Functions of Intonation By Cristina Koch

Intonation “Intonation is the melody or music of a language. It refers to the way the voice rises and falls as we speak” (Wells 2006). Example taken from Scott Thornbury’s An A-Z of ELT: It’s not ↑WHAT you know | it’s ↑WHO you know Thornbury states, this sentence “is usually spoken as two tone units, with a change in pitch” (p. 110) (as you heard above) If it was spoken without intonation, it would sound like this: It’s not what you know | it’s who you know And if we all spoke like this, we would all sound like robots.

What are the 3 main functions of Intonation? Scott Thornbury’s An A-Z of ELT lists the three main candidates to be (p.110): Grammatical Function- “the difference between statements and questions” Attitudinal Function- “interest, surprise, boredom, and so on- what is called high and low involvement” Discoursal Function- “contrasting new information with information that is already known, and hence shared between speakers”

Grammatical Function An example used often to explain the grammatical function is the sentence.. Those who sold quickly made a profit This sentence can be said in two different ways: 1) /’Those who ’sold ↘↗ quickly ’made a ↘ profit. 2) /’Those who ↘↗ sold ’quickly ’made a ↘ profit. English speakers hear two different paraphrases of the sentences because of the different placement of the tone-unit boundary, as in: 1) A profit was made by those who sold quickly. 2) A profit was quickly made by those who sold.

Grammatical Function Another example is the use of a rising tone in statements. The sentence They’re going to have a picnic is usually said as a statement like this: They’re going to ’have a ↘ picnic. In informal speech, however, we may hear: They’re going to ’have a ↗ picnic? (But it’s raining outside) The sentence serves as a question here.

Attitudinal Function Intonation is used to convey our feelings and attitudes. For instance, the same sentence can be uttered in different ways, to express happiness, gratitude, anger, boredom, etc. Cupid Lucid (2008) describes 4 ways in which we can express a certain attitude: 1) Different voice qualities for different attitudes 2) Different pitch range in different ways 3) Different keys: high key, mid key, or low key 4) One may use different facial expressions, gestures, and body movements

Attitudinal Function The following sentence will be said using different attitudes: I need to go to the doctor’s. The attitudes being: a) happy b) sad c) angry d) surprised e) impatient f) confused

Discoursal Function Lucid (2008) states, “Intonation can signal to the listener what is to be taken as “new” information and what is already “given” (ppt 29). Lucid provides two examples: a) Attention focusing He says, “In case of attention focusing tonic stress is placed on the appropriate syllable of one particular word in the tone unit. The tonic stress is placed on the word that is the most important” (ppt. 30). Example: 1) |She went to Scotland| 2) |He went to the drawing-room|

Discoursal Function b) Information Content Lucid says, “Sometimes the stress is placed on syllables in terms of “information content.” The more predictable a words occurrence in a given sentence, the lower its information content will be” (ppt. 31). Example: 1) |I have to take the dog for a walk| 2) |I have to take the dog to the vet|

Which one of these functions is more important than the other two? I would have to say the Discoursal function is the most important function. Finch states, the problems with the grammatical and the attitudinal function. 1.Grammatical- “There is a certain amount of evidence to support this function but not enough for us to say that a particular grammatical form will always have a particular intonation pattern” 2.Attitudinal- “Evidence is not entirely stable because of the range of emotions that can be set against individual tones”

Why the Discoursal Function? Two main reasons: 1.It is the only function that is reliably teachable. 2.In conversation it can convey to the listener what kind of response is being expected from him.

References (Unknown Author) Phonetics-23- Functions and Uses of English Intonation (pg. 1-2). Lichun, S.; Yanling, T. (2012). How Intonation Should Be Taught In The Classroom (pg. 3-4). T3093.pdf Lucid, Cupid (2008). Functions of Intonation. of-intonation-presentation