VII. ENGLISH INTONATION, ITS STRUCTURE AND FUNCTIONS

Date: 2015-10-07; view: 574.

Another part of suprasegmental phonology is intonation. Intonation is a language universal. There are no languages which are spoken as a monotone, without any change of prosodic parameters. But intonation functions in various languages in a different way. So our attention will be turned to the role of intonation in the language and its contribution to the communicative value of the act of speech.

Intonation hasn't been thoroughly investigated yet, as such research involves the use of both special skills and particular technical devices and equipment. From the very beginning of phonetics as a science phoneticians preferred to study segmental phonemes rather than intonation, so now we have a far more detailed analysis of English sounds than of its intonation patterns. Teachers of phonetics also prefer to concentrate their attention on sounds, as the recognition of intonation variations requires a special skill, the so-called musical ear, which is difficult to acquire and develop. Native speakers use intonation unconsciously. Intonational differences in the native language seem to be the first to be perceived and acquired by children, so they are rooted so deeply in their minds that when they come to studying a foreign language, interference (influence) of the native intonation is the strongest and the most difficult to get rid of. More than that. Very often the misuses of intonation patterns in a foreign language are perceived by native speakers not as mistakes, but as an intentional act, so such situations may cause misunderstanding and even offence.

The study of intonation went through many stages: as individual sounds, intonation can be examined on different levels – auditory, acoustic and functional. We shall start with the description of intonation on the auditory and acoustic levels, and then pass on to its linguistic function.