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auxiliary verbs, prepositions, conjunctions, pronouns, determiners. They are more frequently pronounced in their weak forms.
*They are STRONG in the following cases: At the end of a sentence E.g.: I come from Paris. /ai km frm pris/ Where are you from?/we j fr4m/ When being contrasted with another word E.g.: The letters from him, not to him/ letz fr4m im not tu: im/ A co-ordinated use of prepositions E.g.: I travel to and from London a lot/ai trvl tu: n fr4m lndn l4t/ For the purpose of emphasis E.g.: You must give me more money/ju mst giv mi m0: mni/ Being cited or quoted E.g.: You shouldnt put and at the end of a sentence/j dnt pt nd t i end v sentns/ In negative form E.g.: I cant play tennis/ai knt plei tenis/
Grammatica l category
Function word
Weak form
Strong form
the
Articles
i:
a, an
ei,n
and
Conjunctions
but that
t (as a rel t (aa a Shes the person that I like. pron & conj) demonst) That car belongs to me.
than
his
iz(hiz at the hi:z beginning of a sentence) (before consonants) r(before vowels) h(r)when sentence-initial) j(before consonants) jr(before vowels) i h:
This is his book His book is here Ill give it to her later
her
j0:(r)
i:
We re going to do it later I love you Ill give it to him later Ill give it to them later
at for
t f0 (r)
from of Prepositions to
fr4m v tu:
She comes from England Thats the picture of my sister Shes already gone to work
as
some
Indefinit e any adjective such s
sm
ni:/ni: s
sm
eni: s
kn,kd l d mst
Can you lend me some money? Well, what could I say? Shall I do it for you? Well, what should I have said? I must admit that I love you so much. You must do it. Would you like a coffee? Id like an ice cream. Ill do it. Thats what Im trying to say. Wheres he from? Where are you from? Thats where he was born.
would
were
do
does
dz
dz
have
hv, v, v
hv
Have you been to the bank? He will have left by now. Theyve gone.
Has she been away? The baby has swallowed a stone. Hes gone Had he done it? He had already gone. Hed already gone.
has
hz, z, z, hz s
had
hd, d, d
hd
there Adverb
e(befor Theres a restaurant e around the corner. consonants Its over there. ) er(befor e vowels)
* Note:
That: -used as a relative pronoun and conjunction weak form E.g.: The price is the thing that annoys me prais iz i t n0iz mi -used as a demonstrative strong form E.g.: That girl is mine t g:l iz main Some: - used before uncountable nouns (an unspecified amount of) and before countable plural nouns (an unspecified number of) weak form E.g.: Have some more tea hv sm m0: ti: I have some dogs ai hv sm dgz - used before a countable singular noun (unknown individual) and in final position. strong form
E.g.: I think some boy broke the window ai ik sm b0i brk it Ive got some aiv g4t sm
There: - used as the formal subject weak form E.g.: There should be a rule d bi ru:l There is r iz - used as an adverb (demonstrative function) and in final position E.g.: There it is er it iz Put it there pt it e Must: - used in the meaning of obligation or duty: E.g.: You must try harder j ms trai ha:d He must eat more hi mst i:t m0: - used with the sense of forming a conclusion or deduction, and in final position E.g.: She left at 9:00, so she must have arrived here by now i left t 9:00, s i mst hv raid hi bai nau She certainly must i s:tntli mst
English is stressed-timed, or isochronous stresses occur at regular intervals within connected speech, and the duration of an utterance (the amount of time it takes to say a sentence) is more dependent upon the number of syllables that receive stress, either major or minor (primary and secondary) than the total number of syllables. To achieve the regular stress intervals, unstressed syllables are made shorter, and the vowels often lose their pure quality, with many tending towards //, and others towards /i/ and // Isochronicity might be shown as in the following example. We start with a simple sentence ; we add syllables to it on each line, but the time it takes to say the utterance remains the same.
they LIVE they LIVE they LIVE theyve been LIVing theyve been LIVing theyve been LIVing
The occurrence of stresses remains regular, and unstressed syllables are squashed in between the stressed ones, being shorter and losing some purity of the vowel sound. There is also a strong contrast between stressed and unstressed syllables
Function words are words that have little or no meaning in themselves, but which express grammatical relationships. Function words include: 1 articles (a, an, the) 2 prepositions (at, to, of, ) 3 auxiliaries (will, have, forms of the verb be,) 4 personal pronouns (she, he, her, him, it, them, ) 5 possessive adjectives (my, her, his,) 6 demonstrative adjectives (this book, those chairs,) 7 conjunctions (and, or, as, that, ) 8 relative pronouns (that, which, who,) Function words are usually unstressed, unless they are to be given special attention or in final position.
While all content words receive major word stress, one content word within a particular sentence will receive greater stress than all the others major sentence stress. In most cases the major sentence stress falls on the last content word within a sentence. E.g.: 0 o 0 o 0 0 o o O Susan bought a new sweater at Creeds. o 0 0 o o O 0 I walked home in the rainstorm. 0 o 0 o o O o Peter likes your suggestion.
four levels of stress: major sentence stress, major word stress, minor word stress, and unstressed I walked home in the rainstorm.
unstressed
Unstressed
Rain is also called the tonic syllable which is the most stressed syllable in an utterance.
Emphatic stress: E.g.: 0 o o 0 o O -What did you buy at Creeds? o 0 o 0 O o o 0 -I bought a new sweater at Creeds 0 0 o o O o 0 o o 0 o -John lives in the block of flats on the corner, doesnt he? O o 0 o o O o o 0 o - No, he lives in the house on the corner
Contrasted stress E.g.: A: I heard you bought a new car. B: No, I bought a SECOND-HAND one. choice between alternatives, for example: E.g.: A: do you want the red one or the blue one? B: I take the BLUE one.