Ministry of higher and secondary specialized

Chapter II. Accentual tendencies of English stress
II.1.Primary stress and secondary stress

Types of English Word Stress

Types of English word stress according to its degree. One of the ways of reinitiating the prominence of syllables is manipulating the degree of stress. There is controversy about degrees of WS in English and their terminology. Strictly speaking, polysyllabic word has as many degrees of stress as there are syllables in it. Designating strongest syllable by 1, the second strongest by 2, etc., we may represent the distribution Jesses in the following examples:
examination indivisibility
igzeminein indivizibiloti
But from a linguistic point, for the purposes of differentiating words from each
and identifying them, the fourth, the fifth and other degrees of lexical stress are redundant English, while the distinctive and recognitive relevance of the third degree of stress is a objective point. The majority of British phoneticians (D. Jones, Kingdon, A. C. Gimson among them) and Russian phoneticians (V. A. Vassilyev, Shakhbagova) consider that there are three degrees of word-stress in English:
• primary — the strongest
• secondary — the second strongest, partial, and
• weak — all the other degrees.
The syllables bearing either primary or secondary stress are termed stressed, while syllables with weak stress are called, somewhat inaccurately, unstressed. American linguists stingiest four degrees of word stress, adding the so-called tertiary stress . Contrary stress differs from tertiary that it usually occurs on the third or fourth pre-tonic syllable, and tertiary is always post-tonic, e.g. administrative, dictionary. category.
English language not only through the increase of intensity, but also through the changes in the vowel quantity, consonant and vowel quality and pitch of the voice. Russian word stress is not only dynamic but mostly quantitative and qualitative. The length of the Russian vowels always depends on the position in a word. The quality of unaccented vowels in Russian may differ greatly from the quality of the same vowels under stress. Stress difficulties peculiar to the accentual structure of the English language are connected with the vowel special and inherent prominence. In identical positions the intensity of English vowels is different. The highest in intensity is /a/, then u:, u, e, u.
The quantity of long vowels and diphthongs can be preserved (a) pretonic and (b) post-tonic position. All English vowels may occur in accented syllables, the only exception is /, which is never stressed. English vowels /i, u, u/ tend to occur in unstressed syllables. Syllables with the syllabic m, n/ are never stressed.
Unstressed diphthongs may partially lose their glide quality. In stressed syllables English stops have complete closure, fricatives have full friction, features of forties/lenis distinction are clearly defined.
Stress can be characterized as fixed and free. In languages with fixed type of stress the place of stress is always the same.
In English and Russian word-stress is free, that is it may fall any syllable in a word:
a) idea sarcastic archaic
b) placard railway
Stress in English and in Russian is not only free but also shifting. In both languages the place of stress may shift, which helps t0 differentiate different parts of speech, e.g. linsult—to inlsult, import—to imiport.
When the shifting of word-stress serves to perform distinctive function, V. Vassil.Stress performs not only distinctive function, it helps to constitute and recognize words and their forms (constitutive and recognitive functions).
Strictly speaking, a polysyllabic word has as many degrees of stress as there are syllables in it. American and English phoneticians give the following pattern of stress distribution in the word examination. They mark the strongest syllable with primary accent with the numeral 1, then goes 2, 3, etc.
English word-stress is traditionally defined as dynamic, but in fact, the special prominence of the stressed syllables is manifested in the English language not only through the increase of intensity, but also through the changes in the vowel quantity, consonant and vowel quality and pitch of the voice.
Most words of more than four syllables have 2 stresses: primary (nuprefixes and entry. The primary stress falls either on the third or the second syllable from the end and the secondary stress falls on the syllable separated from the nuclear syllable by one unstressed syllable: pro-ition, recog ition, etc.
The place of word-stress in English compound words principally de“rewrite” on the semantic factor, i. e. the element which determines the mean-of the whole compound has a primary stress. But most of the compound possess the nuclear stress on the l element: ‘bookcase, ‘diligence etc, whereas compound adjectives have, as a rule, primary stress on element of the compound ‘well- ?oiown, ibsent-- jinded, etc.[1;34]
III. Word Stress tendencies
In spite of the fact that word stress in English is free, there are certain factors that determine the location and different degree of it. Prof. V. A. Vassilyev describes them as follows:
• the recessive tendency;
• the rhythmic tendency;
• the retentive tendency and
• the semantic factor
The first and the oldest of the English lexical stress tendencies (characteristic of all Germanic languages) known as the recessive tendency originally consisted in placing lexical stress on the initial syllable of nouns, adjectives and verbs derived from them and on the root syllable of words which belonged to other parts of speech and had a prefix. In most cases prefixes lost their referential meaning since then, with the result that recessive stress in present-day English of two subtypes:
1) unrestricted: when stress falls on the initial syllable, provided it is not a prefix which has no referential meaning. A great majority of native English words of Germanic origin are stressed this way: father mother husband, ‘wonder
2) restricted: when stress falls on the root of the native English words with a prefix which has no referential meaning now: a’mong, be’come, before,fo,’get, etc.
It is this tendency that determined the incidence of stress in a huge number of disyllabic and trisyllabic French words which had been borrowed into English until the 1 5th century (during and after the Norman Conquest).
The presence in English of a great number of short (disyllabic and trisyllabic) words defamed the development of the so-called rhythmic tendency which results in alternating stressed and unstressed syllables. Borrowed polysyllabic words developed a secondary stress on the syllable separated from the word-final primary stress by one unstressed syllable. These words began to be pronounced, in isolation, on the model of short phrases in which a stressed syllable alternates with an unstressed one: pronunciation.
The retentive tendency consists in the retention of the primary stress on the parent word: person — personal, or more commonly the retention of the secondary stress on the parent word: ‘personal — 1perso’nalily. The difference between constant accent and ‘ retentive stress consists in that the former remains on the same syllable in all the g forms of a word or in all the derivatives from
one and the same root, whereas retinal, stress in a derivative falls on the same syllable on which it falls in the parent word, while i other derivatives from the same root it may be shifted e.g.: personal .
There are certain categories of English words stressing of which is determined the semantic factor, e.g. compound words and words with the so-called separable prefix The majority of such words have two equally strong stresses, both stressed parts considered to be of equal semantic importance, with the semantic factor thus canceling rhythmic tendency in word stressing, e.g.
• compound adjectives: hard-working, blue-eyed,
• verbs with post positions sit down, take off
• numerals from 13 to 19:fourteen, sixteen.
It should be noted that the rhythmic tendency becomes operative when such work occur in sentences and the first stress of a double-stressed English word disappears in an immediately or closely preceding word requires stress: a ‘very good-looking ‘girl.[3;175]
Variation in word stress
The stress patterns of some English words are liable to variations of different kinds. There is free variation of stress location due to some rhythmic and analogical pressures, both of which entail in addition considerable changes of sound pattern in words[3;182], e.g.
in some words of three syllables, there is variation between’---and-‘—patterns: deficit, integral (adj), exquisite.
2) similarly, in words of four syllables, there is variation between first and secon syllable stressing: hospitable, formidable, despicable.
Pronunciation patterns of such words due to the variation in stress placement have the status of alternative pronunciation forms which occur in educated usage.
Cases of variable stress placement caused by the context is known as ‘stressshift’. When a word of several syllables has a stress near the end of thc word, and is followed by another word with stress near its beginning, there is a tendency for the stress in the first word to move nearer the beginning if it contains a syllable that is capable of receiving stress, e.g. the word academic in isolation usually has the stress or the penultimate syllable /-dem-/. However, when the word year follows, the stress often found to move to the first syllable /k-/; the whole phrase ‘academic year’ will have the primary stress on the word year, so the resulting stress pattern will be ‘academic ‘year. In isolation, we say fundamental and Japanese with primary stress on -ment and -nese, in connected speech these words may have a different pattern: greater stress on fund- and Jap-.
Word stress can be defined as the singling out of one or more syllables in a
word, which is accompanied by the change of the force of utterance, pitch of the voice, qualitative and quantitative characteristics of the sound, which is usually a vowel.
In different languages one of the factors constituting word stress is usually more significant than the others. According to the most important feature different types of word stress are distinguished in different languages.
1) If special prominence in a stressed syllable or syllables is achieved mainly through the intensity of articulation, such type of stress is called dynamic, or force stress.
2) If special prominence in a stressed syllable is achieved mainly through the change of pitch, or musical tone, such accent is called musical, or tonic. It is characteristic of the Japanese, Korean and other oriental languages.
3) If special prominence in a stressed syllable is achieved through the changes in the quantity of the vowels, which are longer in the stressed syllables than in the unstressed ones, such type of stress is called quantitative.
4) Qualitative type of stress is achieved through the changes in the quality of the vowel under stress.
English word stress is traditionally defined as dynamic, but in fact, the special prominence of the stressed syllables is manifested in the English language not only through the increase of intensity, but also through the changes in the vowel quantity, consonant and vowel quality and pitch of the voice.
Russian word stress is not only dynamic but mostly quantitative and qualitative. The length of the Russian vowels always depends on the position in a word. The quality of unaccented vowels in Russian may differ greatly from the quality of the same vowels under stress, e.g. /a/ in травы, травы, травяной is realized as /а, а, ъ/. /а, о, э/ undergo the greatest changes, /y/ and /и/ are not so
much reduced when unstressed.
Stress difficulties peculiar to the accentual structure of the English language are connected with the vowel special and inherent prominence. In identical positions the intensity of English vowels is different. The highest in intensity is /a:/, then go / ɔ:, з:, i:, u:, ж, ɔ, e, u, i/.
The quantity of long vowels and diphthongs can be preserved in (a) pretonic and (b) post-tonic position in English.
A stressed syllable carries a rhythmic beat. Accent is international pitch prominence.
Degrees of word-stress
Instrumental investigations show that a polysyllabic word has as many degrees of prominence as there are syllables in it. D. Jones indicated the degrees of prominence in the word Opportunity. But not all these degrees of prom are linguistically relevant. The problem is to determine which of these degrees are linguistically relevant. There are 2 views of the matter. Some (e.g. D. Jones, R. Kingdon, V. Vassilyev consider that there are 3 degrees or W-s in English: primary, secondary (partial stress) and weak (unstressed). Secondary stress is chiefly needed to define the stress pattern of words. E.g. e,xami'nation, qualifi'cation, 'hair-,dresser.
All these degrees stress are linguistically relevant as there are words in English the meanings of which depend on the occurrence of either of the 3 degrees in their stress patterns. E.g. 'import - im'port, ,certifi'cation - cer,tifi'cation =certificate.
Some American linguists (G. Trager, A. Hill) distinguish 4 degrees of -s:
Primary (as in cupboard) / ( /Secondary (as in discrimination) / ^ /Tertiary (as in analyze) Weak stress (as in cupboard), but very often the weakly stressed syllable is left unmarked. /v/ American phoneticians consider that secondary stress generally occurs before the primary stress (as in examination), while tertiary stress occurs the primary stress (as in handbook, specialize).
Linguistically, tertiary word-stress can be taken for a variant of secondary w-s, as there are no words in English the meanings of which depend on whether their stress patterns is characterized by either secondary of tertiary stress.
The stress Patterns of English words
There are languages in which stress is always falls on the first syllable (as in Czech and Finish), or on the last syllable (as in French and Turkish). Word stress is in such languages is said to be fixed. English words is said to be free because stress is not fixed to any particular syllable, in all the words of the language.
G. Torsuyev, who has made a special analyses of English stress patterns, distinguishes more than 100 stress patterns, which he groups into 11 main types. The most common among them are:
( (Words w/I primary stress as in 'after)
( ( (Words w/2 primary stresses, as in 'week'end)
(_&_ ( (words w/one primary and one secondary stress, as in 'hair-, dresser, maga'zine).
Though w-s in English is called free, there are certain tendencies in English which regulate the accentuation of words. There are 2 main accentuation tendencies: the recessive and the rhythmic tendency.
According to the recessive tendency, stress falls on the 1st syllable (e.g. 'mother, 'father, 'sister, 'brother) or on the 2nd syllable (e.g. be'come, in'deed, for'give etc.) According to the rhythmic tendency stress is on the 3rd syllable from the end (in'tensity, possi'bility). lt has also been noticed that the stress of the parent word is often retained in the derivatives. 'Personal-,perso'nality, 'nation-,natio'nality. This regularity is sometimes called the retentive tendency in English. There is one more tendency in English: the tendency to stress the most important elements in words. Such negative prefixes as -un, -in, -mis, -ex, -vice, -sub, -under, semantically important elements in compound words: well-'known, red-'hot, bad-'tempered.
A.V. Ziryanova says: "Phoneticians generally distinguish the following tendencies in the placement of word stress: recessive tendency, rhythmic tendency, retentive tendency and semantic factor."
Recessive tendency is the tendency to stress the beginning of the word. It can be of two subtypes. Unrestricted recessive tendency is observed in the native English words with no prefix ('mother, 'daughter, 'brother, 'swallow) and in assimilated French borrowings ('reason, 'colour). Restricted recessive tendency is characterized by placing the word stress on the root of the word if this word has a prefix, which has lost its meaning (fore'see, with'draw, be'gin).
The rhythmic (rhythmical) tendency reflects the rhythm of alternating stressed and unstressed syllables. This tendency caused the appearance of the secondary stress in the multisyllabic French borrowings (ˏrevo'lution, ˏorgani'sation). It also explains the placement of primary stress on the third syllable from the end in three- and four-syllable words ('cinema, sig'nificant). The interrelation of recessive and rhythmic tendencies can be traced in borrowed three-syllable words ('family, 'library, 'faculty). In most cases, however, these two tendencies contradict each other, which leads to the existence of such accentual variants as 'hospitable hos'pitable, 'distribute – dist'ribute. The stress on the initial syllable is caused by the diachronical recessive tendency and the stress on the second syllable is under the influence of rhythmic tendency. In sentences, words with two stresses can be pronounced with one singular stress under the influence of rhythm: ˏthirʹteen / Her ʹnumber is ʹthirteen ˎhundred.
The third, A derivative retains the stress of the original word ('similar – as'similate). Sometimes in the derivative the primary stress of the original word turns into secondary stress ('demonstrate – ˏdemonst'ration).
The semantic factor is observed in compound words. The stress generally falls on the elements, which have a greater semantic, distinctive weight. For example, in such pairs as ʹgentleman – ʹgentle ʹman, ʹblackboard – ʹblack ʹboard the placement of stress on the first morpheme signifies that these words have a single meaning, which is not made up from the meanings of their sub-parts. Two equal stresses on both parts of these word combinations show that each element has its own meaning. The semantic factor is also observed when the first element of the compound is more important (ʹbirthday), when it is contrasted with some other word (ʹflute player, not ʹviolin player), or when a compound is very common and frequently used (ʹmidsummer, ʹmidnight).
Word Stress Placement Exercise
1. Make sure that you studied how certain suffixes influence the placement of primary stress.
2. Can you highlight, underline, or circle the syllable that will receive the primary stress for each word of this list?

Activity	emergency
Accomplish	discussion
Accuracy	currency
Accessible	efficiency
Analogy	democracy
Advantageous	expression
Ambitious	Event
Actually	emphasize
Actual	eventually
Aware	essential
Authority	furnish
Apologize	flexible
Apology	finance
Authorize	frequency
Brother	financial
Biography	hideous
Bibliography	happy
Biology	geography
Bacteria	heterogeneous
Awareness	happiness
Community	Likely
Cigarette	horrible
Brotherhood	historical
Classical	impression
Characterize	homogeneous
Criticize	meaning
Courageous	material
Competitive	likelyhood
Courteous	maximize
Conclusion	majority