This document discusses various linguistic concepts related to discourse analysis and phonology, including intonation, rhythm, word stress, prominence, tonality, and pitch. It examines how these elements are used to construct meaning and manage discourse. Speakers can choose prominence on syllables, tones like rising and falling pitch, and their overall pitch or "key" to convey attitudes, structure information, and engage interactively. The functions of prominence, tone, and pitch level need to be analyzed separately but also considered together as unified system that speakers adjust in conversation.

1. DISCOURSE ANALYSIS AND
PHONOLOGY
ELIANA ALMEIDA ARAGÓN

2. INTRODUCTION
• Attention to intonation
• Intonation studies rather
than at the segmental
level
The study of phonemes and their
articulation)
The basis of assumptions that
are open to challenge from a
discourse analyst's viewpoint.

3. • phonemes may undergo
considerable changes
PRONUNCIATION
• Produce meaningful
contrasts with other words
• construction of words
• segment the sounds of language
into discrete items called
pbonemes
2
1
3
4

4. RHYTHM
The impression of rhythm
may arise out of a feeling of
alternation
between strong and weak
'beats' in various patterned
recurrences

5. WORD STRESS AND PROMINENCE
01
02
03
04
Syllables which
stand out in the
flow of talk
because
the speaker has
uttered them with
relatively greater
intensity,
will be
referred to as
prominent
syllables
or duration,
or pitch variation
compared with
surrounding syllables

6. WORD STRESS AND PROMINENCE
When a word is used in conversation and emphasised, one of the
stressed syllables is made prominent.
In a one-stress word this is the stressed syllable, and in a two-
stress word it is usually the syllable with main stress.
Prominent syllables can be shown by using capital letters:

7. THE PLACING OF PROMINENCE
• Prominence refers to the
changes in stress, pitch or
emphasis that allows for added
meaning to be inferred in what
is being spoken
Prominence is given to syllables
depends on the choice of the
speaker to make certain word
salien

8. INTONATIONAL UNITS
• Divide speech up into
small units main, or
nuclear prominence.
• Tone groups often have a slight
pause after them, and are claimed
to correspond most frequently in
natural data with grammatical
clauses

9. TONES AND THEIR MEANINGS
• The prominent syllables in an
utterance are the carriers of
any significant variation in
pitch that the speaker might
use.
• At recognisable points in the
utterance, the pitch level may
rise, fall, or be carefully kept
level.

10. TYPES OF TONES GRAMMATICAL APPROACHES
• correct intonations for
things such as
questions, sentence-
tags, subordinate
clauses, and so on.

11. ATTITUDINAL APPROACHES INTERACTIVE APPROACHES
The choice of tone is
independent
Of the choice of grammatical
form, and that it is the speaker's
assessment of
The conducive (and therefore
non-open) character of the
question that is
Important.

12. KEY
The relative
level of pitch
between one
part of an
utterance and
another
can
often be heard
to change
to jump
upwards
or to drop Hnd
trail off

13. KEY
When speakers are
speaking in the
middle of their
average
pitch range,
they are speaking
in mid-key
and the utterance
simply adds
more to the
ongoing discourse
These three
functions
HIGH FOR
CONTRASTIVENESS
MID FOR
ADDITION
LOW FOR
REITERATION
represent a further
layer of speaker
choice in
intonanon

14. PITCH ACROSS SPEAKERS
Speakers sometimes begin a new topic by asking a question which begins
high in the speaker's pitch range, and how this high pitch is echoed by the
hearer with high pitch at the beginning of the answer. A typical topic-
opening sequence might be:

15. SUMMARY
Any description that
adequately separates
the
functions of
prominence, tone and
pitch level
level, is that separate
parts of the system
can be dealt with
individuall
while not losing sight
of either the overall
discourse significance
of the different levels
of choice
or the unified sense
of the importance of
speaker choice and
adjustmet
to the constantly
Changing state of play
between participants
in the talk

16. CONCLUSION
Dialects and varieties of English, particular tones seem to have
different functions
analysis, Lower-level learners often have to encode utterances in
L2 word-by-word, and under such conditions, appropriate tone-
grouping,
prominence, tone and key may simply not be realised