Интонация
Intonation
is the music of the language. In English, we use tone to signal emotion,
questioning, and parts of the sentence among many other things. It's
important to recognize the meaning behind the tones used in everyday speech,
and to be able to use them so that there are no misunderstandings between the
speaker and the listener. It is generally true that mistakes in
pronunciation of sounds can be overlooked, but mistakes in intonation make a
lasting impression.
Intonation
has always been a difficult thing to define. According to traditional
descriptions, intonation is «the melody of speech», and is to be analysed in
terms of variations in pitch. Intonation is said to indicate the attitudes and
emotions of the speaker, so that a sentence like 'I think it's time to go now'
can be said in a happy way, a sad way, an angry way, and so on. While this is
certainly true, there is clearly more than just pitch variation involved in
conveying such things, so the definition of intonation becomes considerably
more complicated. It is clear that when we are expressing emotions, we also use
different voice qualities, different speaking rates, facial expressions,
gestures, and so on. We must indicate what type of information tye are
presenting and how it is structured, and at the same time we must keep our
listeners' attention and their participation in the exchange of information.
Communicative interaction would be much more difficult without intonation:
think how many misunderstandings between people arise in the exchange of e-mail
messages, where intonation cannot play a role.
In In English, as in many other languages, pitch is an
important component of
accentuation, or prominence, both at the level of individual words and at the
level of longer utterances. In general, we distinguish between pitches which are relatively steady-state,
i.e. which do not change level perceptibly, and those which change
by stepping or sliding up or down to another pitch level, as illustrated
in the figure below. English
intonation characteristically slides or transitions gradually from one pitch level to the next rather than stepping up
or down abruptly from one pitch
level to the next. Thus, English intonation is best represented by
"humps" and "waves" rather than by "angles" and
"steps".
Sliding
contour Stepping contour
If we look at
a typical example, we would expect a falling pitch pattern on a statement like
this:
You
are from London
but a rising
pitch pattern if the same words are used as a question:
You
are from London?
Other examples
of meaning being changed by differences in intonation are - the difference
between
She won`t
go out with anyone
and
She
won`t go out with anyone
Is the first
one (with a falling movement on «any») says that she will go out with nobody,
while the second (with a falling-rising pitch movement) says that she is
careful about who she goes with.
The pitch of the voice is determined by the
frequency with which the vocal cords vibrate., The frequency of vibration of
the vocal cords is in turn determined by their thickness their length and their
tension. The modal pitch of the voice, i.e. one's natural average pitch
level, depends on the size of the vocal cords. In general, men have thicker and
longer vocal cords than women and children do. As a result, the modal pitch of a
man's voice is generally lower than that of a woman or a child.
In addition to its modal pitch, every individual voice has a pitch range which can be
achieved by adjustments of the vocal cords.
By tightening the vocal cords, a person can raise the pitch
of the voice (vocal pitch); by loosening them, one can lower vocal pitch.
There is also a natural variation in pitch associated with the amount of
air that is expended during speech. When the airflow through the glottis is great, it causes the vocal cords to vibrate
quickly. As airflow is reduced, the effect on the vocal cords
is diminished, and the frequency of
vibration decreases. Although it is possible to override these natural effects - e.g. by changing the tension of the
vocal folds - in the unmarked case,
the pitch of the voice will descend naturally over an utterance as the speaker's
breath is used up. This effect is called downdrift.
As a result of
downdrift, there is a natural iconic association of falling pitch with finality and related meanings such
as assurance or defini-tiveness.
Conversely, there is a natural association of non-falling (steady-state or rising) pitch with non-finality
and related meanings such as lack of
assurance or non-definitiveness. The difference between falling and non-falling
or rising intonation is represented by Cruttenden (1981) as that between "closed"
(assertive) and "open" (non-assertive) meaning.
Individual words or phrases may in some cases constitute an entire
utterance in natural speech, as can be seen in the different intonation
contours for okay in figure.
Contour
|
Meaning
|
Example
|
Fall
|
Neutral
|
O
K
A
Y.
(I
accept this.)
|
High
Rise
|
Contradictory/
unbelieving
|
Y?
A
K
O
(I
don’t accept this.)
|
Low
Rise
|
Non-committal/
unfinished
|
KAY…
O
(I’m
listening.)
|
Fall
- Rise
|
uncertain
|
O Y,
KA
(But
I’m doubtful.)
|
|
With
commitment/
definite/
emphatic
|
KA
O
Y!
(Definitely.)
|
The
two compound patterns combine the meanings of falling and rising intonation in
interesting iconic meanings. The fall-rise pattern has the meaning of
both, i.e. both closed and open meaning. This signifies both definiteness and
indefiniteness simultaneously, in the sense that a referent is instantiated
but the utterance is not yet completed or in the sense that the speaker feels
some hesitancy, reservation, doubt or uncertainty. The rise-fall pattern
incorporates the fall of completion or assurance of the first pattern with the
emotional overtone of a high pitch in the middle of the utterance. This is a
so-called swell tone used for emphatic meaning: as the tone swells, the
meaning or emphasis increases.
Brazil,
Coulthard and Johns (1980) point out the importance of relative pitch, in a
discourse context, e.g. for indicating affect or emotion. Most importantly,
relative pitch of an utterance shows the speaker's attitude toward the information
that he\she is conveying. The neutral, unmarked, mid relative pitch -
which is the speaker's modal pitch - is used to make a statement in a neutral
manner. In contrast, high relative pitch indicates an informational
contrast, as shown in example (a). Because high key implies a contrast even
when one is not explicitly present in the discourse, it can be used to single
out individual words for special attention, as in example (b).
Y
H
a
ar 1
(a) I'm going to vard,
not e !!!
n
e
v
t t.
(b) I'd
er
do ha
Low
key is used when the speaker wants to assert that two items in successive tone
units are in some sense equivalent, as in (c):
T
O
I L
D
(c)
you already, du
mmy.
Here the low key on dummy signals
that it is to be interpreted as confer-ential to you.
In some varieties of English,
e.g. those spoken in Ireland, Liverpool and Hawaii, the terminal high rise in
yes/no questions is replaced by an earlier rise, with high pitch maintained
until the tonic word or phrase, followed by a fall as in
Ireland: Would you like some tea?
Liverpool: Did you go to the new supermarket?
Hawaii: 1) You need a general catalog?
2)
You get one book?
In Hawaniian English, question
tags comprising yea with high rising pitch are frequent/ In Welsh
English, question tags are emphasized by a swell-tone (rise-fall patern) on the
tag, which makes it more definite or emphatic.
Stylistic
use of intonation
Speech
typology
Intonational
style
|
Varieties of language
|
Forms of communication
|
Degree of speech preparedness
|
The number of participants
|
The character of participants` relationship
|
Spoken
|
Written
|
Monoloqoue
|
Dialoque
|
Prepared
|
Spontaneous
|
Pub
lic
|
Non-public
|
For-mal
|
Infor-mal
|
Informational style
|
-
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
-
|
Academic style
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
Declamatory style
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
-
|
+
|
-
|
Publicistic style
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
+
|
-
|
Familiar style
|
+
|
-
|
+
|
+
|
-
|
+
|
-
|
+
|
-
|
+
|
Conversational
(familiar) - this kind of English is a means for
everyday communication, heard in natural conversational interaction between
speakers. This style occurs mainly in informal external and internal
relationships in speech of relatives, friends, well - acquainted people and so
on. So this is spontaneous, colloquial, informal, everyday speech.
Informational -
in press reporting, educational descriptive texts. May be represented in
monologues, dialogues, polylogues.
Phonostylistic
characteristics: Loudness normal or increased; pauses are rather
long; rhythm is stable, properly organized; falling tones on the semantic
centres, falling- rising in the initial intonation groups
The following
example illustrates the use of this intonation pattern in the speech of a radio
announcer during news coverage:
ANNOUNCER:
… Early `yesterday MORNING the engine `depot at ROUEN was the target of
`SABOTEURS.
|| The heavy-MA CHINE shops were totally GUTTED | and e leven
`LOCO`MOTIVES | com pletely `DES TROYED.
(A.Booth.
«The Sky is Overcast»)
Academic
(scientific) - style of lectures (conferences,
seminars). The purpose of communication as the speaker’s aim is to attract the
listener’s attention, to establish close contacts with the audience and to
direct the public attention to the message carried in the contents of the text.
Phonostylistic
characteristics: Loudness increased; pauses are rather
long; rhythm is properly organized; high proportion of compound terminal tones
(high fall + low rise, fall – rise, rise-fall-rise), a great number of high
categoric falls.
Example
The
various MEANINGS may be classified under two `general HEADS | -
the optative SUB JUNCTIVE and the PO` TENTIAL sub junctive. || The
`OPTATIVE sub junktive
repre sents
`something as DE SIRED, DE` MANDED, or RE`QUIRED (by a person or
by CIRCUMSTANCES). || The PO`TENTIAL sub jenctive marks `something as
a mere con`caption of the `MIND, but at the same time repre` sents it as
something that may PROBABLY or POSSIB LY `BE or BE` COME a
reality or on the `OTHER handes as SOMETHING that is
contrary to `FACT. ||
(G. O. Curme
«A Grammar of the English Language»)
Oratorial - this term serves for
many kinds of oratorial activities (especially this style uses in political
speeches).
Phonostylistic
characteristics: Loudness enormously increased; pauses
are definitely long between the passages; rhythm is properly organized; tones
mostly emphatic, especially emotionally underlined semantic centres, in
non-final intonational groups falling-rising tones are frequent
Example
(D. Crystal
and D. Davy «Investigating English Style»)
Declamatory
(artistic)- this is the style of declamation.
This is a highly emotional and expressive intonational style, that is why it
needs special training. This style can be heard on the stage, on the screen, in
a TV studio, thus we see that it is always a written form of the language read
aloud or recited.
Phonostylistic
characteristics: Loudness varied
according to the size of the audience and to the emotional setting; pauses are
long especially between the passages, prolonged emphatic pauses are used to
underline the emphasis; rhythm is properly organized; common use of categoric
low and high falls in final and initial intination groups and on semantic
centres
Example
The door of
the `dining-room was OPEN the gas `turned LOW; | a SPIRIT-urn `hissed
on a TEA-tray, and CLOSE to it a cynical- `looking CAT
had fallen A SLEEP on the DINING-table. || Old `Jolyon ``shoo`d`
her `OFF at once.`` ||
The Comparative Analysis of the
Intonation of Basic Positive Emotions in English and Russian Spontaneous Speech
The second part of the 20th
century has been marked by special attention to the investigation of
intonational variation expressing emotions in speech. Being an indispensable
component of oral communication, intonation with other linguistic and extra
linguistic means serves to distinguish the communicative types of utterances,
to identify the speaker and to convey his attitude to the surrounding reality.
Studies of the prosody of emotions are
not numerous, though a growing interest in this area is pointed out. There is
still no exhaustive definition of the notion emotion; nevertheless in
80s a great input into the theory of emotions was made by C.Izard.
The material for the investigation was
samples of authentic English and Russian emotional spontaneous speech, namely
recordings of TV programs, interviews, free talks, situations where people
interact in a way that appears spontaneous. We consider it relevant to study
the prosody of emotions expressed in eye-to-eye, informal communication, as
this is where human attitudes reveal most explicitly.
In the analyzed material 64
spontaneous utterances (32 in English and 32 in Russian) rendering the emotional states of surprise, interest and joy were chosen. The recordings of the three
emotions were studied in an intonogram. The focus of the investigation was made
on such prosodic parameters, as pitch level, pitch range and intensity level.
Intonation was also estimated from the point of view of direction of the F0,
whether it is steady, upward or downward.
The results of the contrastive
acoustic analysis show, that all the emotions under analysis are characterized
by high pitch level both in Russian and English speech.
Interest
The differences in English and Russian
intonation are traced in the direction of the terminal tone and the type of the
scale: while in English utterances expressing interest are pronounced with the
descending stepping scale and downward nucleus, Russian utterances are marked
by the rising nucleus.
Surprise.
Besides high pitch level utterances
expressing surprise are pronounced with two types of terminal tones- the
falling or the rising-falling tones; the percentage of using these tones, both
in English and in Russian, is comparatively equal. The major difference in the
prosody of surprise in English and Russian spontaneous utterances is the
amplitude of intensity, which is smaller in English. The pitch range of the
basic emotion of surprise in English is predominantly narrow, while in Russian
it is either narrow or wide.
Joy
The intensity of Russian utterances
with the attitude of joy is higher than that of English utterances.
The aim of the final stage of the
experiment was to examine the ability of Russian auditors to recognize an
emotion expressed in English utterances.
In the course of the auditory analysis
30 Russians, who don’t master English, had to listen to 32 emotionally charged
spontaneous phrases (13 utterances with the emotional component of interest,
13- with the emotional component of surprise, and 6- with the
charge of joy) and to say which attitude of the three was
expressed in each phrase. Thus, Russian listeners had to judge the emotional
meaning of utterances pronounced by English native speakers relying on the
so-called “pure intonation” when the listeners are not able to percept the
lexical meaning of the phrases
The results of the final stage of the
experiment show, that on average the adequate recognition of joy by Russian
speaking people is 65%, the recognition of surprise- 31,4% and of interest-
51,2%. The overall average recognition of emotional meaning in English
spontaneous utterances by Russians is 45,7%, which is rather high percentage,
if Russian speaking listeners recognize emotions in Russian phrases with the
average level of perception equal to 70%.
The comparative analysis of the
intonation of basic positive emotions shows that similar features in the
prosody of interest, surprise and joy are present in English and Russian,
though the specific variations of intonation characteristic of a language
prevail.
What
can we conclude about the use of intonation in a language like English? Perhaps the best way to look at the subject is to see
intonation as an essential component of the discourse structure of speech.
We speak in order to communicate, and we need to
interact with our listeners to do this. We must indicate what type of
information tye are presenting and how it is structured, and at the same time
we must keep our listeners' attention and their participation in the exchange
of information.