5.2.Linguistically relevant degrees of word stress.

Instrumental analyses show that in a polysyllabic word there are as many degrees of stress as there are syllabic in it, but it disagrees with human perception, because according to our experience there are short ?! syllables in a word. This conflict may be solved in a simple way to pronounce a word or a syllable we have to make some effort , this effort is registrar by machines as stress, what the human are perceives a stress, is:- the greatest degree of effort;

-is connected with the meaning of the word.

Ex. ‘Папа- тато –is perceived as a Russian word- father.

Па’па- is associated with either English or French.

До’рога – доро’га way-dear

And other stressed syllables are not perceived as language important. Usually scholars speak of three degrees of word stress in English:

Strong stress- primary stress

Partial stress- secondary stress

And the so called unstressed syllables- have weak stress.

5.3.Stress patterns of the english words.

The stress patterns of the bulk are regular and stable. The same syllable is stressed in the word and it’s derivatives.

Ex. Merry- merriment .

At the same time English stress is free, it means that it’s not fixed to any particular syllable in all the words. There are two main stress tendencies in it.

1)The recessive tendency. According to it the stress falls on the first syllable in a word which is the root syllable or the second syllable in a word where the prefix doesn’t change the meaning of the word cardinally.

Ex. Come-become

Deed- indeed

Give- forgive

2)The rhythmic tendency. According to it, in polysyllabic words the stress falls on the third syllable from the end.

Ex. Opportunity , mobility.

If there are more than 4 syllables in the word, both tendencies worked together.

Ex.’effi’ciency.

The functions of the word stress are:

1)Constitutive function-manifests itself in the fact that each word has some stress and trere are no words without a stress.

2)distinctive function- manifests itself in the fact that the stress helps to differentiate between different parts of speech.

Ex. ‘abstract –adjective

Abstr’act – verb

‘present-noun

Pre’sent- verb

3)Idetificatory- stress patterns help us to identify word.

6.Suprasegmental level.

6.1.Intonation and prosody.

Syllables (words, sentences, texts) are the basic units of the segmental level. They are segmental units, it means that they are small parts of something bigger. Syllables unite into rhythmic groups, intonation groups, utterances, texts in speech.

But our speech is more than a combination of unites such features of speech has tone, rhythm, stress (not word stress, but utterance stress), tempo, pauses are laid over the combination of units and together with these unites they create the meaning of the utterance. Sometimes these features alone (without the participation of syllables and words) can change the meaning of an utterance.

Ex. Marry ,said / her sister is a ‘student.

,Marry/ said her ,sister/ is a ‘student.

The combinations of features mentioned above is called intonation or prosody. Intonation is a complex unity of speech melody, utterance stress, tempo, rhythm and voice timbre which enables the speaker to express his or her thoughts, emotions and attitude to the content to the utterance their partner in the communication and situation.

Acoustically , intonation is the combination of fundamental frequency , intensity and duration.

Speech melody is related with fundamental frequency, tempo with duration, stress and rhythm are related with the combination of frequency, intensity and duration. The term prosody is basically used in the same sense as the term intonation. The difference is the same features can be studied on the basis of some segmental unites with intonation. These units are rhythmic group, intonation group, utterance,text. With prosody these unites are syllable, rhythmic group, intonation group, utterance, text.