In sentences words with two stresses can be pronounced with one single stress under the influence of rhythm, e.G. ,thir'teen, but: Her 'num­ber is 'thirteen ,hundred.

Under the influence of rhythm a shifting of word-stress can be ob­served in words with secondary stress, e. g.: ,qualifi'cation — 'just 'qualif'ication (emphatic variant).

The rhythmic stress affects the stress pattern of a great number of words in the English language. This results in the secondary accent, e.g. refu'gee, emplo’yee, ˌengi'neer, occu'pation, ,recommen'dation, etc.

Under the influence of rhythm compounds of three elements may have a strong stress on the second element; e. g. hot 'water bottle, waste 'paper basket (,hot 'water bottle, ,waste 'paper basket may also occur).

It has also been noticed that the stress of the parent word is often retained in the derivatives.

Cf. 'personal — ˌpersoˈnality, ˈnation — ˌnatioˈnality.

This regularity is sometimes called the retentive tendency in English.

There is one more tendency in English: the tendency to stress the most important elements in words. Such meaningful prominence is given to negative prefixes "un-", "in-", "mis-" (e.g. "unknown", "inartistic", "misbehave"), such prefixes as "ex-", "vice-", "sub-", "under-", (e.g. "ex-president”, "vice-president", "sub-editor", "under-mine"), suffix "-teen" (e.g. "thirteen", "fourteen"), semantically important elements in compound words (e.g. well-known", "red-hot", "bad-tempered").

In everyday speech the following variants of stress patterns can also be observed:

1. stylistically conditioned accentual variants, e. g. territory /'terətərI/ (full style) — /'terətrI/ (rapid colloquial style);

2. individual, free accentual variants, e. g. hospitable /'hɒspItəbəl/, /'ha:spItəb^əl/.

Free accentual variants should not be confused with orthoepically in­correct accentuation.

These are the tendencies that to some extent regulate the placement of stress in English words and condition their stress patterns.

THE FUNCTIONS OF WORD STRESS

Word stress has a constitutive function, as it moulds syllables into a word by forming its stress pattern. Without a definite stress pattern a word ceases to be a word and becomes a sequence of syllables.

Word stress has a distinctive function in English, because there exist different words in English with analogous sound structure which are differentiated in speech only by their stress patterns. E.g.:

Noun/Adjective Verb

'insult in’sult

'abstract ab’stract or abs’tract

'accent ac'cent

Is it the different degrees of stress or rather the stress patterns that distinguish one word from another?

There exist different views of the problem. Some linguists (G. Trager, A. Hill) regard degrees of word stress as phonological units, which can distinguish words. They consider degrees of word stress to be separate phonemes. They have introduced 4 stress phonemes: primary (or loud), secondary (or reduced loud), tertiary (or medial) and weak stress phonemes. But it may be argued that degrees of stress can be treated as phonemes, because they are not segments into which speech may be divided. Degrees of stress are superimposed on syllables just as other prosodic phenomena.

V. Vassilyev states that in minimal pairs as ˈimport - im'port primary stress and weak stress form phonological oppositions (primary stress vs. weak stress). The distinction in the meaning of the words "certification— certification", according to V. Vassilyev, is based on the phonological opposition of secondary stress vs. weak stress. On this account he treats the degrees of stress as phonological units, which he calls "accentemes". He distinguishes three word accentemes in English: primary accenteme, secondary accenteme, weak accenteme. Accentemes differ from phonemes, because accentemes are prosodic phonological units.

Another view is expressed by G. Torsuyev, H. Kurath, A. Gimson and others. They think that it is the stress patterns of words that contrast with each other rather than degrees of stress. This viewpoint appears to be wellgrounded. It is evident that degrees of stress can be perceived only in stress patterns as relatively strong, medium or weak stress, i.e. one syllable has stronger stress than any other, another syllable is less strong but stronger than the weak ones. Moreover, in one stress pattern secondary stress may be stronger than primary stress in another stress pattern.

Therefore, it is the stress patterns "primary stress + weak stress" and "weak stress + primary stress" that distinguish words as "ˈimport" – "imˈport", "ˈinsult" – "in'sult".

On this account a stress pattern can be treated as a relevant prosodic unit.

Word stress has an identifiсatогу function as well, because the stress patterns of words enable people to identify definite combinations of sounds as meaningful linguistic units. A distortion of the stress patterns may hamper understanding or produce a strange accent.

Thus, it is obvious that word stress performs its linguistic functions only as a structural element of a word. It is actually the stress pattern of a word that performs both the distinctive and the identificatory functions. And it is in the stress pattern of a word that the degrees of stress can be differentiated and opposed one to another.