II. Prepositions and Conjunctions

1. In sentence-initial position they may be stressed when followed by an unstressed syllable (slow colloquial style).

Slow coll. Rapid coll.

"As to my ™future.|| As to my ™future.||

"If she "wants to ™help her…|| If she "wants to ™help her…||

Note. 1. In case a preposition or a conjunction is followed by a proper noun it takes no stress, e. g. If Nina wants to help her…

2. Sentence-initial “but” and “and” are unstressed, e. g. But he would "never °do it.|| And in a ™moment…||

Prepositions and conjunctions in sentence-final position, though unstressed have vowels of full formation, e. g. "What are you °looking at/{t/?|| "What are you °listening to /tu·/?||

III. Interrogative pronouns “what”, “how”, “when”, “why” take no stress in the following type of utterances (they often become high-prehead syllables), e. g. çHow °are you? çWhere °is it?

IV. “What” and “how” in exclamatory sentences followed by some emotionally coloured words take no accent, e.g. How èhorrible!|| What èfine èweather we are ™having to·day!||

V. “How many”, “how much” (rhythmical variations), e.g.

çHow °many?|| "How many °books?||

but

çHow °much?|| "How much °money?||

VI. Any word at its second appearance takes no stress, e. g. "How many °books? – °Two %books.||

VII. “More” and “most” as comparative and superlative degrees take no accent, e. g. The "text is more "difficult than I ex°pected.||

VIII. “Street” and “square” are stressed in the following way: In °Gorky %Street. In "Red °Square.||

IX. Logical stress can be laid on any word semantically important for the speaker. Sentence stress on the words that follow it either disappears or becomes partial, e. g. Do ™you ·speak ·English?||

Note. In “there + be” construction logical stress is fixed on the subject thus leaving an adverbial modifier of place unstressed, e. g. There are "many "places of °interest in Kiev. ||

Logical Stress

Logical Stress serves to mark the semantic center of the utterance (a word or a word-group that carries new information important for the speaker).

Logical Stress is observed when the syntagmatic stress is shifted from its normal place (the last notional word of the intonation-group) to any of the preceding words thus creating a new semantic center. Logical Stress is always combined with one of the moving tones.

Stress on words that follow logical stress either disappears (rapid colloquial) or becomes partial (slow colloquial).

e.g. He "left for °Kyiv %yesterday.||

He °left for %Kyiv %yesterday.||

He "left for "Kyiv °yesterday.||

°He left for %Kyiv %yesterday.||

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