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Sentence Stress in English

Sentence stress in English refers to accenting certain words in a sentence to give the language its rhythm. There are two types of words in sentences: content words that carry meaning and structure words that make the sentence grammatically correct. Content words like verbs, nouns, adjectives and adverbs are stressed, while structure words like pronouns, prepositions and conjunctions are unstressed. Stressing content words at regular intervals gives English its beat or musical quality. Understanding sentence stress helps with pronunciation and comprehending fast speech.

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193 views3 pages

Sentence Stress in English

Sentence stress in English refers to accenting certain words in a sentence to give the language its rhythm. There are two types of words in sentences: content words that carry meaning and structure words that make the sentence grammatically correct. Content words like verbs, nouns, adjectives and adverbs are stressed, while structure words like pronouns, prepositions and conjunctions are unstressed. Stressing content words at regular intervals gives English its beat or musical quality. Understanding sentence stress helps with pronunciation and comprehending fast speech.

Uploaded by

Rayma Fe Narag-Lagundi
Copyright
© Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOC, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Sentence Stress in English

Sentence stress is the music of spoken English. Like word stress, sentence stress can help you to understand spoken English, especially when spoken fast. 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 types of word:

content words structure words

Content words are the key words of a sentence. They are the important words that carry the meaning or sense. 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 or "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: Will you SELL my CAR because I've GONE t FRANCE o 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: Will you SELL my CAR because I've GONE t FRANCE o 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: Content Words Will you SELL my CAR because I've GONE t FRANCE. o Structure Words 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. syllables 2 1 3 1

Will you SELL my CAR because I've GONE t FRANCE. o t1


beat

t1

beat

t1

beat

t 1

beat

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

Rules for Sentence Stress in English


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 nouns adjectives adverbs negative auxiliaries

SELL, GIVE, EMPLOY CAR, MUSIC, MARY RED, BIG, INTERESTING QUICKLY, LOUDLY, NEVER DON'T, AREN'T, CAN'T

Structure words - unstressed


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

Exceptions
The above rules 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 in this case it is a content word). http://www.englishclub.com/pronunciation/sentence-stress.htm

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