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Understanding Word Stress Rules

1) A word has one main stress that cannot change between different syllables on different days. However, stress can shift between syllables to contrast related words, like "vendor" and "vendee". 2) Phonotactic rules determine what sounds can occur in what positions within a word. For example, the "ng" sound cannot start an English word. Stress and phonotactic rules provide clues about whether two words are a compound or separate words. 3) A word must follow the phonological rules of pronunciation in a language, regarding what sounds can be combined where. English spelling does not always match pronunciation perfectly.

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75 views2 pages

Understanding Word Stress Rules

1) A word has one main stress that cannot change between different syllables on different days. However, stress can shift between syllables to contrast related words, like "vendor" and "vendee". 2) Phonotactic rules determine what sounds can occur in what positions within a word. For example, the "ng" sound cannot start an English word. Stress and phonotactic rules provide clues about whether two words are a compound or separate words. 3) A word must follow the phonological rules of pronunciation in a language, regarding what sounds can be combined where. English spelling does not always match pronunciation perfectly.

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Tahsin Opu
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10 WHAT IS A WORD?

`acrobat a`nnoying ca`hoots


`kingfisher de`molish gaber`dine
`patriarchate Chau`cerian hullaba`loo

Main stress can fall on only one syllable in a word. The location of main strees is part of
the make-up of a word and is not changed capriciously by individual speakers. You cannot
decide to stress hullabaloo on the penultimate syllable on a Monday (hulla `baloo), on the
antepenultimate syllable on a Tuesday (hu`llabaloon), on the initial syllable on a Wednesday
(`hullabaloo) and on the final syllable for the rest of the week (hullaba`loo).
However, in some case, if we wish to contrast two related word, we can shift strees from
its normal position to a new position. This can be seen in `vendor and ven`dee which
normally are stressed on the first and second syllable respectively. But if the speaker wants to
contrast these two words both words might be stressed on the final syllable as I heard an
estate agent do in a radio interview.

[2.6]
It is ven`dor, not the ven`dee who pays that tax.

This example illustrates well the point that a word is allowed just one stress. Stress can
be shifted from one syllable to another, but a word cannot have to main stresses. We could
not have *`ven`dor and *`ven`dee where the two syllables received equal stress. Stress has to
do with relative prominence, The syllable that receives main stress is somewhat more
prominent than the rest, some of which may be unstressed or weakly stressed. By contrast,
function words are normally unstressed. We can say Nelly went to town with no stress on to
unless we wish to highlight to for contrastive purpose, e.g., Nelly went to town and not far
away from town).
It is easy to see how stress can function as a valuable clue in determining whether two
content words are a single compound word or two separate words. The nouns street and
lamp are both stressed when they occur in isolation. But if they appear in the compound
`street-lamp, only the first is stressed. The stress on lamp is suppressed.
Stress is not the only phonological clue. In addition to stress, there are rules regulating
the positions in which various sounds may occur in a word and the combinations of sounds
that are permissible. These rules are called PHONOTACTIC RULES. They can help us to
know whether we are the beginning, in the middle are at the end of a word.
Aphonologicalword must satisfy the requirments for words of the spoken language. For
instance, while any vowel can begin a word, and most consonants can appear alone at the
ENGLISH WORDS 11

beginning of a word, the consonant[ ] is subject to certain restrictions. (This consonant is


spelled ng as in long (see the key to symbols used on p. xix). In English words [ ] is not
allowed to occur initially although it can occur in other positions. Thus, [ ] is allowed
internally and at the end of a word as in [1 1] longing and [1 get] longer. But you could not
have an English word like ngether, *[ ee] with [ ] as its first sound. However, in other
languages this sound may be found word-initially as in the Chinese name Nga [ a] and the
Zimbabwean name Nkomo [ komo].
There are also phonotatic restrictions on the combination of consonants in various
positions in a word in the spoken language. As everyone knows, English spelling is not
always a perfect mirror of pronunciation. So when considering words in the spoken language
it is important to separate spelling from pronunciation (cf. chapter 7). You know that He is
knock-kneed is pronounced /hI Iz nk ni:d/ and not */he Is knk kni:d/. A particular
combination of letters can be associated with very different pronunciations in different words
or

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