Pronunciation: Word and Sentence Stress.

What is Word Stress?

In English, we do not say each syllable with the same force or strength. In one word, we accentuate ONE syllable. We say one syllable very loudly (big, strong, important) and all the other syllables very quietly.

Let's take 3 words: photograph, photographer and photographic. Do they sound the same when spoken? No. Because we accentuate (stress) ONE syllable in each word. And it is not always the same syllable. So the "shape" of each word is different.

For example:

• PHOtograph
• phoTOgrapher
• photoGRAPHic

This happens in ALL words with 2 or more syllables: TEACHer, JaPAN, CHINa, aBOVE, converSAtion, INteresting, imPORtant, deMAND, etCETera, etCETera, etCETera

The syllables that are not stressed are weak or small or quiet. Fluent speakers of English listen for the STRESSED syllables, not the weak syllables. If you use word stress in your speech, you will instantly and automatically improve your pronunciation and your comprehension.

Try to hear the stress in individual words each time you listen to English - on the radio, or in films for example. Your first step is to HEAR and recognise it. After that, you can USE it!

There are two very important rules about word stress:

1. One word, one stress. (One word cannot have two stresses. So if you hear two stresses, you have heard two words, not one word.)
2. The stress is always on a vowel.

Sentence Stress

Sentence stress is the music of spoken English. Like word stress, sentence stress can help you to understand spoken English, even rapid spoken English.
Sentence stress is what gives English its rhythm or "beat". You remember that word stress is accent on one syllable within a word. Sentence stress is accent on certain words within a sentence.
Most sentences have two basic types of word:

• content words
  Content words are the key words of a sentence. They are the important words that carry the meaning or sense—the real content.
• structure words
  Structure words are not very important words. They are small, simple words that make the sentence correct grammatically. They give the sentence its correct form—its structure.

If you remove the structure words from a sentence, you will probably still understand the sentence.
If you remove the content words from a sentence, you will not understand the sentence. The sentence has no sense or meaning.

Imagine that you receive this telegram message:

This sentence is not complete. It is not a "grammatically correct" sentence. But you probably understand it. These 4 words communicate very well. Somebody wants you to sell their car for them because they have gone to France. We can add a few words:

The new words do not really add any more information. But they make the message more correct grammatically. We can add even more words to make one complete, grammatically correct sentence. But the information is basically the same:

In our sentence, the 4 key words (sell, car, gone, France) are accentuated or stressed.

Why is this important for pronunciation? It is important because it adds "music" to the language. It is the rhythm of the English language. It changes the speed at which we speak (and listen to) the language. The time between each stressed word is the same.

In our sentence, there is 1 syllable between SELL and CAR and 3 syllables between CAR and GONE. But the time (t) between SELL and CAR and between CAR and GONE is the same. We maintain a constant beat on the stressed words. To do this, we say "my" more slowly, and "because I've" more quickly. We change the speed of the small structure words so that the rhythm of the key content words stays the same.

I am a proFESsional phoTOgrapher whose MAIN INterest is to TAKE SPEcial, BLACK and WHITE PHOtographs that exHIBit ABstract MEANings in their photoGRAPHic STRUCture.

Sentence Stress Rules

The basic rules of sentence stress are:

1. content words are stressed
2. structure words are unstressed
3. the time between stressed words is always the same

The following tables can help you decide which words are content words and which words are structure words:

Content words - stressed

words carrying the meaning	example
main verbs	SELL, GIVE, EMPLOY
nouns	CAR, MUSIC, MARY
adjectives	RED, BIG, INTERESTING
adverbs	QUICKLY, LOUDLY, NEVER
negative auxiliaries	DON'T, AREN'T, CAN'T

Structure words - unstressed

words for correct grammar	example
pronouns	he, we, they
prepositions	on, at, into
articles	a, an, the
conjunctions	and, but, because
auxiliary verbs	do, be, have, can, must

Exceptions

The rules above are for for what is called "neutral" or normal stress. But sometimes we can stress a word that would normally be only a structure word, for example to correct information. Look at the following dialogue:

"They've been to Mongolia, haven't they?"
"No, THEY haven't, but WE have."

Note also that when "be" is used as a main verb, it is usually unstressed—even though as a main verb it is also a content word.



REFERENCES:

“Word Stress, Sentence and Syllable Stress - EFL Magazine.” N.p., n.d. Web. 28 Nov. 2017.  http://www.eflmagazine.com/pronunciation/word-and-sentence-stress/

“Word Stress and Sentence Stress | EnglishClub.” N.p., n.d. Web. 27 Nov. 2017. https://www.englishclub.com/pronunciation/sentence-stress.htm https://www.englishclub.com/pronunciation/sentence-stress-rules.htm