American Accent Training Exercise 1-23: Syllable Count Test CD 1Track 33 Put the following words into the proper category based on the syllable count intonation Write the pattern number in the space provided. Check Answer Key, beginning on p. 193 Single Words 5. analyze (v) 9. believe 6. analysis(n) 10. director 3. sympat 7. analytic(adi 11. indicator 4. sympathetic mistake 12. technology Noun phrases 1. tech support 5. English test 9. a fire engine 2. software program 6. airline pilot 10. sports fanatic 3. the truth 7.Y2K 11. the kitchen floor 4. notebook 8. Santa Claus computer disk Phrases 1. on the table 5. for sure way 2. in your dreams 6. OK 10. like a princess 3. last Monday 1. to pick up 4. for a while 8. back to back 12. a pickup Sentences 1. Al gets T-shirts. 5. I don't know 9. She has head lice 2. i went too fast 6. Bob works hard 10. Gail has head lice 3. Get up 7. It's in the back 11. Sue's working hard 4. Get one! 8. Buy us some 12. I want some more Mixed 1. Do it again 8. in the middle 15. Make up your mind 2. Joe was upset 9. It's a good trick. 16. Tom has frostbite 3. banana 10. specifically 17.sam’ s a champ. 4. banana split 1. Bill needs it 18. He's a winner 5. categorize 12. jump around 19. He likes to win 6. child support 13. on my own 20. Al hates pork chops 7. Mexican food 14. by myself 21. He likes ground beef. Make up your own examples, one of each pattern. Make up more on your own 2b6. 10 7 4e 12
Chapter 1/American intonation Complex Intonation Word Count Intonation Patterns CD 1 Track 34 This is the beginning of an extremely important part of spoken American English-the rhythms and intonation patterns of the long streams of nouns and adjectives that are so commonly used. These exercises will tie in the intonation patterns of adjectives (nice, old best, etc. ) nouns(dog, house, surgeon, etc. ) and adverbs(very, really, amazingly, etc.) One way of approaching sentence intonation is not to build each sentence from scratch Instead, use patterns, with each pattern similar to a mathematical formula. Instead of plug ging in numbers, however, plug in words In Exercise 1-2, we looked at simple noun verb noun patterns, and in Exercise 1-22 and 1-23, the syllable-count intonation patterns were covered and tested. In Exercises1-24 to 1-37, we'll examine intonation patterns in two word phrases It's important to note that there's a major difference between syllable stress and com pound noun stress patterns In the syllable count exercises, each syllable was represented by a single musical note. In the noun phrases, each individual word will be represented by a single musical note---no matter how many total syllables there may be. At times, what appears to be a single syllable word will have a"longer"sound to it- seed takes longer to say than seat for example. This was introduced on page 3, where you learned that a final voiced consonant causes the previous vowel to double Exercise 1-24: Single-Word Phrases CD 1 Track 35 Repeat the following noun and adjective sentences N。un Adjective 1.It’ s a nail It's short 2. It's a cake It's chocolate. [chakl't 3. It's a tub Its hot. hat 4. It's a drive It's hard 5.It’ s a door. It's in back. [baek] 6. It's a card There are four 7. It's a spot. [spat] It’ s small 8. It's a book. IbukI It’ s good.[gid Write your own noun and adjective sentences below. You will be using these examples through out this series of exercises 9. It's It 10. It's a It’s 11. It's a Its
American Accent Training Two-Word Phrases Descriptive Phrases CD 1 Track 36 Nouns are""than adjectives; they carry the weight of the new information. An adjective and a noun combination is called a descriptive phrase, and in the absence of contrast or other secondary changes, the stress will always fall naturally on the noun In the absence of a noun, you will stress the adjective, but as soon as a noun appears on the scene, it takes immediate precedence--and should be stressed. Exercise 1-25: Sentence Stress with Descriptive Phrases CD 1 Track 3 Repeat the following phrases Adjective N。 un and Adjective 1. It's short It's a short nail 2.It’ s chocolate. It's a chocolate cake 3. Its good It's a good plan 4. It's guarded It's a guarded gate 5. Its wide It's a wide river 6. Therere four There’ re four card 7. It was small It was a small spot 8. It's the best It's the best book Pause the Cd and write your own adjective and noun/adjective sentences. Use the same words from Ex 1-24 9. Its It's a 10.It’s Its a 11. It's It's a Exercise 1-26: Two Types of Descriptive Phrases CD 1 Track 38 Re Adjective Noun Adverb Adjective I. It's a short nail It’ s really short 2. Its a chocolate cake. It's dark chocolate 3. It's a hot bath It's too hot 4. It's a hard drive Its extremely hard
Chapter //American Intonation Exercise 1-26: Two Types of Descriptive Phrases contin CD 1 Track 38 5. It's the back door It's far back 6. There are four cards. There are only fo 7. It's a small spot It's laughably small 8. Its a good book It's amazingly good Pause the cd and write your own adjective/noun and adverbladjective sentences, carrying over Ex 1-25 9.It’sa Its 10. Its a It l1.It’sa It's Exercise 1-27: Descriptive Phrase Story-The Ugly Duckling CD 1 Track 39 The following well-known story has been rewritten to contain only descriptions. Stress the second word of each phrase. Repeat after me There is a mother duck. She lays three eggs. Soon, there are three baby birds. two of the birds are very beautiful. One of them is quite ugly. The beautiful ducklings make fun of their ugly brother. The poor thing is very unhappy. As the three birds grow older, the ugly duckling begins to change His gray feathers turn snowy white. His gangly neck becomes beautifully smooth In early spring, the ugly duckling is swimming in a small pond in the back yard of th ld farm He sees his shimmering reflection in the clear water what a great surprise! He is no longer an ugly duckling. He has grown into a lovely swan Set Phrases CD 1 Track 40 a Cultural indoctrination to American norms When I learned the alphabet as a child, I heard it before I saw it. I heard that the last four letters were dubba-you, ex, why, zee. I thought that dubba-you was a long, strange name for a letter, but I didn't question it any more than i did aitch. It was just a name. Many years later, it struck me that it was a double U. of course, a w is really UU. I had such a funny feeling, though, when I realized that something I had taken for granted for so many years had a background meaning that I had completely overlooked. This"funny feeling "is ex actly what most native speakers get when a two-word phrase is stressed on the wrong word. When two individual words go through the cultural process of becoming a set phrase, the original sense of each word is more or less forgotten and the new meaning completely takes over. When we hear the word painkiller, we think anesthetic. If, however, someone says painkiller, it brings up the strength and almost unrelated meaning of kill When you have a two-word phrase, you have to either stress on the first word, or on
American Accent Training the second word. If you stress both or neither, it's not clear what you are trying to say. Stress on the first word is more noticeable and one of the most important concepts of intonation that you are going to study. At first glance, it doesnt seem significant, but the more you look at this concept, the more you are going to realize that it reflects how we americans think, what concepts we have adopted as our own, and what things we consider important Set phrases are our"cultural icons or word images; they are indicators of a deter mined use that we have internalized. These set phrases, with stress on the first word, have been taken into everyday English from descriptive phrases, with stress on the second word As soon as a descriptive phrase becomes a set phrase, the emphasis shifts from the second word to the first. The original sense of each word is more or less forgotten and the new meaning takes over. Set phrases indicate that we have internalized this phrase as an image, that we all agree on a concrete idea that this phrase represents a hundred years or so ago, when Levi Strauss first came out with his denim pants, they were described as blue jeans. Now that we all agree on the image, however, they are blue jeans A more recent example would be the descriptive phrase, He's a real party animal This slang expression refers to someone who has a great time at a party. When it first be came popular, the people using it needed to explain(with their intonation) that he was an animal at a party. As time passed, the expression became cliche and we changed the intona- tion to He's a real party animal because"everyone knew"what it meant. Cliches are hard to recognize in a new language because what may be an old and tired expression to a native speaker may be fresh and exciting to a newcomer. One way to look at English from the inside out, rather than always looking from the outside in, is to get a feel for what Americans have already accepted and internalized. This starts out as a purely lan- guage phenomenon, but you will notice that as you progress and undergo the relentless cultural indoctrination of standard intonation patterns, you will find yourself expressing yourself with the language cues and signals that will mark you as an insider--not an out side When the interpreter was translating for the former Russian President Gorbachev about his trip to San Francisco in 1990, his pronunciation was good, but he placed himself on the outside by repeatedly saying, cable car. The phrase cable car is an image, an established entity, and it was very noticeable to hear it stressed on the second word as a mere description An important point that I would like to make is that the" rules" you are given here are not meant to be memorized. This discussion is only an introduction to give you a starting point in understanding this phenomenon and in recognizing what to listen for Read it over; think about it; then listen, try it out, listen some more, and try it out agall a As you become familiar with intonation, you will become more comfortable with American norms, thus the cultural orientation, or even cultural indoctrination, aspect of the following examples Note When you get the impression that a two-word description could be hyphenated or even made into one word, it is a signal that it could be a set phrase- for example, f light, flash-light, flashlight. Also, stress the first word with Street(Main Street)and nation ilities of food and people (Mexican food, Chinese girls