Stress over Words

[George]

Why do words have accents? Couldn't we just decide with deliberation not to stress any syllables anymore? What's there to lose? And the peoples of English speaking nations then would have some less things to disagree about.

George

[terrie]

george: Why do words have accents? Couldn't we just decide with deliberation not to stress any syllables anymore?

I'm not sure I understand your question but if you are asking about the spoken word, then how could you not stress certain syllables without speaking in a monotone?

As someone who is hearing impaired that wouldn't work for me at all as inflection is sometimes the key to understanding what someone is saying...the worst is people who mumble and don't get me started on mustaches and full beards...'-}}

If I've completely misunderstood your questions, please clarify...'-}}

Terrie

[George]

Originally Posted by terrie

I'm not sure I understand your question...as inflection is sometimes the key to understanding what someone is saying.

Yeah I mean spoken language: where it all begins – pronunciation.

If the accent functions to avoid monotone, then I might ask -- why do we need rhythm? I think you’re right, that it does help hearing and understanding. But maybe, there is something more. But a sentence of one syllable words is still spoken with rhythm. Consider – The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog. The one syllable words would be spoken with rhythm. The “ver” of “over” and “lz’ of “lazy” seem to have less stress merely to ensure they are associated with the word to which they belong.

Maybe, the accent has multiple functions. It gives a word its character to a large extent -- but what is that? But the accent seems to help us identify what sounds are word units. (Canyoureadthis.) In that sense the accent might function like spaces between words in print.

If words were monotones, actually a lot of meaning would be lost, like emphasis or emotional value. Perhaps, it is accent that makes language an art. At times I’ve been struck by how well Shakespeare can precisely place strong accents. That is, I mean, syllables with a lot of sound and force. It had to be well planned on his part. But he can be so subtle, at times making language seem so natural, that is actually quite artistically arranged. I’ve always thought he knew something about accents, that the rest of us don’t know. I wonder if he had lists of types of syllables to compare their force.

George

[roaryg]

Originally Posted by George

Maybe, the accent has multiple functions.
George

I'm no linguist but I always understood that accents had more to do with the pronunciation of the sound of the letter rather than the rythm of the word. For example in french the letter e with its various accents is pronounced a different way depending on the accent, but its still a recognizably "e" type of sound.

What english words use accents anyway? I'm having a hard time thinking of any.

[George]

Originally Posted by roaryg

What english words use accents anyway? I'm having a hard time thinking of any.

I wonder if your focusing on characteristics of pronunciation, has you forgetting prominence of a syllable in pronunciation as another meaning for "accent." All words with more than one syllable have stress, called its "accent." In a dictionary, word accents are noted, with a heavy mark for primary stress, and a lighter one for secondary stress.

Maybe, your first language is French?? In that case, learning English stress can be an ordeal. I studied French for many years but gave it up. I also studied Latin but gave that up. Now I'm studying a work that is heavily dependent on Latin, and I just read one example that makes a comparison with French. I wish I wasn't so foolish in throwing away knowledge as a youth. But I shouldn't complain. I did retain other things I learned from my youth.

George

[iamback]

Originally Posted by George

I wonder if your focusing on characteristics of pronunciation, has you forgetting prominence of a syllable in pronunciation as another meaning for "accent." All words with more than one syllable have stress, called its "accent." In a dictionary, word accents are noted, with a heavy mark for primary stress, and a lighter one for secondary stress.

Stress and accent are not exactly equivalent. In tonal languages accent refers to the tone, and diacritical marks may be used (in Latin scripts like Vietnamese or Pinyin) to indicate the tone - which is quite independent from stress (still possible in tonal languages, but then it's stress for emphasis, not part of normal pronunciation).

In non-tonal languages (which is what I think you are referring to) there is always stress, but using "accent" for this can be confusing, especially when referring to non-tonal languages that use "accents" (diacritical marks) to distinguish different vowel sounds. And "accent" can also refer to a pronunciation related to a particular area or dialect. Best to use just "stress" if that's what you mean.

[George]

Originally Posted by iamback

Stress and accent are not exactly equivalent.

After all these years, I mostly just use Random House dictionary in English. I don't think I want to change from using it as my standard.

George

[iamback]

Originally Posted by George

After all these years, I mostly just use Random House dictionary in English. I don't think I want to change from using it as my standard.

Does Random House have a Chinese(-English) dictionary? If they use "accent" exclusively for English, then fine - but then when you use "accent" in the sense of "stress" you should be explicit which language you're referring to.

[George]

Originally Posted by iamback

Does Random House have a Chinese(-English) dictionary? If they use "accent" exclusively for English, then fine - but then when you use "accent" in the sense of "stress" you should be explicit which language you're referring to.

Well, I'm not going to let Random House know they got it wrong, unless they didn't intend for the entry to apply to other languages. When you informed me Eric Myer got it wrong on how to enter font types, (which I still use,) I didn't let O'Reilly know then either. However, I'm actually satisfied with how I made the post to initiate the thread, as well as my ensuing responses.

George

[Richard Waller]

It all depends on which syl-ARE-ble you place the em-PHAR-sis