The Accentual Structure of English Words

Not all the syllables in a word are pronounced with the same degree of force. Usually one syllable is made more prominent than the others, and it is said to be stressed or accented. Stress is usually studied from two points of view: its production and its perception. The production of stress is generally believed to depend on the speaker using more muscular energy than is used for unstressed syllables. From the perceptual point of view, all stressed syllables have one characteristic in common, and that is prominence. At least four factors contribute to a greater prominence of a syllable:

· loudness (a louder syllables is perceived as more prominent)

· pitch (especially the change of pitch level)

· the length of a syllable (a longer syllable is perceived as stressed)

· the vowel quality (long vowels and diphthongs are generally more prominent than short vowels, while among short vowels themselves open ones are more prominent, and [ɪ-ʊ-ə] are the least prominent)

Generally, these four factors work together in combination, although syllables may sometimes be made prominent by means of only one or two of them.

Languages differ according to the type of stress. European languages such as English, German, French, Russian, etc. are said to have the dynamic stress which implies greater force (greater muscular energy) with which the syllable is pronounced. The musical (tonic) word stress is observed in Chinese, Japanese, Vietnamese, etc. The meaning of words in these languages depends on the variations of voice pitch in relation to neighbouring syllables. For example, in Chinese the sound sequence ma pronounced with the level tone means mother, with the rising tone – “material”, with the falling-rising tone – “a horse” and pronounced with the abrupt fall it means “an insult”. In Scandinavian languages the word stress is considered to be both dynamic and musical.

The nature of word stress in Russian seems to differ from that in English. The quantitative component of stress plays a greater role in Russian word stress. In the Russian language we never pronounce vowels of full formation and length in unstressed positions, they are always reduced. In English nonreduced vowels occur sometimes in the unstressed syllables as in transport [ˈtræspɔ:t], museum [mju:ˈzi:əm], hotel [hɜʊˈtel].

Now a brief word on the degree of stress. Phonetic prominence of a syllable in a word is relative, i.e. compared with the preceding one. In fact there are as many degrees of prominence as there are syllables in the word. Phonologically, there are only three degrees: primary - the strongest, secondary and weak (or unstressed): eˌxamiˈnation, ˌorganiˈsation. Some linguists also distinguish tertiary stress, which is as weak as secondary but has a different distribution: it follows the primary stress, while the secondary stress precedes it. Tertiary stress is usually found in American English: ˈsecreˌtary, ˈdictioˌnary.

Languages are also differentiated according to the placement of word stress. It can be fixed (or limited to a particular syllable - the last in French, the last but one in Polish, the first in Czech) or free (or variable). English word-stress has many peculiarities, which make it very complicated. These peculiarities are due to the fact, that in English there are many borrowed words from different languages with various rules of syllable formation. Though stress placement in English words is free it follows certain rules. As we have already mentioned, phoneticians divide syllables into strong (heavy) and weak (light). A strong syllable contains a long vowel or a diphthong or a short vowel plus two consonants; syllables with a short vowel and no coda are weak ones. Only strong syllables can be stressed (although not all of them), but weak syllables are never stressed. Other factors that may determine the placement of stress are: the morphological structure of the word (whether it is simple, complex or compound), its grammatical category (noun, verb, adjective, etc.) and the number of syllables in the word.

The word stress in English as well as in Russian is not only free, but it may also be shifting, thus differentiating lexical units, parts of speech and grammatical forms: ˈcontrast - conˈtrast, ˈtransport - transˈport, ˈзамок - заˈмок, ˈмука - муˈка.

Besides the stress pattern of English words can vary under the influence of some factors. First of all in the present day English stress can shift under the influence of rhythm to avoid a succession of weak syllables (stress shifts to the second syllable, or the third one from the end) as in ˈhospitable - hosˈpitable, disˈtribute - ˈdistribute, ˈaristocrat - aˈristocrat, etc. In compounds the stress on a final-stressed compound tends to move to a preceding syllable if the following word begins with a strongly stressed syllable: afterˈnoon - ˈafternoon ˈtea.

The stress pattern can change under the influence of tempo as well; in this case secondary stresses are dropped. It sometimes happens that a word’s stress pattern is influenced not only by rhythm, but also by the stress structure of a derivative: preˈfer - preˈferable (instead of the regular ˈpreferable; ˌdistriˈbution - ˈdistribute (instead of the regular diˈstribute.

Word stress is closely interrelated with sentence stress, which usually falls on the syllable marked by word stress. So the arrangement of stresses in an utterance depends on the stress patterns of words. Besides, the alternation of stressed and unstressed syllables is common to both sentence and word stress. At the same time they are different in application (word\utterance) and secondly, the word stress may be omitted in a phrase: ˈLet’s buy an ˈice-cream. Word and sentence stress perform different functions as well. The three functions of word stress are the following:

• constitutive
• identificatory
• distinctive

First of all word stress builds up a word by making one (or more) syllables more prominent than the others, it organizes the syllables of a word into a language unit. Thus the word stress performs the constitutive function. Sound sequences become a phrase when they are divided into units organized by word stress into words. The recurrent stress pattern of the word helps the listener to recognize (identify) it in the flow of speech. Correct accentuation facilitates the process of communication and prevents misunderstanding. This function is called identificatory (or recognitive). Word stress is capable of differentiating the meaning of words or their forms, thus performing its distinctive function: ˈcontent – conˈtent; ˈinsult – inˈsult; ˈconcrete – conˈcrete.

The complicated system of the stress structure of English words is a major cause of intelligibility problems for foreign learners, and should be treated very attentively. The possible mistakes are: the placement of stress in a word; words with secondary stresses; and words with the full vowel in the unstressed syllable.

The stress structure of English words in speech is inseparably connected with the rhythmic organisation of speech chain, which will be discussed in the following unitss.

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