Unit 49. He Will Win.

Introduction to Emphatic Stress
Unit 49; Part A
Short sentences have a typical sentence stress, or rhythm. (See Unit 23. ) For example: He won't win! oOO (The sentence has three syllables, and there is stress on the second and third.) He'll win! oO (The sentence has two syllables and there is stress on the second.) |
Unit 49; Part B
But in conversation, speakers can choose to put the stress in anyplace. This is like underlining words in writing: we do this to putemphasis on words. Here are the same two examples from A again, butthis time they are in the context of a short conversation. Notice theway the speakers 'underline' some words. A: Hell win, you know. B: He won't win! A: He will win! In this example, the speakers do not agree with each other. В 'underlines' won't to show that he is saying the opposite of what A said. Then A 'underlines' will for the same reason. Note that the written form also changes, from 'll to will. |
Unit 49; Part C
To 'underline' a word, a speaker does one or more of these things: amakes it louder, b makes it longer, с makes it higher. Listen to thisconversation. It shows the 'underlining' very clearly.![]() | |
We emphasise words for example when we want to make a contrast withwhat the other person says, or correct some wrong information. (Units50 to 53 give more detail on this.) |
Exercises
![]() | Unit 48 Unit 49 Unit 50 | ![]() |