The difference between rp and ga in the pronunctiation (word-stress, prosody (5)

Word stress

1. The differences in stress are also lexically determined, and, therefore, and hard to generalize:

RP address, adult, princess, detail;

GA address, adult, princess, detail

2. One group of words ending in suffixes -ary, -ory, -ery, -ony, -berry is pronounced with one primary stress in RP whereas in American English there is an additionally secondary stress which some linguists call “tertiary” (because it follows the primary stress, and is assumed to be weaker than the one preceding the primary stress):

RP dictionary [ dikәnәri];

GA dictionary [ dikinәri]

3. French borrowings are assimilated in RP and have one primary stress on the initial syllable. In GA they are still stressed as in French, on the final syllable, or have two stresses, one primary on the last syllable and one secondary on the first:

RP ballet [ bælei], garage [gærәdg]

GA ballet [bæ lei], garage [gәra:g]

Prosody (intonation)

The monotony of American speech is created by regular recurrence of similar pitch patterns: mid-level wavy head plus high fall or level-rise. Thus compared to RP the intonation group in GA starts at a lower level (like in Russian) but the pitch configuration is specifically English: sliding on each accent group within a narrow range until it comes to the terminal fall with initial rise, similar to an RP intensified fall or rise-fall. Compared with the Russian language the final element is very prominent acoustically, and that is where the most important information point is normally located.

Билет 15

Different approaches to the problem of syllable. The definition of syllable as a unit of the phonetic basis

Syllable is a complicated phenomenon. Syllable is a minimal pronounceable unit, which in the one hand, is a ground work for speech production &, on the other hand, for speech perception.

Syllable is a minimal pronounceable unit, where the sounds are joined in a way which is special for each particular language.

4 points of view on the syllable:

1) Зиверс, Stetson, Щерба, Васильев, Жинкин define syllable as a minimal pronounceable unit;

2) Потапова, Златоустова define syllable as the basis for the high language units or morpheme words, sentences;

3) Трубецкой, Мартине: syllable is referred to the domain of prosody, prosodic characteristics (length, pitch, timber, force) of the syllabic vowels & sonorants in different languages;

4) complex approach is widely exposed by Потапова, Златоустова, Косевич, Прокопова. Syllable is a complex phenomenon.

Syllables – minimal pronounceable units into which sounds show a tendency to group themselves. The syllable or syllables of the word are said to be stressed or accented. The correlation (взаимосвязь) of varying prominences (выделение) of syllables in a word is understood as the accentual structure of the word or its stress pattern.

Syllable is the minimal grouping of vowels & consonants necessary for articulation (phonetic unit) & for storing strings of phonemes in the mental representation (phonological unit). S can be defined as a complex unit made up of nuclear & marginal elements, with vowels acting as nuclear, syllabic elements & consonants as marginal, or non-syllabic ones.

The S may consist of the onset, the nucleus & the coda. The nucleus plus coda constitute the rhyme. There is no S without the nucleus, the presence of the onset & the coda depends on the phonotactic rules of a particular language.

Syllables can be open, when ending in a vowel (V, CV), closed, ending in a consonant (VC, CVC), covered, with a consonant for an onset (CV, CVC), uncovered, with no onset (V, VC), light, with a short vowel like ə or ı or υ & no consonants to follow, & heavy, with a long vowel or a diphthong, or a short vowel with a consonant to follow. Heavy syllables attract stress, they become stressed, while light syllables are unstressed.