of the message is not the subject (neutral theme)

This morning │ I´m going into town. (marked tonality)

These ideas │I must reject. (marked tonality)

►Adjuncts:

Adjuncts that affect tonality include linking adjuncts like: however, nevertheless, perhaps, of
course, unfortunately, etc.

However │ he ran the mile in four minutes.

In fact │I went to one last week.

►Tags→ checking tags (two clauses, two intonation units: neutral tonality)
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 → copy tags (may not necessarily require their own , separate IP; in that case: marked
tonality.

Work out all the meanings with the following example:

They lost against Newport of all teams │ didn´t they. (degree of uncertainty)

They lost against Newport of all teams │ didn´t they. (certainty)

They lost against Newport of all teams │ did they. (sudden realization of the significance of the
information)

They lost against Newport of all teams did they. (with a touch of irritation)

Tonality contrasts grammar:

♦Defining and non-defining items

♦Apposition →compare: *Tom Jones │the singer │ comes form South Wales.

Tom Jones the singer │ comes form South Wales.

They sent Joan a waitress from the hotel.

They sent Joan │ a waitress from the hotel.

They sent Joan │ a waitress │ from the hotel.

They called Susan a waitress.

They called Susan │ a waitress

♦Verb phrases → He came to hear about it. (involves a complex verbal phrase as an idiom
meaning “it happened by chance that...), but because it constitutes only one verbal phrase, it is the
predicate of only one clause, hence only one intonation unit

→ He came │ to hear about it.(this sentence has a main clause followed by a

“purpose clause”: two clauses, two intonation phrases)

♦Negative domain:

I didn´t come because he told me (two clauses, one IP)

I didn´t come │ because he told me (two clauses, two IPs)

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♦Report clauses:

He said he would come. (it is best to regard the two parts as a single clause consisting of the main
verb of “reporting” and a clause as the direct object complementing the “reporting” verb. A single
intonation unit covers the whole sentence

Note the difference:

Tell him to save time. (normal pattern for report clauses)

Tell him │to save time.(main clause followed by a dependent “purpose clause”)

Clause complements:

Intonation disambiguates between parallel wording:

She washed and brushed her hair

She washed │ and brushed her hair

Intonation unit boundaries

there is a perceivable pitch change at some point following a tonic syllable; either a
stepping up after a falling tone, or a stepping down after a rise; if the pitch of the tonic
syllable was level, then either a stepping up or stepping down would signal the start of a
new intonation unit
There is either a very slight pause or a change of pace in the flow of syllables; syllables at
the end of a unit tend to be relatively slower, but syllables at the beginning of a unit have a
tendency to speed up

Tonicity

The tonic syllable is that syllable in a given intonation unit which is made most prominent by a
combination of pitch, volume and length. The function of the tonic is to form the focus of
information: to express what the speaker decides to make the main point or burden of the message
(Halliday). The tonic represents the focus of each unit of information

Neutral tonicity → tonic syllable within the last lexical item in the intonation unit

70
Broad focus → the focus embraces the whole clause

Narrow focus →the focus is on only part of the information in the intonation unit

Marked tonicity → takes two forms:

The tonic accompanying a non-final lexical item

The tonic accompanying a grammatical item
►Marked tonicity also emerges as a way of avoiding a tonic on a repeated item. (Belgium one
/ Wales one)

►Contrast is an obvious case of narrow focus

►Event sentences

The tonicity of final adjuncts:

Certain verbs require adjuncts of place as their complements; verbs like put, send require a
locative adjunct to complete their sense. Thus a distinction need to be kept between
locatives as essential complements to verbs – they have got to be there- and locatives that
add circumstantial information
Compare:

The books are here.

Put the books here

I´ve got some books here.

Adjuncts of time and place: they do not normally take the tonic if they belong to closed
systems like here, there; now, then; yesterday, today, tomorrow unless a contrast is
intended.
Another class of adjuncts that acts in a similar “non-tonic” way is the “comment adjuncts”
(though, of course, you know, at least).
Other adjuncts, like adjuncts of manner, are lexical, i.e. they belong to open sets, and if
they occur in final position are likely to take the tonic.

71
 Vocatives, final glosses (ex: He shouldn´t have done it the fool) or direct speech markers
can form an extra intonation unit. The effect is to give a little more prominence to the item
concerned.
Some adjuncts can have two different functions, and the different functions follow different
tonicity patterns. An adjunct like “normally” or “frankly” can be used as an adjunct of
manner, and if it comes at the end of its clause, as in the following examples, it would tend
to be accompanied by the tonic:
He drives normally (=in a normal manner)

He drives normally (= it is normal for him to drive)

I couldn´t speak to him frankly

I couldn´t speak to him frankly

Tonicity by default

Neutral tonicity indicates broad focus where all the information in the unit is new, but it may
indicate narrow focus if that which is new information is found at the end of the unit. Marked tonicity
indicates new information that is either grammatical or not final

All- given information:

In the cases of echoes and repetitions, the intonation unit only consists of given
information, but the units are treated as if they contain the same information structure of given and
new as the original (ex: A: is this your handbag? B: Sorry? A: is this your handbag?
Insists (A: Why have you invited the Robinsons? B: But I haven´t invited them.) The focus
in the insists usually correlates with the given information in the original , because it is the given
information in the original that is the basis of A´s presupposition.

Tonicity and grammar:

Compare:

He asked himself

He asked himself

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Shoot John

Shoot John

They didn´t come happily

They didn´t come happily

Tone

Tone refers to pitch movements, and that observation which has frequently been commented on –
‘that it is not what they said, but the way they said it’ – relies primarily upon the pitch movements.

Tone has been defined hitherto as the contrastive pitch movement on the tonic syllable; so, We
make a distinction between primary and secondary tones. Primary tones are the basic contrastive
pitch movements on the tonic, i.e. whether the pitch of the voice moves up (rises), or moves down
(falls), or combines a movement of down and then up (fall-rises). Secondary tones are the finer
distinctions of the primary tones, i.e. the degree to which the pitch of the voice rises, falls or
combines a fall and a rise – whether there is, for example, a rise to a high pitch. or a mid pitch, or a
fall from a mid pitch or a high pitch, etc. Secondary tones also cover the pitch movements in the
pre-tonic segment (the head and the pre-head). (Pitch movements in the tail are not considered
separately from the pitch on the tonic because they are an extension to the tone itself.) The
primary tones of English, i.e. the fall, the rise and the fall-rise. The primary tones of English, i.e. the
fall, the rise and the fall-rise, function, like tonality and tonicity, in the organization of information,
but they also feature, like the other systems, in a second function. Wl Whereas tonality and tonicity
produce contrasts in grammar, the tone system produces contrasts in the communicative, or
illocutionary function; that is. They help to indicate differences between telling and asking, between
commanding and requesting, between congratulating and wishing, and a whole host of similar
functions that language is used to fulfil.

The secondary tones do not function, as such, in the organization of information – or, for that
matter, in either grammar or the communicative functions. Their role is in the expression of
attitudes.

Primary tones: falls, rises and fall-rises

Pitch is a relative matter. The actual range of pitch of most adults is lower than that of children; and
again the actual range of pitch of men is, on average, lower than that of women.

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Falls: Neutral Fall (from mid-high to low): ‘plain statement’. It is the pitch you would expect if no
other meaning or connotation was intended. It is indicated by a downward-pointing line before the
syllable concerned.

There are ‘primary’ functions associated with the fall, but ‘secondary’ (High Fall or Low Fall) –
attitudinal – functions associated with the alternative degrees of fall.

Rises: the Neutral Rise (from Low to mid or mid-high) sounds a little like a query, but it can also
indicate something like ‘This is not all I want to say; I’m going to continue’( “incomplete
information”)

The High Rise is commonly associated with a stronger sense of querying, suggesting surprise or
even disbelief

The Low Rise (from low to mid-low) suggests a non-committal, or even grumbling attitude.

Fall-Rise

A common sequence of tones in a pair of intonation units is a rise in the first, to indicate
incompleteness, followed by a fall in the second, to indicate completeness

He simply got up / and went home.

Another common sequence of tones in a pair of intonation is the reverse: a fall in the first and a
rise in the second. In this case, the rise cannot mean incomplete, because it does in fact come at
the end. This sequence is what Halliday termed major and minor information. The main piece of
information is contained in the first unit, and the second unit contains an extra piece of information.

But he didn´t go to bed │ though he was tired.

So we cannot label the Fall, therefore, as necessarily indicating complete information, since that is
not the case in the example above.

Major / complete → primary information

Minor/ incomplete → secondary information

Mid-level → only occurs in a non-final unit of intonation; and it is used as an alternative to the true
rise to indicate incomplete information.

A rise, the, indicates either incomplete or minor information, depending on whether it precedes or
follows the fall.

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A final adjunct can either be contained in the intonation unit of the clause preceding it, or it can
have its own unit. In the latter case, the adjunct will typically have a rise, as minor information:

We´ve got some books /here

Difference between a single fall-rise tone and a fall-plus-rise sequence:

If the pitch movement is contained in a single syllable, it is a single tone, not a sequence of
two.
If the pitch movement has a rise on a final unstressed syllable, it is the single fall-rise,
because the rise in the fall-plus-rise sequence would have to co-occur with a tonic.
The rise component in the single fall-rise ends at a higher level.
The fall-rise tone relates to one piece of information in one intonation unit, whereas the fall-
plus-rise sequence relates to two pieces of information in two intonation units.
The fall-plus-rise sequence lacks the implicational meaning of the single fall-rise

Difference between fall-rise and rise

When a fall-rise tone precedes a fall in a close sequence of two units, it comes as a
contrast with the ordinary rise. Compare:
In the kitchen / you´ll find a surprise. (the rise leads on to major information)

In the kitchen / you´ll find a sur prise. (the fall-rise highlights the theme)

Un fortunately / he can´t come (just connecting)

Un fortunately / he can´t come (comment)

Use of fall-rise in final position: there is a “but” about it (Halliday) : reservation, contrast,
personal opinion offered for consideration, and concession

Analyse:

I didn´t come │ because he told me. Vs. I didn´t come because he told me.

They don´t admit any students. Vs. They don´t admit any students.

He doesn´t write anything. Vs. He doesn´t write anything.

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Tones and the communicative functions

The tone system is used in English not only for the indication of information status but for
another purpose, the indication of communicative functions. By ‘communicative function’ we
mean the purpose for a given utterance intended by the speaker. For instance, is the speaker
telling me something or asking me? Are they commanding me or requesting me to do
something? The tone system is a guide, in a general sense, to such communicative functions.

Can you tell when a rise, for instance, is indicating information status and when it is indicating a
communicative function? The phonetic answer is easy in theory, but sometimes difficult in
practice: a rise is operating in its informational capacity when it belongs to an intonation unit
that is dependent upon another. When indicating either incomplete or minor information, its
intonation unit is tied very closely – often with no pause – to another unit; such a unit acts as a
kind of satellite to the other. The same is true of the non final fall-rise indicating the highlighting
of a theme; it is closely attached to another unit without pause. However, when a rise is
operating in its communicative capacity, it is operating in an independent intonation unit, which
is often separated from preceding and following units by a pause or even silence, or, of course,
by a change of speaker. Furthermore, the rise for information status is usually confined to
neutral rise, from low to mid; whereas the rise for communicative functions not only uses a
neutral rise – and in that respect is wholly indistinguishable from its use in information status –
it does have the potential for high and low variations to add an attitudinal dimension to the
questions (or whatever).

►Falling tones are associated not with satellite, dependent, units of intonation, but with the
more central, nuclear, independent, units. This befits its designation of bearing major
information. This particular status of the fall is bolstered by the observation that usually
between half and two-thirds of all tones are falls.

The fall is associated with the speaker knowing something, telling something and in the case of
interjections, expressing their own feelings: the speaker´s knowledge, authority and feelings
dominate.

►The rise is associated with the speaker not knowing and therefore having to ask.

►A fall indicates the speaker´s certainty or dominance in respect of knowledge, authority and
feelings

► a rise indicates the speaker´s uncertainty or deference to the knowledge of the person
addressed.

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Here is no special tone for each separate communicative function; the resources of intonation
are simply not sufficient for so many different functions. The tone system simply indicates the
speaker’s status vis-à -vis the hearer: either as dominant or deferent.

All the communicative functions can be grouped into three kinds: relating to knowledge in
respect to a) information, reality and belief; b) authority in respect to influencing other people´s
action (suasion); and c) social interaction. We will now consider each of these three groups of
communicative functions and show how the tone system operates to indicate dominance and
deference.

a) Information, reality and belief

A fall indicates the speaker´s dominance (knowledge) and a rise their deference to the
presumed superior knowledge of the addressee. (a clear example is question tags)

Following functions with a falling tone: statements, answers, explanations, reports, agreement,
acknowledgement, descriptions, suppositions, hypotheses, deductions. They all presuppose
the speaker´s dominance in knowing and telling. Other communicative functions that display
the speaker´s knowledge and therefore are accompanied by a fall are denials, affirmations adn
of course, disagreements.

The functions with an accompanying rise are yes/no questions, appeals and requests, which
are functions in which the speaker acknowledges knowledge, and authority, in the addressee.

Implication: fall rise: It´s possible (but...)

Concession: is a kind of deference to somebody else´s proposition: rising tone: It´s possible
(You are conceding to your addressee that the proposition he made might be valid.

Contradictions → rise (Oh no I didn´t)

Challenges → also regularly take a rising tone (generally to a high level) (Your father´s
travelling to Timbuk tu)

Echo questions → rise: A: You´re going to meet Jack. B: I´m going to meet him?

Guesses → falling tone (have you heard all this be fore)

Denials → fall (have I ever let you down: I´ve never let you down)

Exclamations → fall: Isn´t he like his mother

Leads-in → fall (preliminary utterance to telling a joke: Have you heard the joke about the two
poli ticians?)

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Repeat question → fall: A: Do you want a cup of tea? B: Pardon? A: Do you want a cup of
tea?

b) Suasion: authority in respect to influencing people´s actions.

→ fall: indicates speaker´s authority: Turn the radio off.

→ rise: indicates deference to the other person´s authority or decision: 'Turn the
radio off.

Advice and recommendations → fall (because they contain a degree of authority): You should
take a little break

Suggestions and invitations → rise: 'You could take a little break

Compare: 'How about a cup of coffee? (recommendation); 'How about a cup of coffee?
(invitation)

Promises → fall: I´ll let you know to morrow.

Offers → rise: 'Can I help you in any way?

Threats → fall Don´t you dare tell lies.

Warnings → rise: 'Look where you are going.

Appeals → rise: A: I´ll have to throw this coffee away. B: You don´t have to do that.

c) Social exchanges
The third category of communicative functions is social exchanges. These kinds of
communication do not involve either the provision or elicitation of information, nor are they
primarily intended to influence other people’s action; they are simply intended to establish and
maintain relationships between people; for instance, greeting and bidding farewell,
introductions, attracting attention, apologizing, sympathizing, wishing, thanking, and so on.
Once again, some of these functions seem naturally to require a fall, others a rise, and yet
others either.

Greetings → either a fall or a rise: Good morning. Good morning

Farewells → typically accompanied by a rising tone: 'Good bye. 'See you a gain. (with a
fall, it will sound very much like a dismissal in which the speaker´s feelings dominate)

Thanking → fall: Thank you (= “I´m thanking you”)

→ rise: Thank you (= “ I am acknowledging a you as the one I thank”)

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Greetings on the phone → rise: Hell o.

Good wishes → rise: 'Happy birthday. 'Have a nice time.

Toasts and congratulations → fall: Good health. Cheers. Well done.

Praise, appreciation, approval and disapproval → fall: That´s great. It´s a lovely thought.
You 'shouldn´t have gone to so much trouble

Expressions of regret → rise: I´m ever so sorry.

Apologies → rise: I do beg your pardon.

Sympathy → rise: 'That´s a pity

Granting forgiveness → rise: 'That´s all right.

Request for attention → fall rise: Ex cuse me. W aiter.

Vocative → fall rise: John.

→fall: sounds more like summons, in which a speaker´s feelings or sense of authority
dominate.

→ rise: sounds like enquiries: E lizabeth. (Are you there)

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 Focus Minus Expressions

Focus Minus Expressions: group of words, phrases and expressions that will not normally
attract accent because they are semantically predictable, old information or do not contribute
significant information to the context.

1. Cohesion markers: They comprise expressions which make explicit the logical relation
between the proposition they are appended to and its context.
a. Additive: really, actually, as a matter of fact, in fact…
b. Concessive: though, if possible…
c. Contrastive: on the other hand, for a change…
d. Inferential: then, so…then, of course…
e. Reinforcing: of course, thanks, if necessary, for example…

2. Hearer-appeal markers: This class comprises items that are used by the speaker to appeal to
the hearer. Most of them serve to enhance the solidarity the speaker
intends to establish with the hearer, some are ‘challenging’ and as
such have a distancing effect.
a. Vocatives: (in final position)…Bob, …woman, …you two…
b. Softeners: I mean, I’m afraid, you know, please, mind you…
c. Tags (copy tags, and tags of reverse polarity in which the speaker is sure about
what he is saying)

3. Approximatives: They comprise expressions that indicate the approximate nature of the
proposition they are appended to. E.g.: …or something, …or two,…
in a way …and so forth…

4. Time-space markers: They establish a link between the proposition they are appended to and
the outside world. There is some previous reference (tenses, pronouns
etc). E.g.: now, this morning, yesterday, anywhere, here, there…

5. Textual markers (parentheticals)

a. Comment clauses (epistemic verbs): I think, I believe, I suppose….
b. Reporting sentences: he said, he asked….

6. Nouns of wide denotation: general nouns referring to large categories.

E.g: place, thing, person, colour, time, boy, girl, street (if named).

Note: These notes have been compiled by Prof. Smith.

Prof. Smith got this summary from Prof. Nilda Zenobi, and Prof. Marina Cantarutti.
Apparent source: Johns-Lewis, Catherine (1986): Intonation in Discourse. UK/US: College Hill Press, Inc.
Compiler: unknown.

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 1

Focus [-] expressions

Activity

A. Match the focus minus expressions in the examples on the left to the type of expressions
on the right.
B. Work with tonality and tonicity in the 10 examples.
C. Read out the examples.

Example Type

1. You’re impossible, Peter! Cohesion markers:

2. It took us an hour or so. a. Additive
3. Why don´t we go to the theatre for a b. Concessive
change. c. Contrastive
4. Everybody’s going to the mountains. d. Inferential
We´re going to the seaside, though. e. Reinforcing
5. So you´re a doctor, are you? Hearer-appeal markers:
6. If you´re bored, go and do your f. Vocatives
homework, then. g. Softeners
7. The sooner the better of course. h. Tags
8. I´m fed up with him, you know. Approximatives
9. My kids are not very fond of video games,
actually.
10. Mr. Brown can’t see you now, I’m
afraid.

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FOCUS: identify the different nuclei according to the context

What´s happened?

Who did she kill?

Who killed her husband? She killed her husband

Did she hit her husband?

Did you receive ten mails?

Who wrote ten mails?

What did you do yesterday? I wrote ten mails

What did you write yesterday?

How many mails did you write yesterday?

Why are you so happy?

Who made a chocolate cake?

Did your mother make a cheese cake? My mother made a chocolate cake

What did your mother make?

What did your mother do?

Who spent $2,000 on clothes?

You look very worried. Any problem?

How much money did your wife spend on clothes? My wife spent $2,000 on clothes

Did John´s wife spend $2,000 on clothes?

Did your wife spend $1,000 on clothes?

Did your wife spend $2,000 on food?

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3. adj + noun: long established compound: high school, blackboard, grandfather, dark room

4. ing (GERUND): boarding school, running shoes, sleeping bag, steering wheel.

5. Noun + ing: Noun is the object of the verb: bookkeeping, time consuming, role playing, time
saving

6. N +PP: moth eaten, V-shaped, moonlit, air-conditioned,

7. Some combinations of verbs and nouns: heartbreak, daybreak, playboy

8. Uncountable nouns: snowflake, cornflake, sand dune, waterfall

Double stressed compounds:

1. Place or time: country house, winter holidays, kitchen sink, evening meal. (cf: Christmas
Day, Christmas Eve BUT Christmas present /card)
2. 2nd N made of the first: apple sauce, fruit salad, lemon pie, olive oil (exceptions: juice, cake,
bread, paper, milk, water)
3. 2 Nouns 2 referents: baby boy, woman doctor, twin sister, student teacher, woman driver)
4. Ing (PRESENT PARTICIPLE): running water, developing countries. working class
5. Proper names, Place names or names of institutions: Hyde Park, Times Square, Park
Avenue , River Thames, King´s College (exceptions: street, gate, high school, secondary
school, Pizza Hut)
6. Titles: James I, William the Conqueror.
7. Colours; navy blue, bottle green
8. Acronyms: USA, FBI

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COMPOUNDS (notes compiled from Word and Sentence Stress – Ortiz
Lira

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stream

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Hancock)

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DRILLS

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 TEXTS AND DIALOGUES FOR PRACTICE (Dialogues compiled from:

Bradford, B. (2005) Intonation in context. Cambridge: CUP. Streamline Departures.

1) Doctor So wanso

Doctor So wanso is the Secretary General of the U 'nited Nations.  He´s one of the 'busiest
men in the world.  He´s just a>rrived at New Delhi Airport  now.  The Indian Prime
Minister  is meeting him.  Later they´ll talk about  Asian problems. 

Yesterday he was in Moscow. He visited the Kremlin and had 'lunch with Soviet leaders. 
During lunch they dis'cussed international politics. 

To morrow  he´ll 'fly to Nai robi.  He´ll meet the President of Kenya and other 'African
leaders. He´ll be there for 'twelve hours. 

Theday after to morrow he´ll be in London.  He´ll meet the 'British Prime >Minister and they´ll
'talk about European eco nomic problems

Next week he´ll be 'back at the United Nations in New York. Next Monday he´ll speak to
the General A ssembly about his 'world tour. 'Then he´ll need a short  holiday.

2) An Interview
Robin Knight, the television re/porter, is /interviewing the Duchess of Wessex for the
/programme The >English at Home.

Robin: Now, /Duchess … tell us about an ordinary day in your life.

Duchess: Well, I wake up at seven o’/clock …

R: /Really? Do you get up /then?

D: No, of course I don’t get up at that time. I have breakfast in /bed, and I read ‘The Times’.

R: What time do you get up?

D: I get up at ten.

R: What do you do then?

D: I read my /letters and dictate the replies to my secretary.

R: …and /then?

D: At eleven, I walk in the garden with Philip.

R: Oh? Who’s Philip?

D: /Philip’s  my dog.

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R: What time do you have lunch?

D: I have lunch at twelve thirty.

R: >And  /after lunch?

D: Oh, I rest  until six o’clock.

R: … and at /six? What do you do at six?

D: I dress for dinner. We have >dinner  at eight o’clock.

R: What time do you go to bed?

D: /Well,  I have a bath at nine /thirty,  and I go to bed at ten.

R: Thank you, Duchess … you  certainly have a /busy  and /interesting  life! #

3) Mrs Newell
Mrs. /Newell has gone to see the doctor  and is discussing her /problem  with him.

D: Where is the /pain, Mrs. Newell?

Mrs. N: Here, Doctor, in my chest.

D: I see. /Here?

Mrs. N: Yes, Doctor.

D: Does it hurt when you /cough?

Mrs. N: Yes, it /does.

D: How long have you had it?

Mrs. N: Six or seven weeks.

D: Six or seven weeks? As long as that?

Mrs. N: I /think so.

D: Have you tried /taking anything – for the \cough,  I ∕mean?

Mrs. N: Well – the usual /honey  and hot /lemon. And /then  I bought some cough
syrup.

D: Did it /help?

Mrs. N: No, Doctor. That’swhy I’ve come to see you. #

4) Jack Marsden
Jack /Marsden  has arranged to /see  his bank manager  because he wants to >borrow 
enough /money  to start buying a flat.

B.M: So,  you’re interested in some sort of loan, Mr. Marsden?

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Jack: That’s /right. You >see, I want to raise enough /money  for a de/posit  on a
smallflat.

B.M: Do you mean to /buy?

Jack: Yes. I don’t want to go on /renting.

B.M: I see. Do you think you can get a /mortgage?

Jack: Yes. I’ve /seen about that. You >see,  I’ve got a secure /job  with a good salary.

B.M: Is the flat for yourself?  Will you be living there alone?

Jack: Yes. For the /moment  anyway. Why?  Does that make any difference to the /loan?

B.M: /No, /no.  Just /interested. That’s /all.

Jack: Do you need to know anything /else?  I’ve brought my /contract  with details of my

/salary.

B.M: Good. Yes, fine. And have you any se/curities?  Shares in any /companies?

In/surance policies? Things like /that? #

5) Samantha

Lisa: That was Samantha on the phone. /Honestly,  I don’t know how she does it.

John: Ah… Samantha. What’s she done now?

L: Nothing, really. That’s what’s amazing. But /somebody  has >sent her  a dozen roses.

J: A dozen /what?

L: A dozen roses.

J: /Roses … /mmm, I /say! … and at this time of the year.

L: Yes. And a dozen roses.  He must be /keen.

J: Is it her /birthday or something?

L: /No,  and what’s /more they were red roses.

J: /Now … a dozen red roses. You know what /that means.

L: Yes. I know what you’re going to /say.

J: It /means  he’s not just keen. He’s in love with her.

L: I /know,  I /know. Poor >guy …

J: Poor /guy? What do you mean? He doesn’t sound very poor to /me  if he can afford

a dozen  roses.

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L: No, I mean I feel /sorry for him. He’s in love with /her – yes. But /she’s  not in love

with him.

J: How do you know? Did she /say so?

L: She doesn’t even know who it is – and she says she doesn’t really mind. She always

>manages …#

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174
10) Got the keys?

Monica: Ok, right about now the turkey should be crispy on the outside, juicy on the inside.
Why are we standing here?

Rachel: We're waiting for you to open the door. You got the keys.

Monica: No I don't.

Rachel: Yes, you do. When we left, you said, "got the keys."

Monica: No I didn't. I asked, "got the ke-eys?"

Rachel: No, no, no, you said, "got the keys".

Chandler: Do either of you have the keys?

Monica: (panicked) The oven is on.

Rachel: Oh, I gotta get my ticket!

Joey: Wait, wait, we have a copy of your key.

Monica: Well then get it, get it!

Joey: That tone will not make me go any faster.

Monica: (angry) Joey!

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READING PRACTICE

A) Henry: Cigarette?

Tony: Oh…er…thanks, Henry…Um, do you have a light?

Henry: Sorry. Here.

Tony: Thanks. Lovely day, isn´t it? Pity I’m on duty.

Henry: I´ll stand in for you if you like. I’ve got nothing else to do.

Tony: Oh no, I couldn’t possibly…

Henry: Go on. Go off and have a good time. Here – you can have the Mini if you like.

Tony: But…are you sure, Henry?

Henry: Of course I am. Take Jill up the mountains, or something.

Tony: That’s ever so good of you, Henry. Oh, you won’t tell anyone, will you…I mean, I am on duty.

Henry: Not a word. Bye, Tony – enjoy yourself.

Tony: Thanks Henry. I won´t forget this…

Henry: Damned right you won´t, you poor fool!

B) My worst exam moment happened when I was caught cheating by my mum after a history
exam. I really liked history classes, but I didn’t have a very good memory . So on the morning of
the exam I wrote loads of important facts and figures on the insides of my shirt cuffs. I made sure
that I got to the exam room really early so I could sit at the back. I managed to answer quite a few
questions using the stuff I’d written on my shirt. I was terrified that I was going to get caught, but
luckily the teacher never noticed what I was doing. Stupidly though, when I got home I was so
happy the exam had finished that I just got changed out of my school clothes and left them on my
bed. Anyway, while I was playing football with my friends in the park, my mum came to get my dirty
clothes so that she could do some washing. She found the shirt and immediately realised what I’d
done – she was absolutely furious, of course, and stopped my pocket money for three months. It
taught me a lesson though, and I’ve never cheated at anything since.

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C) A: I want to buy the hat in the window

B: There are three hats together in the window, madam. Do you want the one with the feathers?

A: No. The other one.

B: The small one for three hundred and three euros?

A: No, not that one either. The one over there. The leather one.

B: Ah! The leather one. Now This is another leather hat, madam. It´s better than the one in the
window. It´s a smoother leather.

A: But I´d rather have the one in the window. It goes with my clothes.

B: Certainly, madam, but we don´t take anything out of the window until three o´clock on Thursday

D) Jill: Hello, Janet. what's the matter?

Janet: I'm desperate! It's my husband. He's gone!

Jill: Gone? Where's he gone?

Janet: He flew to Paris three days ago.

Jill: Has he gone on business?

Janet: No. He hasn't gone on business. He's gone with Dorothy!

Jill: Who is Dorothy, Janet?

Janet: His manager.

Jill: Do you think he is coming back?

Janet: I don't, I'm afraid. Here´s the letter he wrote.

Jill: I wonder how long the affair will last. She´s much older than him, I guess.

Jill: She is much older, but she is richer. And more famous, you know.

E) A: Listen, I’ve got a real problem.

B: What is it?

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A: The car’s broken down.

B: Oh not again.

A: Yeah, I checked the oil, and I checked the battery. It’s not, I don’t know what it is, it’s just

not starting at all.

B: You’ll have to get rid of it you know.

A: I know, I know. But look, the thing is, I’ve got to pick Samantha up at the airport.

B: Do you want to borrow mine?

A: Do you mind? I know I’m covered by the insurance.

B: Well you drove it last week, didn´t you?

A: Well, that would be a great favour.

B: Oh, come round when you like. I don’t need it till tonight.

F) Tom: Bill, can you lend me £5?

Bill: I can't, I'm afraid. I haven't been to the bank today.

Tom: Oh. I haven't been there either, and I need some money. It's four o'clock and the banks have
closed, you know.

Bill: Why don't you ask Peter?

Tom: Has he been to the bank?

Bill: Yes. He went there two hours ago.

Tom: I'll ask him then. By the way, here are the reports I wrote. The files about the murder at
Oxford Street. Remember?

Bill: I do remember them. Thank you, Tom. Are you leaving now?

Tom: Yes. See you tomorrow.

Bill. Goodbye.

178