A Brief Analysis of Phonetics and Phonology

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Intonation is one important kind of linguistic prosody. What intonation is and what it does？ According to Ten （1996）， he gives us the clear definition： intonation is the linguistic use of pitch in utterances； intonation refers to the rise and fall of the pitch of the voice in spoken language. Thus， we know that in linguistics intonation is the variation of pitch when speaking.

Many languages use pitch syntactically to convey the speakers’ meanings， such languages are called intonation languages. This essay will focus on discussing the relative advantages and disadvantages of systems of notion for intonation of both Roach （2000） and Brazil （1980）. Compare and evaluate them theoretically.

2. Description of the system of intonation by Roach （2000）

Roach （2000） makes clear that there are level tone and moving tone in one-syllable utterance. However， level tone does not sound natural； it is very common to move tones for English speakers. Falling tone refers to one that descends from a higher to a lower pitch； rising tone is a movement from a lower pitch to a higher one. As Roach （2000） points out the function of intonation： how speakers want the utterance to be heard by hearers decides what speakers choose their tones. There are three tones mentioned here： Level， Falling and Rising. Though the tones of the words ‘yes’ and ‘no’ are different， the meaning of them is not different. English， however， is not a tone language. There are other more complex tones： fall-rise which the pitch descends and rises again and rise-fall which the pitch rises and descends again. Speakers use both highest pitch of a top level and lower pitch of a bottom level that does not go below. Natural speech makes intonation appear within the lower part of the speaker’s pitch range， but extra pitch height expresses strong feelings.

There are five functions of English tones. Firstly， rise tone means inviting interlocutor to continue the conversation， the speaker wishes to get more information from the interlocutor. Secondly， rise-fall tone conveys strong feelings of approval， disapproval or surprise. Finally， level tone is used to express a feeling of saying something routine， uninteresting or boring. According to Roach （2000）， a small number of particularly prominent syllables can be identified in tones in English utterances. The sized unit needed of syllable is called the tone-unit； one syllable is the smallest form of tone-unit. A syllable that carries a tone is called tonic syllable or nucleus that has a high one obligatory tonic syllable. A head is a part of a tone-unit that extends from the first stressed syllable up to the tonic syllable， it is important for the first syllable to be stressed. If there is no stress， there is no head. The pre-head is the unstressed syllables in a tone-unit preceding the first stressed syllable. Tail is between the tonic syllable and the end of the tone-unit. In longer stretches speech， tone-unit boundaries occur， such as one tone-unit ends and another begins， or a tone-unit ends and is followed by a pause， or a tone-unit begins following a pause.

According to Roach （2000）， intonation is carried by the tone-unit. If the final syllable is the tonic syllable， one-syllable tone-unit does not sound much different from the tone. If a tonic syllable has a rising tone， then the tail of the tonic syllable will continue to get higher from the pitch of the tonic syllable. Then the pitch keeps within the speaker’s normal pitch range at a top level. On the other hand， the similar situation can be found in the falling tone. The “fall” part of the fall-rise is taken place in the first syllable and the “rise” part in the second. The continuous pitch movement of the added syllable is very similar to the one-syllable case， if there are no voiceless medial consonants to cause a break in the voicing. If the continuity of voicing is broken， there is a parallel with rhyming.

3. Comparison and evaluation of the strength and weakness of two approaches： the treatments of intonation by Brazil （1980） and Roach （2000）

According to Brazil （1980）， the differences of descriptions are decided by the kind of meaning the writers regard intonation as carrying and by the significance the writers attach to different parts of the tone unit.

Brazil （1980） points out that there are five tones： falling， rising-falling， rising， falling-rising and level. This method is the same as Roach’s （2000）. However， Brazil （1980） uses the symbol r representing fall-rise tone （referring） and symbol p instead of the falling tone （proclaiming）. In addition， the rise， symbol r+， the rise-fall， p+ and the level tone， symbol o. Roach’s （2000） indicates that fall-rise is described as limited agreement or response with reservations. However， Brazil （1980） suggests that fall-rise tone is to mark the experiential content of the tone unit； participants occupied the matter as the shared common ground in an interaction. The treatment of tones by Brazil （1980） can be diagrammed like this：

Roach （2000） reports that falling tone gives an impression of “finality”. Whereas Brazil （1980） thinks that falling tone marks the matter as new， he indicates that the common ground will be enlarged， the speaker is told something he did not already know. According to Brazil （1980）， a speaker’s assessment of the relationship between the message and the audience decide the tone choice， instead of depending on linguistic features of the message. Roach （2000） argues that each tone has more meanings. It is impossible to find a context where one could not substitute a different one， no particular tone has a privilege of occurrence in a particular context.

According to Roach （2000）， he analyses the tone unit into four parts： （pre-head） （head） tonic syllable （tail） or， more briefly， as （PH） （H） （TS） （T）. While Brazil （1980） divides tone units into three segments： （proclitic segment） tonic segment （enclitic segment）. He points out that prominent syllable plays an important role on recognising where the tonic segment begins. Prominence is a property associated with a word by virtue of its function as a constituent of a tone unit. According to Brazil （1980）， the tonic segment begins with the first prominent syllable， the onset， and end with the last prominent syllable， the tonic. There are no prominent syllables in the proclitic and enclitic segments. Prominence represents the speaker’s assessment of the relative information in his discourse； many of the words of an utterance are grammatically or semantically predictable. Reference to Roach （2000） reveals that The normal pitch movement falls on the tonic syllable and to keep low until the last stressed syllable of the tail， if there are more than two syllables in the tail. The pitch then rises from that point to the end of the tone-unit. The rise is carried by the final syllable if there is no stressed syllable in the tail. The similarity will be found in the rise-fall tone. The stressed syllable of the high head is higher than the beginning pitch of the tonic syllable. In the low head the stressed syllable of beginning the head is usually lower than the beginning pitch of the tone on the tonic syllable. Unstressed syllables continue the pitch of the stressed syllable preceding them. If there are more stressed syllables in the head， there is a change in the beginning pitch of the tone on the tonic syllable. Only stressed syllables are marked in marking intonation. Because intonation is carried completely by the stressed syllables of a tone-unit and the pitch of unstressed syllables is either predictable from that of stressed syllables or is of so little importance that is not worth marking.

According to Brazil （1980）， prominence is associated with certain pitch phenomena. There is a consistent relationship between pitch movement and the placement of prominence. He argues that there is a tendency of making prominent to occur towards the end of the clause. Roach （2000） states that It is not easy to identify the tonic syllable when the tonic syllable is followed by a tail or some tone-units contain not one but two tonic syllables. The boundaries of tone-units are not easy to be identified； there are some anomalous or incomplete tone-units. Autosegmental way of analysing intonation has two basic phonological elements of H （high tone） and L （low tone）.

Roach （2000） concludes that there are four functions of intonation： attitudinal， accentual， and grammatical and discourse functions. It is more comprehensive to analysis discourse function of intonation. Roach （2000） categorises attitudinal， accentual and grammatical function into different aspects of discourse function. He finds that it is too broad and little powerful to predict the intonation of accuracy when a speaker would use in a particular context. It is inadequate to study the function of intonation relying on isolated sentences or tone-units， the linguistic and situational context should not be removed. By contrast， Brazil （1980） describes the functions of intonation from the angels of discourse structure and reading. Obviously， there are some overlaps of the approaches between them. For example， Brazil （1980） also talks about spoken discourse function of intonation. He describes it in terms of five ranks： interaction， transaction， exchange， move and act. He concentrates on studying exchange， because he thinks exchange is the basic of all types of interaction. In addition， the exchange under consideration illustrates a very important intonational relationship between pitch concord and the initial key choice of the next move. Furthermore， Brazil （1980） notes that the reader would rather discovers what meanings the text reasonably allows than what the writer intends， because writer’s intendment is never recoverable.

4. Conclusions

In conclusion， we may say that Brazil （1980） argues that all intonation choices relay finally on the speaker’s assessment of the state and extent of the common ground between himself and his listeners. Roach （2000） points out that intonation makes it easier for listeners to understand what a speaker tries to convey. Both Roach （2000） and Brazil （1980） describe their approaches of intonation from either similar or different angles. It is inevitable that there are some overlaps between their treatments of intonation. For us the importance is to make use of their strengths and avoid using the weaknesses. The most useful descriptive system will be taken depending on different perspective.

References：

[1]Brazil，D.1994.Pronunciation for advanced learners of English.Cambridge：Cambridge University Press.

[2]Brazil，D.，M.Coulthard & C.Johns.1980.Discourse intonation and language teaching.London：Longman.

[3]Ladd，D.R.1996.Intonational phonology.Cambridge：Cambridge University Press.

[4]Roach，P.2000.English phonetics and phonology.3rd Edition.Cambridge：Cambridge University Press.

[5]Tench，P.1996.The intonation systems of English.London：Cassell.