Today we are going to see just a new area of
pronunciation in English and Arabic.
We are going to touch the stress system of English
and Arabic to see the areas of difficulties of the
stress system in both languages. You know, the
stress is the high pitch where
the sound is quite high or is high.
Here, We have two types of stresses, of stress.
The primary stress and the secondary stress. Then
we have the zero stress or weak form. Our focus
will be on primary stress. How could we pronounce
words which are stressed in English, either words
in isolation or words in connected speech. First
of all, the stress is meaningful. It gives
meaning.
And also, it's grammatical. So, grammatically, We
can distinguish between verbs and nouns by using
the stress. I say, for example, subject. It's a
noun. Subject. Verb. Object. Object. Report.
Report. Verb. Okay? So we have, we can distinguish
between the verbal noun by using the stress if the
morphological system of this word is the same in
both the noun structure and the verb structure.
Now, semantically, the location of the stress
differentiates the meaning of a word and of the
sentence as a whole. So, we mentioned subject and
we mentioned that this is a noun and then subject
and this is a verb and both are different
semantically.
In a sentence, we have what is called contrastive
stress, which is placed wherever you like, just to
convey a certain meaning.
Today, today, I want to show you the sound system
of English. This means this day, not any other
day. Today, I want to show you the sound system of
English. This means I, not anyone else. Today I
want to show you the sound system of English. This
means that we are going to explain the sound
system, not any subject else. So wherever you put
the stress, you change the meaning of the
sentence. So we need to tackle the stress system
and see the areas of difficulties facing our
students while learning English. The English
stress.
So, the stress is one of the suprasegmental
features along with the pitch, the intonation, and
length. And it's very important in language since
it has grammatical and semantic functions.
The location of the stress differs from one word
to another. We have what is called estimate rules
for the stress, but cannot cover all words of
English, mainly because these words are derived
from different origins. You know, English relies
on borrowing. So, this language has lots of
borrowing words. In the 20th century only, English
borrowed from more than 100 languages just in the
20th century. So what about going deep in history?
You find English borrowed from Portuguese, from
Latin, from Greek, from Arabic, from even Hebrew,
from different languages. So the system of these
words differ either in pronunciation or even in
grammar, mainly the plural system or the
pluralization system. Okay? So you have to take
care when pronouncing these words. I'll try to
facilitate the case by introducing just estimate
rules as much as I can.
So, the stress is prominent in a word. So, once I
say subject, it's in the first syllable at the
beginning, and this comes out with a noun. Once I
say subject, this is a verb. Okay? And this is
available at the second part of the word. Okay?
So, it is prominent.
Now, we have some words that will indicate the
manner of the stress system and how it is located
or pronounced.
Now, the location of the stress, as I mentioned,
is responsible for changing the meaning. I thought
you would eat, I thought you would eat it. I
thought you would eat it. This means that he
intended,
the meaning is intended, I mean, you have eaten
it. I thought that, I thought you eat, you would
eat it. But in the second one, I thought you would
eat it. This means that you haven't eaten it. So,
the meaning is changed according to the different
location of the stress. Now, we have what is
called rhythm in English and Arabic. The rhythm
system is based on the stress. Okay?
So,
The rhythm in the sentence depends on the number
of stressed syllables. Okay? In English, the
sentence or the rhythm, or say the stress, is of
time intervals. This means that not every single
word in the sentence is stressed in English.
However, in Arabic, The situation is different.
Arabic is a syllable-time language. It is syllabic
language, syllable-stressed language. Sorry,
syllable-stressed language. So, this means that
every single word is almost stressed in Arabic. In
English, the situation is different. In connected
speech, we have weak forms. These weak forms are
not stressed. For example, the preposition, the
pronoun, the determinants, the conjunctions, the
one-word syllable is not stressed. These
altogether are not stressed in the sentence.
However, the rest of the words may be stressed,
mainly the topic of the sentence or the topic of
the phrase. It is definitely stressed.
So this, I mean, the number of stresses in the
sentence comprise what is called the rhythm of the
sentence.
As I mentioned, we have two main types of stress,
the primary stress and the secondary stress. The
location of these two stresses differs from one
word to another or one group of words to another
mainly because of the difference in the origin of
these words. I told you that we have different
borrowed words in English. So, the system differs
from one group to another. Okay? This is one phase
of the difficulty of pronouncing English.
However, in Arabic, the situation is rule-based.
Arabic is a productive language. English is not.
Okay? So you find some sort of difficulty in
pronouncing certain words. Now, generally, the
word stress is not always in the first syllable in
English.
So we have, for example, computer, computer, pew,
language. Pronunciation. So three words of
different stress locations. Okay? So we don't have
exact rules for the position of stress. Still, we
have estimate rules that can be applicable to a
certain group of words rather than others.
As I mentioned, we have what is called word
stress. Still, we have phrase stress. And we have
what is called contrastive stress. It is optional.
The contrastive stress can be put wherever you
like, even in Arabic.
I say, for example, أنا سأشرح لكم الدرس أنا سأشرح
لكم الدرس اليوم. اليوم.
سأشرح لكم الدرس اليوم. So it is the high pitch.
Now, even the three sentences of Arabic differ one
from another semantically according to the
position of what is called the contrastive stress.
This situation is applicable to the contrastive
stress in English, as we are going to see.
Now, the shape of a word itself decides the
position of the word stress. Whether the word is
morphologically simple or complex. The grammatical
category of a word itself can decide the position
of the stress. I told you that functional
morphemes, grammatical morphemes, don't have
stress. They are weak forms. Lexical words are
stressed, but the stress differs in position from
one word to another. The number of syllables in a
word also decides the location of the stress.
So we have stress in two-syllable words. We have,
for example, assessed. This is a verb. This is in
the second syllable. Assist. Okay. Apply. Apply.
Apply. Okay. So it is apply. The second syllable.
I say object. The second syllable. Subject. The
second syllable. Report. The second syllable.
However, it can be in the first syllable. Report.
Subject, object. Okay?
Now, if the final syllable contains a short vowel
and one final consonant, the final syllable of a
word, if it contains a short vowel and the final
sound is consonant, Okay, then the stress must be
in the first syllable. I say open, open, equal,
equal. I don't say equal, I say open, open, equal.
So the stress is in the first syllable. Mainly
because the final part is consonant and it is
preceded by a short vowel.
For the nouns, you have this list maybe or mostly
in the first syllable. I say money, money.
Product, product. It is the first syllable.
We have adjectives which also have their stress in
the first syllable, as lovely, even, willing,
honest, perfect, but not necessarily having
this rule be applied on all types of animals. So,
we need to see the stress in most of the English
words, I mean the word types. Now, we reach the
stress in the three-syllable words.
We have the verb.
So if the last syllable contains a short vowel and
ends with not more than one consonant, The
syllable will be unstressed and the stress will be
placed on the preceding syllable. So we say, for
example, encounter, encounter. Cow, this is
encounter. This is the stress in the middle.
Determine, determine, deter, tear. This is the
stress. Determine.
If the final syllable contains a long vowel or a
diphthong or ends with more than one consonant,
then the final syllable will be stressed. I say,
for example, entertain, entertain, this is
diphthong. So it is stressed.
Now, if the syllable preceding the final syllable
contains a vowel or a diphthong, or it ends with
But if the word ends in IC or SION or TION, then
the stress is in the second syllable. So we have
solution, solution,
terrific, terrific,
terrific. You have your students mix between or
misunderstand, mispronounce the stress, so they
say terrific. This is not acceptable in English.
Terrific.
Still, we have different types of locations of
stress. I'm giving you the chance to have these
introduced by native speakers now.
Here are some more suffixes that have the stress
immediately before the suffix. This time though,
the suffixes have two syllables.
Listen and repeat Ability
Second Diameter Second Medical First Biography
Second Simplify First Biology Second Here are some
more examples Listen and repeat
nationality thermometer electrical
photography unify
psychology
In English, any syllable can have the stress. For
example, enjoy, document, banana, afternoon.
However, there are some rules. Words that end in
the suffixes ear,
ease,
eek and ee have the stress on the suffix. Listen
and repeat.
volunteer suffix e Japanese unique
employee
here are some more examples listen and repeat
boutique
antique technique
Engineer,
career, mountaineer,
refugee, trainee, referee,
Chinese,
Portuguese, Vietnamese.
Careful, not all words ending in E have the
suffix, which one here has the suffix and the
stress?
We have only one word which is stressed here.
Honeybee, coffee, devotee, committee.
Do you understand?
Here are some rules about stress and suffixes.
Words that end in the suffixes –il,
you, in, shun with an s or shun with a t,
shunt, shus with a c or with a T and IK. All have
the stress immediately before the suffix. Listen
and repeat.
Official Visual
Politician
Addition
Ancient Spacious Organic
Here
are some more examples. Listen and repeat.
Commercial Annual Indian
Television
efficient, delicious,
fantastic.
As you see, once you have these suffixes, the
stress is in the second syllable from the end.
Okay? Before the suffix, you have to stress on the
pitch to produce high pitch or say, primary
stress. I say terrific. Television. Television. V.
Okay?
Fantastic.
Here are some more suffixes that have the stress
immediately before the suffix. This time though,
the suffixes have two syllables.
and repeat.
Ability.
Diameter. Medical.
Biography.
Simplify. Biology. Here's some more examples.
Listen and repeat.
nationality thermometer electrical photography
unify
psychology
The final one.
Finally, to clear suffixes, they have to stress on
the second syllable before the suffix. Eight,
eyes, us, and the double syllable uri. Listen and
repeat.
Operate.
apologize dangerous necessary Here are some more
examples listen and repeat dominate exaggerate
integrate certificate socialize
Criticize. Emphasize. Recognize.
Marvelous. Mysterious. Obvious. Miscellaneous.
Secretary. Dictionary. Ordinary. Vocabulary.
So, as you see, the word stress has different
rules. All these rules which I mentioned are
estimate rules. So, it's very difficult for the
Arab learners to understand such systems unless
they imitate the speakers. The more you expose
yourself to English, the more you master the
suprasegmental phonemes. Okay? So you have to be
very cautious in teaching your students the sound
system. And it depends on their levels, either the
junior, the intermediate, or the advanced. You
have to introduce certain activities that suit
their level in pronunciation, in speaking, in
communication. The junior pupils or the junior
graders can imitate you. This means that the
teacher himself must master the subrasegmental
phonemes very, very perfectly. If you follow, If
you just pronounce wrongly, this means that your
students will follow you and commit mistakes which
can be fossilized by the run of time. So, You know
that the reasons for committing errors are of
different types. You have the types of errors.
Some errors result from over-generalization or
faulty teaching, fossilization or simplification.
You've taken this in your methodology, I think,
classes. So, we need to continue. with a system of
stress.
We spoke about these points, and now we mentioned
the different types of word stress, and I think
that we terminated on the phrase stress.
It's very important Stress, it comprises the
rhythm of the sentence and it is bound with time
intervals in English. However, in Arabic, it is
syllabic or syllable intervals. This means that
every single word may be stressed in Arabic, but
not necessarily to have every single word stressed
in English. Okay. I say, Dahabto ila almadrassa.
Translate it, please.
This is
Arabic. Again Arabic.
Okay,
good. Quite good. Out.
Excellent.
I went to school. I say that the preposition is
zero. It is weak form. So it is not necessarily
every single word stressed. Okay? Today I want to
explain the sound system of English. Today I want
to explain the stress system of English. of
English. I don't say today I want to explain the
sound system of English. This is Arabic. Cannot be
understood by native speakers. This is heavy
accent. Today I want to explain the sound system
of English.
Okay? So this means that we have weak forms and
strong forms. The strong forms and the phrase are
stressed. They represent words which are stressed.
Okay? We have also what's called a stress shift.
The stress in isolation, in words, differs from
the stress in a sentence. So, for example, we have
princess. Princess. Where's the stress? In the
second syllable. Now, Princess Diana. Princess
Diana. The stress moves to the beginning. So, this
means that the stress does not locate in a certain
position even on the same word. It depends on
utterance. So, connected utterance Speaking
English in connected utterance is different from
pronouncing words in isolation. The position of
stress differs.
So,
Now, you hear now two sentences read slowly and
deliberately as if they were said in presentation.
The noisy cars being parked in the garage.
Many people often read the business section of the
newspaper.
This is in slow tune. But we can read them
differently.
The noisy cars being parked in the garage.
The noisy cars being parked in the garage. So, we
have The stress, the first stress is the final
syllable of a word. This gives exclamation. Okay?
Many people often read the business section of the
newspaper. The newspaper. Just the business
section is read. Okay? So the focus is on one
word.
Now we have some
affixes, I mean prefixes, also fixes that control
the position of stress in the sentence. It seems
that we are out of time now. I leave these
PowerPoints on my page And this includes the films
about stress which you have already heard. So,
you'll see the whole lecture in my webpage. Okay?
Next time, we are going to continue with the
stress system in both English and Arabic as well.
Thank you.