Syllabification as a Challenge in Speech Studies

Abstract

          The study of lexical stress demonstrates that syllables, irrespective of whether they are initially strong or weak, and whether they bear primary stress or not, may function contrastively, conveying nuances of meaning that cannot be expressed through other linguistic means. Consequently, any speaker who possesses a sufficiently clear understanding of the nature of the syllable can distinguish any syllable within a word or phrase by freely manipulating the relative values of the principal syllabic parameters. The material shows that these contrasts play an important role in interpersonal communication.

        Both in literary discourse and in various forms of intellectual communication, phonesthemic and morphological repetitions within words are clearly perceived primarily through the emphasis of the corresponding syllables. These syllables form such an indispensable reality of spoken interaction that speakers may abstract away from the linguistic significance of phonesthemes or from established rules of morphological segmentation, thereby “playing” with phonetically similar yet semantically incompatible and indivisible words. In English, the essence of these principles is reduced to a single, most significant feature: the strong attachment of a consonant to the preceding vowel, resulting in the prevalence of closed syllables.

         It is obvious that our aim is to improve the effectiveness and productivity of teaching the system of English syllabification. It is important for us to identify the dominant tendencies and concentrate on the most essential aspects of English pronunciation. Therefore, the question of establishing the exact location of syllable division is of secondary importance to us.