Intonation

Intonation
Fonética y Fonología del Inglés II

Intonation
• Accent and pitch go together when we talk about intonation.
• What is intonation?
• We are going to study English intonation system by:
1. Looking at its structure

2. Looking how intonation functions
3. Exploring the meanings it conveys
The structure of intonation
The intonation system is composed of the three T’s:
• Tonality
• Tonicity
• Tone
Tonality
• It is the division of an utterance into Tone Units (units of information).
• Tone Units are separated by Tone Boundaries, represented by a

double slash //
• Normally, the presence of the six marks always correlate with a

boundary between Tone Units. (Written English)
• In speech we rely mainly on pauses (ex. Structures smaller than

clauses).
Despite the warnings// some residents were not leaving.
• There are also important differences between prepared speech and

spontaneous speech.
• There are other cues to signal tone unit boundaries:
- Adverbials
- Inserts
- By phrases in passive voice
- Parenthetical
- Initial vocatives
- Apposition
- Topicalized forms
- Pseudo-cleft sentences involving what
- Wh-cleft – typically with the wh-clause as subject
“Studies have suggested that in conversation and in lectures around
half the intonational phrases [tone units] will be 3-4 words in length
and only in under 10 percent of cases will they be over 8 words in
length. In reading aloud from prepared texts, intonational phrases
[tone units] are likely to be longer and are likely to be at least partly
governed by punctuation.”
(Cruttenden 2014: 286).
What is the importance of Tonality?

Tonicity
• It is the internal analysis of a Tone Unit.
We can divide a Tone Unit in:
(Pre-Head) + (Head) +Nucleus + (Tail)
A: It was a good party

B: It was a fantastic party
Tone
• Tone is to assign a distinctive pitch movement to the nucleus.
• The pitch pattern begins in the nuclear syllable and continue through the
rest of the tone unit.
• Tone languages
LISTENING – foolish, rare, cold, perspirationg

• The basic pitch movements are four:
Falling
Rising
Falling-rising
Rising-falling
• The symbols are called tonetic marks

SCALE
HIGH
MID
LOW
TYPES OF NUCLEAR TONE
Falling
• 70% of all types used in conversation.
• There are two types:

- High fall
- Low fall
T32 P143 Mees.
• In tone units – low pre-head, high head and fall (N, or N+tail).
Rising
• Much less common than falls.
• There are two types:

- High rise
- Low rise
T34 P144 Mees
• Low pre-head, rise starts at the N and spreads over the tail.
Falling-rising
• It may be confined within one syllable and it is very rapid.
T35 P144 Mees
Rising-falling
• It is the less common and it is simply the inverse of the previous one.
T36 P144
• According to Quick et al. this is the frequency of tones in British
conversation:
Falling 52%
Rising 20.8%
Fall-rise 16.2%
Rise-fall 6.9%
Level 4.9%
Hewings 39
Watch this video for extra practice: https://youtu.be/Pgwpom2ME_E
The functions of intonation
Attitudinal function
• Allows speakers to express emotions and attitudes.
• It can be related to Tone.
A: I got married last summer.

B: Did you?
• Tendencies of tones associated with attitudes:
Low fall: boredom, resignation, surliness

High rise: excitement, curiosity
Fall rise: doubt, uncertainty, reservation, appealing to the listener to
reconsider.
Rise fall: impressed, surprised, arrogant, confident, self-satisfied,
mocking.
High fall or low rise: neutrality.
The grammatical function
• Recognize the grammatical structure of spoken language.
• Allow to recognize certain syntactic relationships.
• It works through two systems:
Tonality
Tone
T22 P223-226 Mott
T22 P223-226 Mott
• Clause division: Incompletion – fall rises and rises Completion – falls
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_gv6fRejLM&ab_channel=TurkishAirlin
es
• Subject and predicate division
• To distinguish between restrictive and non-restrictive clauses.
• Questions versus statements.
• To distinguish “any”.
• Same direct object.
• Appositional phrases.
• To clarify ambiguities in writing.
• Linking, stance adverbials and adverbials of time and place.
• Parentheticals.
Accentual function
• Helps the speaker to accentuate some bits of information and
emphasize others.
• Typically a broad focus sentence will have the accent in the last lexical
syllable but a shift to a preceding syllable can be used to emphasize or
contrast information.
T23 P226 – 227 Mott

Discourse function
• How one piece of information relates to another in speech.
• Which pieces of information are new or old.
• It signals the beginning and end of speakers turn in conversation.
T24 P 227 – 228 Mott

The use of intonation: Meanings
of the tones
The fall
• It can be high or low depending on the effects of the attitudinal function. It is normally associated with
certain constructions (grammatical function). A falling tune is generally used in bold statements, wh-
questions, commands, exclamations, and question tags expecting agreement.
• It is the most neutral of the tones when we talk about meaning and it is
generally use in:
T25 P219 MOTT
Question tags
Questions
Inserts
The rise
• It is normally associated with implications of meaning.
T26 P221
• The low rise is generally used in:
- Yes/no questions
- Wh-questions showing interest or sympathy
- Expressions of encouragement or reassurance
- Expressions of disagreement
- Question tags not necessarily expecting agreement.
Tails
Question tags
Questions
Inserts
Fall or rise?
The fall rise
• It is a very common pattern in English.
• It has several functions:
- Attitudinal: irony, don’t blame me, contradiction…

- Grammatical: speaker hasn’t finished what s/he is saying.
- Accentual: correcting someone.
T27 P222 MOTT

• It is also very frequent at pause and everyday expressions and:
- Correcting someone
- Expressing differences of opinion, contrast or contradiction.
- Expressing irony
- Introducing new information
- Questioning the appropriateness of sth that has been said.
- Expressing indignation
- Pleading
Reservation, contradiction, contrast and warning.

Reservation
Practice the Fall-Rise in the following exchanges, where there is an unspoken “but” in each reply, which
leaves the hearer to infer an unspoken reservation:
A: Did you like the film?
B. The acting was good [↘↗]
A: Are you using the car?

B. No [↘↗]
A: How’s he getting on at school?

B: He enjoys it [↘↗]
Showing interest
Requests
Comparison and contrast
Adding information
Fall, Rise or Fall-Rise?
Fall, or Fall-Rise?
The rise-fall
• It is the less important and the most difficult to imitate.
• It is essentially attitudinal.
T28 P226 MOTT
- To show that you are impressed

- To show complacency
- To express censoriousness
- To challenge
Giving your opinion
- Rise fall as being impressed, unimpressed, indignant or sarcastic.
- It is also use for gossip and for marking yes/no interrogative as an

exclamation.
Take an extra-look at Collins and Mees P.145

Bibliography
• Collins, B., and Mees, I. M. 2008. Practical Phonetics and Phonology. A
Resour
• Cruttenden, A. 2014. Gimson's Pronunciation of English / revised by Alan
Cruttenden. - 8th ed. Abingdon: Routledge. Chapter 11.6.
• Cruttenden, A. 2014. Companion website:
http://www.routledge.com/cw/cruttendence Book for Students. Unit B7.
• Hewings, M. 2007. English Pronunciation in Use: Advanced. Self-study and
classroom use. Units 39-53.
• Mott, B. 2011. English Phonetics and Phonology for Spanish Speakers. Unit
10 (Moodle).

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Intonation

Fonética y Fonología del Inglés II

• We are going to study English intonation system by:

1. Looking at its structure

• Tone Units are separated by Tone Boundaries, represented by a

• Normally, the presence of the six marks always correlate with a

• In speech we rely mainly on pauses (ex. Structures smaller than

• There are also important differences between prepared speech and

What is the importance of Tonality?

We can divide a Tone Unit in:

(Pre-Head) + (Head) +Nucleus + (Tail)

A: It was a good party

LISTENING – foolish, rare, cold, perspirationg

• The symbols are called tonetic marks

• There are two types:

• There are two types:

T35 P144 Mees

• It can be related to Tone.

A: I got married last summer.

Low fall: boredom, resignation, surliness

• Allow to recognize certain syntactic relationships.

• It works through two systems:

T23 P226 – 227 Mott

• Which pieces of information are new or old.

• It signals the beginning and end of speakers turn in conversation.

T24 P 227 – 228 Mott

• It has several functions:

- Attitudinal: irony, don’t blame me, contradiction…

T27 P222 MOTT

Reservation, contradiction, contrast and warning.

A: Are you using the car?

A: How’s he getting on at school?

T28 P226 MOTT

- To show that you are impressed

- It is also use for gossip and for marking yes/no interrogative as an

Take an extra-look at Collins and Mees P.145

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