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ESL forum >
Techniques and methods in Language Teaching > pronunciation
pronunciation
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racim
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pronunciation
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Dear all,
Do we pronunce " Could I come in ?" with a falling or a rising intonation at the end of the question . Thank you .
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12 Dec 2012
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yanogator
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Falling at the end. Stress on "I", then falling from there.
I would diagram the intonation like this:
I
come in?
Could |
12 Dec 2012
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chrissmolder
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It could be pronounced with a falling or a rising intonation. It is conventional to teach that yes/no questions (questions beginning with an auxiliary and not a question word) are spoken with a �rising � intonation.
Intonation is a very complex issue, but two common uses of it in this case might be as follows:
falling - spoken to a person who is familiar to you (a relative, friend or colleague) or inferior (an employee) and it is assumed that the answer will be �yes �
rising or fall-rise - polite, the question seems more genuine
�Come in � is a phrasal verb with an adverbial. This means that the tonic will probably be on �in � since ��in� is a content word and �come in� is the focus of the phrase/sentence. The tonic is the place where the tone usually falls or drops and then rises again. If it is rising, the intonation sometimes rises throughout the whole phrase/sentence, but with �in � as the highest and longest syllable. Again--intonation varies considerably, but these are some general tendencies of some native speakers (others may disagree!).
Sometimes a fall-rise seems like it is falling, but it does gently rise again at the end. This may be the most common type of intonation for this question, but I would have to check the research. I can recommend a great thesis on the subject if you are interested!
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13 Dec 2012
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