2.7. Auditory Test

• Delimit the stretches of everyday talks. Mark the pauses.

• Single out the rhythm groups schematically.

• Mark the reduced articulation syllable sequences of notional and functional words.

• Focus on the pitch patterns (simple, compound tunes). Try to differentiate the tune structure (pre-head, head, nucleus, tail).

• Observe variations of the rate and volume.

• Identify the highlighted syllables (tonic – pre-tonic, ).

E.g. how’s your new job going?

(ra) (ra)

 □ □  □ □ – simple tune, high level one-peak head + Fall with the initial Rise nucleus + tail, normal rate, loudness.

Analyse these stretches:

1. Yeah and then afterwards, she’ll be all smiles and sweety-sweety and making jokes again as if nothing’s happened. It’s really getting on my nerves, I tell you …

2. It’s really difficult isn’t it. Have you tried talking to anyone else about it? I mean maybe she’s like that with everyone?

3. I don’t know. I don’t really feel as if I know any of them well enough yet.

4. No. And I don’t suppose it’s worth trying to say something to her about it, I mean, I suppose it is possible that she doesn’t realize she’s doing it?

5. Can you imagine! No, ugh! I don’t think that would work. I think she knows exactly what she’s doing …

6. Oh dear, poor old you, it’s such a shame when everything else is going so well …

7. Still, maybe things get better when she gets to know you a bit better, and realizes how deeply and fantastically brilliant you are! Try not to worry about it too much, eh … have another drink, what do you want?

8. Well, James, the best I can do for a pay rise this year is five per cent. Sorry.

9. I’m really sorry it can’t be more this time round. But the company must have capital for research and development.

10. Do you realize that the rate of inflation this year is running at ten per cent?

11. James, I know very well that the situation is difficult.

12. All right, but only if you say you’re prepared to negotiate a settlement and not just impose a figure.

Score level criteria

Excellent: relevant to assigned model.

Good: relevant number of intonation groups, adequate pitch patterns but lack of accuracy in the pausation.

Fair: limited knowledge, inadequate delimitation at times, lack of accuracy in the pre-nuclear stress placement and pausation specifics.

Poor: not enough to evaluate.

Score – mark

12-11 - 5

10-8 - 4

7-5 - 3

4-… - 2

2.8. Reading Technique

• Try to develop your reading skills. Practice ‘Extract from a Spy Story’.

• Delimit the message into intonation groups, utterances, phonopassages. Use the set of symbols to mark the pauses observing the specifics of timing.

• Focus on the timing process of the previous extracts for reading aloud. Do you think the type of message conditions pitch, rate and volume variation?

• Read these utterances for revision. Try and concentrate on the tonal colouring of the presentation.

That individual writes or speakers may in certain circumstances be identified through specimens of their discourse has given rise to another highly influential notion of style – as a set of individual characteristics (Module One).

There have been signs that some European leaders are reluctant to take the present British offer seriously, and it is widely felt in White hall that Mr. Rippon’s main task at the moment is to make it clear to the Six that the offer is viewed in this country as a reasonable and realistic one (Module Two).

Any surpluses that a nationalized industry makes … these are derived from its year-to-year-trading operations and of course, these surpluses belong to the State unlike in a private company, of course, where they are issued to the shareholders by way of dividend (Module Three).

The effect on public consumption was great and by the early ‘80s’ the statistics provided by market research proved that more and more Americans were switching from Coke to Pepsi – a cause of serious concern for the management of Coke (Module Four).

The Husband – the characters are not given names and, significantly, never use names to address each other – comes home from his office and tells the Wife that he has invited a friend to dinner (Module Five).

If you are entertaining, and say to your guest as you put his dinner before him ‘I hope you like it’, then he will probably think one of two things: either that there is an element of doubt about him or there’s an element of doubt about the meal – that the food is perhaps unusual, and he will not be enough of a gastronomic sophisticate to appreciate it (Module Six).

• Account for the differences in the manner of presentation and take into consideration various varieties of kinetic tones that result in the specific communicative timbre characteristics of the discourse patterns.

• Consider the tunes of the text under consideration. Focus on the expressive contours.

• Practise over the compound tunes in isolation.

• Remember to try and give additional force to some syllables to make the words sound more expressive.

• Try and read out loud the chains of intonation groups observing their coordinative and subordinative relations.

• Be careful to properly punctuate the thought; keep to the length and function of pauses.

• Try to restructure the prosodic pattern of the extract telling your friends the story about Angus Pym.

• Get ready to present the text reading out loud to the best advantage. What’s the difference between reading and speaking in terms of the phonetic arrangement?