Intonation UNIT 4B

Phonetics and phonology
INTONATION II
UNIT 4B
WHAT IS INTONATION ? Intonation is the melody of
speech
In studying intonation we study how the pitch of the voice

rises and falls, 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.
If we had no intonation, our speech would be monotonous.
PROSODIC FEATURES
The prosodic (or suprasegmental) characteristics of speech are
those of pitch, loudness and speed. These combine together to
make up the RHYTHM of speech, and are combined in turn with
stretches of silence to break up the flow of speech.
STRESS is realized by a combination of loudness, pitch and
duration. Some languages use stress placement lexically (=to
distinguish different words in the dictionary.
TONE is another prosodic characteristic, being realized mainly by
differences in the pitch of the voice (eg. High level, mid level, low
level, rising or falling. A high pitch results from a relatively rapid
vibration of the vocal folds in the larynx, a low pitch from a
relatively slow vibration.
IS ENGLISH A TONE
LANGUAGE?
English has nothing like these prosodic characteristics of Thai,
Mandarin, Zulu, Norwegian or Japanese. English does not use tone
lexically: in this sense, it is not a tone language. But English does
use tone for intonation.
Thus 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.
We complain, “it’s not what you said, it’s the way that you
said it”, meaning that your words when writing down appears
innocuous- yet when spoken aloud they were offensive or
insensitive. The same words in the same grammatical constructions
may have different pragmatic effects. This is because they may
differ in intonation, and perhaps also in other paralinguistic,
features (e.g huskiness, breathiness, whisper, nasality, special
THE THREE TS
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 chunks. There will be an intonation an
intonation pattern associated with each chunk. These chunks are
known as intonation phrases or IPs . Each IP in an utterance has its
own intonation pattern. In general, we make each clause into a
separate IP.
We don’t know | who she is.
Tonicity: Speakers use intonation to highlight some words
as important for the meaning they wish to convey. These are
the words on which the speaker focuses the hearer’s attention.
To highlight an important word we accent it. We accent its
stressed syllable. That is to say, we add pitch prominence to
the rhythmic prominence that a stressed syllables bears.
The nucleus is the most important accent in the IP. It indicates
the end of the focused part of the material. Onset
Prehead Head Nucleus
It was remarkably good
Every IP contains a nucleus, not all IPs

contain a prehead, a head or a tail.
Tone: Having decided the tonicity- what kind of pitch
movement (what tone) is the speaker going to associate with
it?
In general, a fall tends to indicate that the information
conveyed is, or could be, complete.
A rise or fall-rise tends to indicate that there is something more
to come.
The default tone (=the tone used if there are no special
circumstances) for these are:
Fall: for statements, exclamations, commands and wh-
questions
Rise: yes-no questions
Fall-rise: often signals particular implications
THE FUNCTIONS OF
INTONATION
English makes more elaborate use of intonation to signal meaning
than do most other languages. This is a further reason why it
should not be neglected by learners and teachers of English as a
foreign language.
The attitudinal function: The most obvious role of
intonation is to express our attitudes and emotions. We do this by
tone.
The grammatical function: Intonation helps identify
grammatical structures in speech. We use intonation to mark the
beginning and end of grammatical units such as clause and
sentence. We do this by tonality. We also use intonation to
distinguish clause types, such as question vs statement, and to
disambiguate various grammatically ambiguous structures. We do
The focusing function:
• Intonation helps to show what information in an utterance is new and what
is already known.
•We use it to bring some parts of the message into focus;
• To emphasize or highlight some parts and no others. We do this by tonicity
and by the placement of other accents.
•We combine accentuation with the choice of tone to present some longer
stretches of the message as constituting the foreground of the picture we
paint. While leaving other stretches as background. These are pragmatic
functions
 The discourse function: It enables us to signal whether or not we
have come to the end of the point we are making; whether we want to
keep talking or are ready to give another speaker a turn.
The psychological function: Intonation helps us organize speech
into units that are easy to perceive, memorize and perform. This is why we
need tonality.
The indexical function: Intonation may act as a marker of
personal or social identity. What makes mothers sound like mothers,
lovers sound like lovers. Partly, their characteristic intonation.
TONE: GOING UP AND
GOING DOWN
FALLS: In a falling nuclear tone the pitch of the voice starts relatively high
and then moves downwards. The starting point may be anywhere from
mid to high. The endpoint is low. There may be some upward movement
before the pitch moves downwards.
I really don’t care!

RISES: In a rising nuclear tone the pitch of the voice starts
relatively low and then moves upwards. The starting point maybe
anywhere from low to mid, and the endpoint anywhere from mid to
high. If the nucleus is on the last or only syllable in the intonation
phrase, then the rise takes place on that syllable.
Who?
Fall rises: In a fall-rise nuclear tone, the pitch of the voice
starts relatively high and then upwards again. The starting point
may be anywhere from mid to high, the midpoint is low, and the
endpoint is usually mid. If the nucleus is on the last or only
syllable in the intonation phrase, then the entire fall-rise
movement takes place on that syllable.
Mine.

Intonation UNIT 4B

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Intonation UNIT 4B

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Phonetics and phonology

In studying intonation we study how the pitch of the voice

Tonality: The first matter a speaker has to decide is the division

Every IP contains a nucleus, not all IPs

I really don’t care!

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