PHONOLOGICAL SYSTEMS. THE ENGLISH PHONEME SYSTEM

1. Phonology

Like many languages, English has wide variation in pronunciation, both historically and from dialect to dialect. In general, however, the regional dialects of English share a largely similar (though not identical) phonological system.

SUPRASEGMENTAL PHONOLOGY

Syllable components
as a directed graph

Suprasegmentals - some contrastive elements of speech cannot be easily analyzed as distinct segments but rather belong to a syllable or word. These elements are called suprasegmental, and include intonation and stress. In some languages nasality and vowel harmony are considered suprasegmental or prosodic by some phonologists.

FUNCTIONS OF INTONATION. DISCOURSE PHONOLOGY

1. Functions of intonation

All vocal languages use pitch pragmatically in intonation — for instance for emphasis, to convey surprise or irony, or to pose a question. Tonal languages such as Chinese and Hausa use intonation in addition to using pitch for distinguishing words.

Many writers have attempted to produce a list of distinct functions of intonation. Perhaps the longest was that of W.R.Lee who proposed ten. J.C. Wells and E.Couper-Kuhlen both put forward six functions. Wells's list is given below; the examples are not his: