Voice distinctions of an English utterance.

Date: 2015-10-07; view: 635.

English utterance is impossible without intonation. There are two main approaches to the problem of intonation in Great Britain. One is known as acontour analysis and the other may be called grammatical.

The first one: H. Sweet, D. Jones, G. Palmer, L. Armstrong, I. Ward, R. Kingdon, J. O'Connor, A. Gimson and others. According to this approach the smallest unit to which linguistic meaning can be attached is a tone-group (sense-group). Their theory is based on the assumption that intonation consists of basic functional "blocks". They pay much attention to these "blocks" but not to the way they are connected. In fact the aim of communication determines the intonation structure, not vice versa.

The grammatical approach to the study of intonation was worked out by M. Halliday. The main unit of intonation is a clause. Intonation is a complex of three systemic variables: tonality, tonicity and tone, which are connected with grammatical categories. Tonality marks the beginning and the end of a tone-group. Tonicity marks the focal point of each tone-group. Tone is the third unit in Halliday's system. Tones can be primary and secondary. They convey the attitude of the speaker. Hallyday's theory is based on the syntactical function of intonation. One of the main components of the intonation is the voice pitch. It is the tone of the voice. It may be considered from the articulatory, acoustically/auditory and functionally points of view. Auticulatory—voice pitch is the result of the work of the vibrator mechanism, producing vibrations. Acoustically—voice pitch is complex periodic vibrations combined with main tone. Fundamental frequency of vibrations is a measuring unit of the voice pitch. Auditory—voice pitch (voice melody) is percepted as significant movements of the voice up and down. Functionally voice pitch manifests itself both at the end of an utterance – in the nucleus as a nuclear tone & within the whole contour. Pitch consists of pronouncing a syllable on a higher pitch level than the others, or in giving that syllable a certain melodic shape: a falling one, a rising one, or a combination of the two. In acoustic terms it means the number of vibrations per second of the vocal cords. Pitch is created by the rate of vibration of the vocal cords. Pitch is also a component of accent. Pitch consists of pronouncing a syllable on a higher pitch level than the others, or in giving that syllable a certain melodic shape: a falling one, a rising one, or a combination of the two. In acoustic terms it means the number of vibrations per second of the vocal cords*. Pitch contrasts are more easily perceived with voiced sounds. Variations of pitch occur in chunks of speech called tone units. A tone-unit* is the phonological unit greater in size than the
syllable, and it is the basic unit of intonation. In its smallest form a tone-unit may consist of only one syllable so it would in fact be wrong to say that it is always composed of more than one syllable. For example, both you and is it you may be regarded as tone units; the former is a one-syllable utterance which carries a tone* while the latter is an utterance of three syllables in which only the third one carries a tone. A syllable which carries a tone is called a tonic syllable* or nucleus*. Conventionally, the structure of a tone-unit/intonation pattern or tune* is made up of the following components:− a nucleus or tonic syllable (an obligatory element) – carried by the stressed syllable of the most important word in the utterance − a pre-nuclear component part (non-obligatory) consisting of an optional head (that part of a tune starting with the first accented syllable and continuing up to the nucleus) and a pre-head*
(all the unaccented syllables before a head).- a post-nuclear part (optional) - called tail which usually
consists of the unstressed syllables after the nucleus. Sometimes a tail can contain stressed words but without pitch change as in well, ‘say something, then! For all the languages two tones are common—falling and rising. Falling tone is always complete, categoric. Rising is on the contrary.

D. Crystal distinguishes the following functions of intonation.

• Emotional function's most obvious role is to express attitudinal meaning -sarcasm, surprise, reserve, impatience, delight, shock, anger, interest, and thousands of other semantic nuances.

• Grammatical function helps to identify grammatical structure in speech, performing a role similar to punctuation. Units such as clause and sentence often depend on intonation for their spoken identity, and several specific contrasts, such as question/statement, make systematic use of it.

• Informational function helps draw attention to what meaning is given and what is new in an utterance. The word carrying the most prominent tone in a contour signals the part of an utterance that the speaker is treating as new information.

• Textual function helps larger units of meaning than the sentence to contrast and cohere. In radio news-reading, paragraphs of information can be shaped through the use of pitch. In sports commentary, changes in prosody reflect the progress of the action.

• Psychological function helps us to organize speech into units that are easier to perceive and memorize. Most people would find a sequence of numbers, for example, difficult to recall. The task is made easier by using intonation to chunk the sequence into two units.

• Indexical function, along with other prosodic features, is an important marker of personal or social identity. Lawyers, preachers, newscasters, sports commentators, army sergeants, and several other occupations are readily identified through their distinctive prosody.

There are special mechanisms with the help of which we produce the sound. From the articulatory aspect they can be distinguished thus: power mechanism—includes mainly the lungs. Its function is to supply the sound producing organs with energy in the form of the air pressure coming from the lungs; vibrator mechanism—is mainly the larynx (upper part of the windpipe) with the vocal cords and the glottis situated in it. V.m. is both articulatory and acoustic mechanism, its function is to produce different types of vibrations: y regular/periodic and irregular/ non periodic. The greater number of vibrations is produced the higher voice (tone) is obtained. Resonator mechanism—it is produced in the mouth. It is very important, because there is a tongue there and it is a main obstructer and it is the most active, flexible organ. Its function is to give rise to vowels (to define qualities) by changing the size, shape and volume of the mouth resonator. They are modified by the tongue and the lips. Vowels are classified according to: position of the tongue, of the lips, historical length and final phase of articulation, stability. According to the historical length vowels are long and short. Accor. To the final phase they are free and checked. Free, which are historically long, are those in the production of which there is some decrease in the force of articulation. Checked, which are short are those in the production of which there is no decrease in the force of articulation. They are always checked by the following consonant. Obstructive mechanism—its main function is to produce consonants—speech sounds with the obstruction. The tongue, the lips and the soft palate fulfil the role of obstructers. The quality of obstruction is defined by the manner of obstruction: a) the type of obstruction—(in)complete and intermediate. Consonants may be occlusive(смычные), constrictive(щелевые), and occlusive-constrictive(смычно-щелевые). b) the manner of producing noise—plosives, fricatives,sonants. According to the active organs of speech—labial, lingual, pharyngeal or glottal. Labial—bilabial, labia-dental. Lingual—forelingual, mediolingual, backlingual. According to the place of articulation—dental, alveolar, post-alveolar, palato-alveolar, palatal, velar(небные). The kind of noise—voiced and voiceless. Their intensity—forties—voiceless, lenis—voiced.