Intonation: Definition and Functions

Roach, P. Chapter 15

Intonation
The pitch of voice plays the most important part.

Utterance
Continuous piece of speech beginning and ending with a clear pause

Tone Language
The tone can determine the meaning of a word, changing one tone to another can completely change the meaning (eg. Chinese)

Intonational Languages
Substituting one tone for another does not cause a change in the dictionary meaning, tones have other purposes and functions.

Functions of Intonation
Attitudinal function: intonation enables us to express emotions and attitudes as we speak. (OConnor and Arnold) Accentual function: Intonation helps to produce the effect of prominence in syllables Grammatical function: The listener is better able to recogniz the grammar and syntactic structure of what is being said by using the information contained in the intonation (yes/no questions, wh questions, etc)

 Discourse function: Looking at the act of speaking in a broader way, we can see that intonation can signal for the listener what is to be taken as new information and what is already given