2018-01-16 Pronunciation: content and structure words

Greg Malivuk
[email protected]
http://www.pastebin.com/u/gmalivuk - notes from all classes
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Homework: Find a clean Limerick that you like, to share with the class tomorrow.
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There once was a fisher named Fischer
Who was fishing for fish in a fissure,
When a fish with a grin
Pulled the fisherman in.
Now they’re fishing the fissure for Fischer.
rhythm: 3, 3, 2, 2, 3 (usually with two unstressed syllables between each beat)
rhyme: A A B B A
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A slumberous sound, a sound that brings
The feelings of dreams, as of innumerable wings,
As when a bell no longer swings,
Faint the hollow murmur rings
O’er meadow, lake, and stream.
There once was a man from Peru
Who dreamed that he swallowed his shoe.
He woke up in fright
In the mid of the night
To learn that his dream had come true.
A newspaper man named Fling
Could make copy from any old thing,
But the copy he wrote
Of a five-dollar note
Was so good he now wears so much bling.
A certain young fellow named Bee-bee
Wished to wed a woman named Phoebe,
But he said, “I must see
What the clerical fee be
Before Phoebe be Phoebe Bee-bee.”
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Some words typically have strong stress: main verbs, nouns, adjectives, adverbs
Others have weak stress: articles, prepositions, auxiliary verbs, pronouns
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Listen to two versions of a conversation with half the words missing. Which one can you understand better? Why?
Content words are usually stressed because they give the most important information in a sentence.
Structure words are usually unstressed because they give “only” grammatical information in a sentence (and we’re lazy, so we don’t want to spend unnecessary time fully pronouncing these words).
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Exercise 5A
Exercise 7
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Note: one-syllabie conjunctions, pronouns, and prepositions are almost always reduced, but longer words often give more content and are often stressed more strongly.
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http://ncf.idallen.com/english.html