Speaking clearly. Improving voice and articulation: Фонетический практикум. Фомиченко Л.Г. - 28 стр.

28
rhythm or with the other. In the one kind, known as a syllable-timed
rhythm, the syllables recur at equal intervals of time — they are
isochronous. In the other kind, known as a stress-timed rhythm,
stressed syllables are isochronous. English, Russian, Arabic illustrate
this other mode: they are stress-timed languages 3.
      From the point of view of rhythm, a sense-group in English is
divided into rhythmical groups, like bars in music. There are as many
rhythmical groups in a sense-group as there are stressed syllables. A
minimal rhythmical group consists of nothing but a stressed syllable.
Most rhythmical groups consist of a stressed syllable and one or more
unstressed ones. In ordinary speech the number of unstressed syllables
between each consecutive pair of stresses varies considerably. In verse,
where a definite regularity in the alternation of stressed and unstressed
syllables is required by the metre, rhythm can be observed very easily.
      The basic rules of English rhythm that an adult learner may
find useful are as follows:
      1. The stressed syllables in a sense-group follow each other at
regular intervals of time; only in very long rhythmic groups, contain-
ing many unstressed syllables, this regularity is not strictly observed.
      2. Most non-initial rhythmic groups begin with a stressed syl-
lable; unstressed syllables occurring inside a sense-group have a ten-
dency to cling to the preceding stressed syllable, forming its enclitics;
only initial unstressed syllables always cling to the following stressed
syllable, forming its proclitics 1.
      3. The greater the number of unstressed syllables intervening
between stressed ones, the more rapidly they are pronounced.
      4. Each sense-group has a rhythm of its own, depending on the
degree of semantic importance attached to it in comparison with the
other sense-groups of the utterance.
      Listen and read the exercises. Don’t forget to divide the sentences
into rhythmic groups. Tap the rhythm.
      Exercise 1. The following word-combinations in English usually
have a full stress on each word: adjective-noun, adverb-adjective, ad-
verb-verb.
      Brown dog / sharp pen / round table / very hard / quite
pleasant / nearly finished / almost everything / fairly quick / half
__________
      1
        Gimson A. An Introduction to the Pronunciation of English. Lon-
don, 1966.; J.D. O’Connor. Better English Pronunciation. Cambridge, 1977.