Masaryk University Faculty of Arts Department of English and American Studies

4.5 Presence v. Absence of Stress and Influence on Vowel Quality

So far we have dealt in depth with the complexities of where stress is placed within a word and what determines its placement. However, the absence of stress can have as much impact on the pronunciation of a word or indeed the meaning of a phrase/sentence as can its presence. “In a strongly stressed language like English, vowel quality is so frequently influenced by the presence or absence of stress, wrong stressing disguises words far more effectively than does wrong intonation.” (Kingdon, 1958, p. xi) In Fudge’s (1984) system this is best explained on the example of three related words: explain, explanatory and explanation (p. 193). When pronouncing these three words, we immediately notice that the vowel of the root is pronounced differently in each case. In explain and explanatory, it is pronounced as a full vowel (eɪ and æ respectively) while in explanation, the only one of the three words where main stress does not fall on the syllable –pla-/-plai-, the syllable is pronounced as reduced (ə). Also, among the full vowels, explain is pronounced with a long vowel, while explanatory with a short one. Similarly we can observe a difference in pronunciation of the prefix ex-: in explain and explanatory, the vowel is pronounced as reduced (ɪ) since secondary stress does not fall on it due to the fact that the following syllable bears main stress; as said before, due to the rhythmic nature of English language, strong stresses do not occur next to each other. On the other hand, in explanation, the main stress is placed on the syllable –na- (expla`nation), allowing for the secondary stress to appear on the prefix, giving it the pronunciation with a full vowel [e].
From this example alone it is quite apparent that the absence or presence of strong stress (main or secondary) greatly influences vowel quality: in the absence of stress, vowels are reduced; in its presence, they are pronounced as full. In some cases (Fudge, 1984, p. 193), vowel length is sufficient to prevent reduction regardless of the assignment of secondary stress as can be seen in the verb advocate (pronounced `ædvəkeɪt). For these reasons, the low level stress mark ˌ is introduced into the English stress system to indicate vowels which, though not bearing a strong stress, are prominent enough (by virtue of their length etc.) to avoid reduction (thus the word is correctly transcribed as `ædvəˌkeɪt). Though this mark is most commonly used to indicate non-reduced syllables after the main stress, it can generally be assigned to vowels which are not strongly stressed but do not undergo reduction regardless of their position (e.g. ˈreˌla`xation). There are several conditions which prevent syllables from being reduced regardless of the placement of strong stresses within the word:

1. 
   Reduction would cause the distinction between a pair of words disappear.
   

In this case, reduction may be prevented in one or both of the words. For example if the verbs exercise and exorcise would undergo stressing and reduction by the rules explained, both would be pronounced the same. However, instead the vowel of the second syllable does not undergo reduction and the distinction between the words is preserved. Generally it can be said that the less used word of the two is protected from reduction while the other is reduced as usual by the rules. However, this condition is not entirely regular, as some word pairs are pronounced the same regardless (e.g. the adjective dependent and the noun dependant).

2. 
   First syllable of a word is strong.
   

In most varieties of English this rule does not apply to stress-repellent prefixes even if they form a strong syllable. Monosyllabic stress-neutral prefixes, however, do fall under this rule and are not reduced. Though this rule might appear quite simple and clear, difficulties arise in cases where syllable boundaries are not entirely obvious. If a short vowel is followed by an “s” plus one or two consonants, the boundary may fall either before the s or after it, producing a weak initial syllable in one case and strong in the other. For example in the word prospective, the syllables are divided as pro.spec.tive, the initial syllable is weak and undergoes reduction (prəspektɪv) while in prosperity the division stands as pros.pe.ri.ty, the initial syllable is protected from reducing and is pronounced with a full vowel (prɑsperɪtɪ).

3. 
   If stress-shift occurs in the noun of a noun-verb pair. The root syllable normally does not reduce in this case as described in (chapter 4.2)
   
4. 
   A short vowel is followed by a consonant or consonant cluster of a certain type. Mostly, unstressed short vowels reduce in open syllables (syllables with an empty coda) and in syllables ending with m, dental or alveolar consonants and in certain consonant clusters. However, in other types of syllables, unstressed short vowels maintain full quality unless the preceding syllable is weak and stressed. Thus, for example, the unstressed final syllable of “syllabub” is pronounced with a full vowel ʌ since the short vowel is followed by a b which is a bilabial consonant, not a dental or alveolar one. Nevertheless in cherub, the final vowel of the final syllable is reduced to ə since it is preceded by a weak stressed syllable.
   

Returning to the initial example of explain, explanatory and explanation, attention was drawn to the fact that in explain and explanatory, though the first syllable of the root was stressed in both cases, they differ in length. While the etymological basis among these words, explain, contains a long vowel in its root (eɪ), its derivate, explanatory, contains a short one (æ). The process occurring in this case is known as trisyllabic shortening. The only thing necessary to take into account when dealing with trisyllabic shortening is the final three syllables of the SP of the word. As long as the antepenultimate syllable is stressed with empty coda, the penultimate syllable unstressed with empty coda and the penultimate and the final syllable have at least one consonant in their onset, the vowel of the antepenultimate syllable will be shortened. Thus when the suffix –atory is added to the word explain, the antepenultimate syllable (-na-) will be stressed with empty coda, (-to-) unstressed with empty coda and (-ry) will have one consonant in its onset, fulfilling the conditions for trisyllabic shortening and thus transforming the vowel of the penultimate syllable. A similar phenomenon occurs when the final syllable does not contain a consonant in its onset, however, it is only limited to the vowels i and y. All other vowels in this context lengthen instead (vowel lengthening rule number 2).
Secondly, certain suffixes, when added to a word with long vowel in its final syllable cause the vowel to be shortened: -ative, -atory, -(e)fy, -(i)fy, -ic, -ical, -ics, -itive, -ity, -tude, -ual, -uant, -uate, -uous. Addition of several of these suffixes in fact fulfils the conditions for trisyllabic shortening, while in others, shortening happens by virtue of the suffix’ accentual properties. However, though trisyllabic shortening does not appear exclusively in suffix derivates, it is oftentimes faster to analyze a word by its suffix and stem, rather than investigate the conditions for trisyllabic shortening.
On opposite process may also take place in English. A vowel will be lengthened in these cases:

1. 
   A stressed vowel precedes another vowel. For example in a word like chaos, the vowel of the second syllable is pronounced as long since the vowel before it is stressed.
   
2. 
   The antepenultimate syllable is stressed with empty coda, the penultimate syllable unstressed with empty coda and at least one consonant in its onset and the final syllable contains no consonant in its onset. All vowels except for i and y are lengthened in this context.
   
3. 
   Vowels o and u are always long when word-final (e.g. stereo, hero).
   
4. 
   If the initial open syllable (syllable with empty coda) of a disyllabic word is stressed, its vowel will be lengthened (e.g. China).