English Phonology M11

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Module Five:
Word Stress
Learning Activity Two: Comparing the stress patterns of BI and English
Instructional Aims:
After reading this module the students are expected to be able to:
1. identify the stress pattern of BI.
2. explain and provide examples of the location of stress in BI.
3. identify the possible location of stress in English.
4. identify factors that may affect stress assignment.

A. Learning Material
5.2.1 The Stress Pattern of BI
In this section we will explore the stress patterns of BI and English and see if there are
aspects of stress of the two languages that can be compared. We will begin with the stress
pattern of BI to find out which syllable carries the primary stress. More specifically, we will
investigate if BI has initial stress like Pintupi, or penultimate stress like Warao, or final stress
like Weri.
In order to figure out the stress pattern of BI we need to consider the following data.

A B C
basah [basa] ‘wet’ bentuk [bntuk] ‘form’ betul [btul] ‘true’
bisa [bisa] ‘able’ perlu [prlu] ‘need’ tepat [tpát] ‘precise’
busa [búsa] ‘foam’ lembu [lmbu] ‘cow’ belah [blá] ‘split’
bela [bela] ‘defend’ benda [bnda] ‘thing’ letih [lti] ‘tired’
botol [botol] ‘bottle’ sembuh [smbuh] ‘recover’ sesat [ssát] ‘lost’
daerah [daerah] ‘region’ kelenjar [kljar] ‘gland’ sedekah [sdkah]
‘alms’
istirahat [istirahat] ‘rest’ belenggu [blgu] ‘shackle’
khatulistiwa [atulistiwa] telentang [tlnta] ‘face up’
‘equator’
gemerlap [gmrlap] ‘shining’
D
puteri [putri] ‘daughter’
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karena [karna] ‘because’


isteri [istri] ‘wife’
sutera [sutra] ‘silk’

Data in group A show that stress consistently falls on the penultimate (i.e. pre-final)
syllable, while in groups B and C stress falls on the ultimate (final) syllable. What
phonological phenomena distinguish words in the groups B and C from those in the group A
that make stress fall on different syllables. Let us take a closer look at the data, particularly
the penultimate (pre-final) syllable of each word in the three groups. The fact is as follows. If
the penultimate syllable contains no schwa, stress will fall on this syllable. As we can see in A
group, no words contain a schwa. Therefore, all words are stressed on the penultimate
syllable. Words in groups B and C, on the other hand, contain a schwa on the penultimate
syllable. And they are all stressed on the final syllable. Now let us examine words in the
group D. All words in this group contain a schwa on the penultimate syllable preceded by a
non-schwa in the preceding (i.e. antepenultimate) syllable. What happens here is that stress
shifts to the antepenultimate syllable, and the schwa deletes. The final result is a word which
is stressed on the penultimate syllable. It must be mentioned, however, that words like these
are few in number.
We can then summarize the basic stress pattern of BI words as follows:
1. Stress falls on the penultimate syllable if the syllable contains no schwa.
2. Stress falls on the ultimate syllable if the penultimate syllable contains a schwa.
3. If the penultimate syllable contains a schwa and the antepenultimate syllable
contains a non-schwa, stress falls on the antepenultimate syllable, and the
schwa is deleted.
4.If the penultimate syllable contains a schwa and the antepenultimate syllable
also contains a schwa, stress falls on the ultimate syllable.
This stress rule applies to base (unaffixed) words. If a word contains an affix, a suffix
especially, which generally consists of a syllable, the stress shifts to the final syllable of the
base immediately before the suffix; consistently maintaining a penultimate stress pattern. This
is exemplified by words like: makan ‘eat’ → makanan ‘food, ibu ‘mother’ → ibuku ‘my
mother’, ambil ‘take’ → ambilkan ‘take for someone’.
Now that we have sketched the Indonesian stress pattern briefly, it is time to explore the
stress pattern of English.
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5.2.2 English Stress Pattern


Unlike Bahasa Indonesia in which the word stress can be predicted easily, English shows a
rather complicated stress pattern. This can be seen from the fact that English dictionaries
include stress in every entry. What that suggests is that learning a word must also learn how to
pronounce the word. This implies that there are no adequate phonological rules like those in
BI, which can describe the stress pattern of English. Therefore each word must be memorized
with its pronunciation including stress. As a matter of fact, stress can fall on any syllable of a
word, as depicted by the following examples.
a. Stress on the ultimate syllable:
believe, return, suggest, arrest, etc.
b. Stress on the penultimate syllable:
potato, banana, develop, handsome, cabbage, etc.
c. Stress on the ante-penultimate syllable
America, cinema, furniture, difficult, handicap, etc.
d. Stress on the pre-ante-penultimate syllable
dictionary, vocabulary, lavatory, laboratory (Am. Eng), etc.

There are several factors that can affect the placement of stress in English. The factors can
be syntactic, morphological, or phonological. The syntactic factor that affects stress
placement is the word category. For example, the following pairs of words are stressed
differently, depending upon whether they are nouns or verbs.

Noun Verb
address address
insult insult
comment comment
present present
import import
export export
increase increase
decrease decrease
permit permit
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Thus, we say: I’d like to address this letter to my sister, but I don’t have her address.
Besides syntactic factors, morphological factors also play a role on stress assignment. The
morphological elements that affect the location of stress are mostly suffixes or word endings.
Consider the following word pairs

atom atomic Canada Canadian


origin original Japan Japanese
continent continental photograph photography
melody melodious defíne definition
compose composition modify modification
terrify terrific parent parental
ambiguous ambiguity invite invitation

With respect to stress, suffixes can be classified into at least three types; neutral suffixes,
tonic suffixes, and post-tonic suffixes (Kreidler 1985). Neutral suffixes are suffixes which
have no effects on stress placement, i.e. the stressed syllable in the base word and in the
suffixed word remains the same. There are so many forms of such suffixes. Among others
are: -al, -er, -ness, -en, -y, and -ed, as in arrive - arrival, garden - gardener, happy –
happiness, sharp – sharpen, difficult – difficulty, and cover – covered.
Tonic suffixes are suffixes that carry stress. If such type of suffix is attached to a base, the
stress of the base shifts to the suffix. For example –ee and –ese (-nese) as in examine –
examinee, adviser – advisee, Java –Javanese, Japan –Japanese.
The third type of suffix is post-tonic suffixes. They are suffixes that shift stress to the
syllable immediately preceding the suffix, or the second from the suffix depending upon the
weight of the syllable preceding the suffix. Suffixes of this type are, among others,: -ic, -ics, -
ion, -ity, as in economy – economic, gymnast –gymnastics, demonstrate - demonstration,
capable-capability.
The phonological factor that may affect the location of stress is the syllable weight. As
mentioned earlier, stress tends to be attracted by prominent phonological elements (quantity
sensitivity), i.e. by heavy syllables. A syllable is called heavy if it contains a long vowel, a
diphthong, or short vowel followed by consonantal coda. For example, a verb will be stressed
on the final syllable if the syllable is heavy, otherwise it will be stressed on the pre-final (i.e.
penultimate) syllable: complete, elect, believe, permit, divide; but edit, cover, develop, worry,
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marry (keep in mind that for verbs and adjectives, a syllable with a short vowel followed by
not more than one consonant is considered light).

B. Conclusion
The stress pattern of BI can be summarized as follows. Stress basically falls on the
penultimate syllable so long as the syllable contains no schwa. If there is a schwa on the
penultimate syllable, stress falls on the ultimate syllable! The stress pattern of English is
rather complex. In English, stress basically can fall on any syllable. There are three factors
that can affect the stress placement in English; syntactic factor, morphological factor, and
phonological factor. Syntactic factor means that stress placement is sensitive to the syntactic
category of the word (for example noun or verb). Morphological factor means that stress
assignment is sensitive to the type of affix the word contains. And phonological factor means
that stress assignment is sensitive to the prominent phonological elements.

C. Exercises
1. Make a list of acronyms in BI! Examine the stress pattern of the acronyms? Is the
stress pattern the same as that of abbreviations or the same as that of ordinary words?
2. Provide lists of English words that are stressed on ultimate, penaltimate,
antepenultimate, or even pre-antepenultimate syllable. You may consult a good
dictionary.
3. Provide examples where the location of word stress is triggered by syntactic,
morphological, and phonological factors.

D. Formative Test
1. Which of the following statements is true about the stress pattern of Indonesian?
a. stress always falls on the penultimate syllable
b. stress falls on either the penultimate or ultimate syllable
c. stress can fall on any syllable
d. stress always falls on the ultimate syllable

2. In Bahasa Indonesia (BI), stress falls on the ultimate syllable if …..


a. the penultimate syllable is heavy
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b. the ultimate syllable is heavy


c. the penultimate syllable contains a schwa
d. the ultimate syllable contains a schwa
3. Which of the following statements is true about the word stress of English?
a. Stress can fall on any syllable.
b. The choicwe of stress location is either penultimate or altimate syllable.
c. Stress falls on the penultimate syllable if the ultimate syllable is heavy.
d. Stress almost never falls on the antepenultimate syllable.
4. Which of the following statements is NOT true about the factors that may affect the
location of stress in English?
a. The location of stress can be affected by the syntactic category of the word.
b. The location of stress can be affected by the kind of suffix that attaches to the
word.
c. Prominent phonological elements may also affect the location of stress.
d. The location of stress is already fixed.
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