Functions of intonation

Date: 2015-10-07; view: 583.

Intonation helps to organize sentences and to divide them into sense-groups. It indicates the communicative centre of a sense-group. Intonation may be used as a means for distinguishing different communicative types of sentences such as statements, questions, imperatives or exclamations. Thus, a statement may be turned into (превращать) a question if a rising tone is used instead of a falling tone. At the same time intonation may indicate the emotional attitude of the speaker to words reality and differentiate such communicative typed as polite questions, friendly warnings, encouragements, etc.

Speech melody (the pitch): the pitch component of intonation. It is the variations in the pitch of the voice.

Sentence stress: it is the greater prominence which is given to one or more words in a sentence in comparison with other words in the same sentence.

The timber of speech: it is the special coloring of the voice in pronouncing sentences and it shows the speaker's emotions.

The tempo of speech: it is the speed with which sentences or their parts are pronounced. It is determined by the rate at which speech sounds are uttered (произнесение звуков) and also by the number and length of pauses.

Closely connected with the tempo of speech is its rhythm (ритм) (the recurrence of stressed syllables at more or less equal intervals of time).

The components of intonation for unit and we cannot divide them or single them out because they function together.

4. RP – Received Pronunciation (принятое произношение)

The main types of RP. There are 3 types:

1 conservative

2 general

3 advanced

The conservative RP forms are used by the older generation and they represent the pronunciation existing at the end of the 19^th century.

The general RP forms are the type of pronunciation most commonly produced by educated natives. It is the pronunciation adopted by mass-media (BBC).

The advanced RP forms are mainly used by young people especially of the upper classes.