Lecture 5 - Stress

8/14/2019 Lecture 5 - Stress

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Lecture 5

Stress

Definition

Types of stress

Nature of stress

Placement of stress within words Simple words

Derived words

Compound words

Word class pairs

Strong form and weak form


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Definition

Stress is an extra force exerted on a particular syllable

or a particular word in spoken language. The stressed

syllable or word is said with greater energy, and stands

out in a word, phrase or sentence. Examples:

father/f\/ information/nf\men/

John bought a new car yesterday


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Types of stress

1. Word stress: is an extra force put on a particular

syllable of the word. It is usually fixed. For example:

invite entertain

2. Sentence stress: is an extra force put on a particular

word in a sentence. Sentence stress is not fixed. It

depends on the speakers feelings and attitudes and

the message that he wants to get across to the

listener. For example:

John bought a new car yesterday.


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The nature of stress We can study stress from the point of view of production

and perception.

1. From the production point of view, the production of

stress is generally believed to depend on the speakers

using more muscular energy than for unstressed

syllables.

2. From the perception point of view: all stressed syllables

have one characteristic in common, and that is

prominence. At least four factors make a stressed

syllable prominent: loudness, length, pitch and vowelquality. Generally, these four factors work together in

combination though syllables may sometimes be made

prominent by means of only one or two of them.


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Levels of stress1. Primary stress (tonic/nuclear): is the strongest type of

stress. It is marked by a small vertical line high up just

before the syllable it relates to.

2. Secondary stress (non-tonic): it is weaker than

primary stress, but stronger than unstressed syllables. It

is usually found in words of four or five syllables. It is

represented in transcription with a low mark. Forexamples:

photographic economical

anthropology nationality

3. Unstressed: can be regarded as being the absence of

any recognizable amount of prominence.


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Placement of stress within words

In order to decide on the stress placement, it is

necessary to make use of some or all of the following

information.a. Whether the word is morphologically simple or

complex.

(whether the word is a simple, derived or compound

word).

a. The grammatical category to which the word belongs.

b. The number of syllables in the word.

c. The phonological structure of the word.


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Simple word stress

1. Two syllable words

a. Verbs

b. Adjectives

c. Nouns

d. Adverbs and prepositions

2. Three syllable words

a. Verbsb. Nouns

c. Adjectives


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Two-syllable verbs

a. If the second syllable of the verb contains a long

vowel or a diphthong or it ends with more than

one consonant, that second syllable is stressed.

E.g.

provide protest

contain agree

More examples: select, arrest, design, inform,

invent, prefer, depend, occur, succeed, deny,

apply, record, invite.


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b. If the second syllable contains a short vowel and

ends with one or no consonant, the first syllable is

stressed. Examples:

enter worry

travel open

More examples: menace, settle, marry, differ,equal, answer.

c. The final syllable is also unstressed if it contains/@U/. Examples:

follow borrow


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Two-syllable Adjectives

Two syllable adjectives are stressed according to

the same rules as verbs. Examples:

correct major

polite complete

heavy happy

sincere precise


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Two-syllable Nouns

a. If the second syllable contains a short vowel, the

stress will be on the first syllable. Otherwise, it will

be on the second syllable.

money reason

office larynx

estate balloon

autumn affair delight pocket

canoe surface


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Notes

Other two-syllable words such as adverbs and

prepositions seem to behave like verbs and

adjectives. Examples:

beyond never

seldom behind

again very

before after

except across


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Three-syllable verbsa. If the last syllable contains a short vowel and ends

with not more than one consonant, the last syllable

will be unstressed, and stress will be placed on the

second syllable.

encounter determine

abandon remember

b. If the final syllable contains a long vowel or a

diphthong, or ends with more than one consonant,

the final syllable will be stressed.

entertain introduce

intervene recommend


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Three-syllable Nounsa. If the final syllalbe contains a short vowel or /@U/, it is

unstressed. If the second syllable contains a long

vowel or a diphthong, or it ends with more than one

consonant, the second syllable will be stressed.

potato disaster

cathedral advantage

b. If the final syllable contains a short vowel and the

second syllable contains a short vowel and ends with

not more than one consonant, both the final and

middle syllalbes are unstressed, and the first syllable

is stressed.


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quantity cinema

enemy alphabet

animal company

antonym character

c. If the final syllalbe contains a long vowel or a

diphthong or it ends with more than one consonant,the stress will usually be placed on the first syllable.

paradise exercise

architect marigold

photograph attitude


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Three-syllable Adjectives

Three-syllable adjectives seem to need the same

rules as Nouns to produce stress pattern such as:

opportune insolent

possible derelict

important absolute

enormous similar

accurate popular


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Complex word stress

Derived words

Stress on the affix No change in stress placement

The stress remains on the stem but is shifted to

a different syllable.

Compound words

Primary stress on the second element

Primary stress on the first element.


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Stress in derived words The affixes will have one of three possible effects on

the word stress.

1. The affix itself receives primary stress.circle semi-circle

employ employee

person personality

Portugal Portugese

cigar cigarettepicture picturesque

mountain mountaineer


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2. The word is stressed as if the affix were not there.

comfort comfortable

marry marriage

refuse refusal

wide widen

wonder wonderful

amaze amazingred reddish

power powerless

punish punishment

poison poisonous

glory glorify


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3. The stress remains on the stem, not the affix, but

is shifted to a different syllable.

advantage advantageous

proverb proverbial

climate climatic

injure injurious

tranquil tranquility

photograph photographer

economy economical

equator equatorial


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Compound words

a. If the first word/part of the compound is in a broad

sense adjectival, the stress goes on the second

element with a secondary stress on the first.

loudspeaker

full moonfast food

new moon

open hearted

ill mannered


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b. If, however, the first element is, in a broad sense, a

noun, the stress goes on the first element.

car ferry

tea cupsuitcase

bottle feed

boatpeople

farm house

airplanebodyguard

bedroom


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Word class pairs

In English, there are pairs of two syllable words with

identical spelling which differ from each other in stress

placement, apparently according to word class. Therule is as follows: The stress will be placed on the

second syllable if the word is a Verb, but on the first

syllable of the Noun or Adjective.

abstract abstract

conduct conductcontrast contrast

desert desert


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escort escort

export export

import import

insult insult

object object

perfect perfect

permit permit

present present

produce produce

rebel rebel

record record

subject subject


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Strong and weak forms

There are certain well-known English words that can be

pronounced in two different ways which are called strong

form and weak form.

I like that

I hope that you are fine

It is possible to use only strong forms in speaking, andsome foreigners do this. Usually, they can still be

understood by other speakers of English, so why is it

important to learn how weak forms are used?a. Most native speakers of English find an all-strong-form

pronunciation unnatural and foreign sounding, somethings

that most learners would wish to avoid.


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More importantly, speakers who are not familiar with the

use of weak forms are likely to have difficultyunderstanding speakers who do use weak forms. Since

practically all native speakers of English use them,

learners of the language need to learn about these weakforms to help them understand what they hear.

Almost all the words which have both a strong and weak

form belong to a category that may be called grammatical

words such as auxiliary verbs, prepositions,

conjunctions... It is important to remember that there are

certain contexts in which only the strong form is

acceptable, and others where the weak form

pronunciation is the normal.


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The strong form is used in the following cases:

a. When the word occurs at the end of a sentence.

What are you looking at?

I am looking at my pictures.Where are you from?

I am from Vietnam

b. When a weak form word is being contrasted with

another word.

The letter is from him, not to him.

He likes her, but does she like him?


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A similar case is what we might call a co-ordinated

use of prepositions.

I travel to and from London a lot.

A work of and about literature.c. When a weak form word is given stress for the

purpose of emphasis.

You must marry me

I have to go

You must choose us or them.

d. When a weak form word is being cited or quoted

You shouldnt put and and the end of a sentence.

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Lecture 5 - Stress