Section III english rhythm Unit 1. Peculiarities of English Rhythm

An essential feature of connected speech is that the peaks of prominence - the stressed syllables - are inseparably connected with non-prominent syllables. The simplest example of a close relationship between the stressed and unstressed syllables is a polysyllabic word-utterance which is a phonetic and semantic entity, incapable of division, e.g.:

^\Excellent. To^\morrow. ^\Certainly.

Thus an utterance is split into groups of syllables unified by a stressed syllable, i.e. stress-groups, each of which is a semantic unit - generally a word, often more than a word. Within a stress-group composed of one polysyllabic word the unstressed syllables may join the stressed one as either proclitics (preceding it) or enclitics (following it).

It is natural that the unstressed function words should be attached to the notional word with which they are connected semantically and grammatically. An important feature of English pronunciation is that proclitics are considerably faster in pronunciation than enclitics. This difference can easily be observed by comparing the speed of utterance in the prehead and in the tail of the intonation-group.

Another important feature of English pronunciation is that the prominent syllables in an utterance occur at approximately equal periods of time.

When an utterance consists of stressed syllables only, this peculiarity means more or less the same length of each stressed syllable in an utterance.

When there are unstressed syllables between the stressed ones it means equal time for each of the stressed groups.

It must be understood that this “equal time” is relative, not absolute. This impression is based on the syllable duration in speech: the speed of utterance will be the highest in the group with the largest number of syllables and, vice versa, the tempo is noticeably slower in a group with fewer syllables. Thus, the speakers tends to minimize the differences in the length of stressed groups in an utterance.

The above-mentioned compression of syllable duration, on the one hand, and its lengthening on the other, are shown in speech in different ways: unstressed syllables are normally shorter than the stressed ones.

Rhythm is, first of all, a certain periodicity of the stressed syllables. This relative equality of time intervals between the stressed syllables is a peculiarity of English. English speech is therefore often described as more 'rhythmic' than, for example, Russian.

The units of the rhythmic organization of an utterance are stress-groups which may be also called rhythmic groups. The boundaries between rhythmic groups are often associated with the stressed syllables.

So, there are two principles operating in speech: keeping more or less regular time intervals between stresses, on the one hand, and marking the semantic links between unstressed and stressed syllables, on the other.

Unit 2. The Influence of Rhythm on Word-Stress and Utterance-Stress

Regularity of occurrence of stressed syllables in English is closely related to another important feature of English rhythm: alternation of stressed and unstressed syllables. This tendency is caused, first of all, by a high frequency of monosyllabic notional words (usually stressed in an utterance) and function-words (usually unstressed). It must be understood that the alternation of stressed and unstressed syllables is very seldom of an 'ideal' pattern, such as in the following utterances, e.g.:

I 'can't be'lieve my ^\eyes.

The ratio of stressed and unstressed syllables may be one to two, one to three, or even more, e.g.:

They are 'leaving to'morrow by ^\air.

Moreover, in the majority of cases the number of unstressed syllables between the stressed ones is different within an utterance, i.e. the rhythmic groups have uneven numbers of syllables, e.g.:

Will 'someone 'meet you at the _/station?

The tendency to alternate stressed and unstressed syllables shows the peculiarity of the composition of an English utterance and its utterance-stress. However, this tendency becomes active when an utterance consists exclusively of monosyllabic notional words. In such cases it is not typical to stress all the words e.g.: 'Come next ^\week. 'Now turn^\left.

Although there may be cases of putting stress on all the words if the meaning requires it:

'Most 'boys 'like ^\dogs.

The same tendency to avoid stressing adjacent words is observed even when these words are not monosyllabic. So, this tendency involves alternating not only stressed and unstressed syllables but also alternating stressed and unstressed words. So, even if the word is prominent, it is usually unstressed if it is preceded and followed by stressed words (in order to keep the rhythm):

She is a 'very good ^\actress.

This phenomenon is known as the influence of rhythm on utterance-stress. However, the decisive factor for utterance-stress is the semantic weight of a word in the given context.

The tendency to alternate strong and weak syllables accounts for making two syllables prominent in many English polysyllabic words:

e'xami^\nation / 'abso^\lutely / con'side^\ration

In connected speech, however, such words may lose one of the stresses:

The 'girl looked 'absolutely^\ lovely.