9.3 Irregular preheads

Irregular prehead is a prehead which is displaced in pitch from its normal position in the lower half or about the middle of the voice range. The displacement can be made both upward and downward – High Irregular and Low Irregular Preheads, respectively. High Irregular prehead is much more common in speech.

In the High Irregular prehead, or High Prehead (HP) for short, all the syllables are said on a very high pitch, higher than the onset syllable, which is usually the highest syllable in the group. The HP is never long (2-3 syllables), it rarely contains more than two or three syllables, one of which can be partially stressed.

Examples: He was a`mazing. He,llo.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

______________ ________

__________________ __________

--------------------------- ----------------

Irregular preheads make speech livelier and more emotional. The emphatic role of the High prehead increases when it is used before a low head or a low nuclear tone, e.g.: Is that what you ,,want? The HP is commonly used with emphatic kinetic tones, especially in tunes containing no head, e.g. : Did you see the ,,film?

In the Low Irregular prehead all the syllables are said on a very low pitch.

E.g.: I told you to go.

________________

________________

------------------------

Speech Exercises

Ex. 1 Read the situations containing High Irregular Preheads and sound emotional and lively.

1. - Poor Nora, look here, I’ll see if I can buy another pair for you.

– Oh, but its all right, Harry. I’ve got them.

2 – I hate doing nothing.

- Don’t be silly, Harry. You’ve got a temperature.

3 – Well, the Rovers won, mum.

- The Rovers, Robert? Why, where have you been?

4 – I think that’s my niece at the door.

- Ha llo, Betty, dear. I’m so glad to see you.

Ex. 2 Provide an appropriate context for each utterance using prompts.

1 Why, he’s got a sore throat!

2 Yes, he’s got a very good memory.

3 You could ask Jill to help you. She is a very good typist.

4 You could find Bill to help you. He would have never re fused.

5 To morrow?

6 To morrow?

7 Yes, and I’ll try to be as quick as I can.

8 Yes, and I think he’s getting on quite well at it.

Prompts:

1) Why do you insist on his staying in bed?

2) He can learn a lot in a short time.

3) I’m terribly busy this week. I’ve got to finish typing.

4) I had to do anything alone.

5) They are getting married tomorrow.

6) I’m having an interview with the manager.

7) Well, Mike, let’s meet in the waiting-room.

8) What’s he studying now? Is he studying science?

9.4 Stress Reduction. Nuclear Tone-Shift

In a normal utterance the syllable bearing the nuclear tone is more prominent than the stressed syllables in the prenuclear part. When it is desired to reinforce the semantic weight of the nuclear word it can be done

a) by reducing the prenuclear stresses, thus giving the nucleus the greater relative prominence.

I can’t I magine what he looks like.

I can’t imagine what he looks like.

b) by using the so-called nuclear tone-shift, which means displacing the nuclear tone from it’s normal position – on the last notional word in an utterance – to a word at the beginning or in the middle of it. It gives the effect of special semantic prominence or contrast.

- I simply can’t manage it.

- Then let’s all get down to work.

The effect of a contrastive tone-sift is always greater when the nuclear stress is given to a function word or a pronoun or when it is combined with emphases.

• John seems to have enjoyed the party.

• Well, I don’t know. It’s the last party I shall go to with him.

- It’s only three weeks to the New Year.

- Why, it’s less than three weeks.