THE NATURE OF INTONATION.

THE NATURE OF INTONATION.

The alternation of words and their grammar forms is to be used in sentences.
Besides the syntactic factor the main factor that turns a word or a group of words
into a sentence is intonation. It is present in every sentence because words in the
sentence conditions are pronounced with certain tone, timbre, voice, loudness and
duration. These features are called supra-segmental or prosodic characteristics of
speech. The term “prosody” embraces such notions as pitch, loudness, tempo and
substitutes the term “intonation”.

The basic prosodic features of the sentence are: speech melody, sentence
accent, tempo, voice, timbre, rhythm, pausation. Intonation together with the
proper choice of grammar structure is the main constituent feature of the sentence.
So the major function of intonation is therefore sentence constitutive.

Simultaneously it performs the sentence distinctive function. It can be proved
by the following personal observations:
 a) intonation gives the final expression tothe sentence;
b) changes in the components of intonation alter the communicative
type of the sentence. E.g. “You have a personal objection to her” (falling tone –
statement; rising – general question). “Remove the luggage” (falling tone – order;
rising – polite request). It is seen from these examples that intonation alongside
with a sentence constitutive function performs the sentence distinctive function
simultaneously. It also has the recognitive function. Intonation can give the
sentence emotional colouring expressing joy,