Phonostylistics.

Plan.
1. The Problems of Phonostylistics. Phonostylistics as a branch of phonetics.
2. Extralinguistic situation and its components.
3. Style-forming and style-modifying factors.
4. Classification of phonetic styles.
5. The phonostylistic analysis of the text.

1. The Problems of Phonostylistics. Phonostylistics as a branch of phonetics.

Pronunciation is by no means homogeneous. It varies under the influence of numerous
factors. These factors lie quite outside any possibility of signaling linguistic meaning so it is
appropriate to refer to these factors as extralinguistic.
The information about stylistic variations in learning, understanding and producing
language is directly useful for the design, execution and evaluation of teaching phonetics.
The branch of phonetics most usually applied for such information is phonostylistics.
Phonostylistics is a rapidly developing and controversial field of study though a great
deal of research work has been done in it. It would not be accurate to say that phonostylistics
is a new branch of phonetics. It is rather a new way of looking at phonetic phenomena.
Linguists were until recently not aware of this way of analysis and awareness came only as a
result of detailed analysis of spoken speech.
What gave a mighty impulse to this new way of looking at phonetic phenomena? The
point is that during the first half of the 20th century linguists have shown interest in written
form of the language and so the emphasis in language study was laid on analyzing written
speech. It is only during the last decades that the situation has changed. It may be said that it
was the invention of the tape-recorder and other technical aids that was the real turning point
in phonetics and linguistics in general. Linguists got a good opportunity of studying the other
form of language realization — spoken speech — the variety which had been largely or
completely ignored.
It is not only the absence of mechanical aids which accounts for the lack of linguistic
research that has been carried out into this variety of language and the procedure difficulty of
obtaining reliable data to investigate. There is, however, a further reason. Until quite recently
theory and research on language was based on the assumption that it is only the written form
of language realization that can serve a reliable object of investigation, while the spoken
form is not worthy of scientific analysis because it produces deviations from the literary
norm.
Nobody would want to deny the fact that spoken speech is the primary medium of
language expression. So when linguists became involved in investigating language in use
they realized that language is not an isolated phenomenon, it is a part of society. In real life
people find themselves in various and numerous situations. In these situations language is
used appropriately, i.e. people select from their total linguistic repertoires those elements
which match the needs of particular situations.
This fact changed the whole approach to the language. Rather than viewing language
as an object with independent existence, a thing to be described for its own sake, it became
evident that it must be seen as a tool, a means to an end outside itself. That end is, of course,

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communication and it is only in the context of communicative situation that the essential
properties of a linguistic system can be discovered and analyzed.
So it is taken to be reasonably obvious that much of what people say depends directly
or indirectly on the situation they are in. The nature of this dependency is fairly complicated
and it would be quite unrealistic to attempt to analyze all aspects of it.
We would like to point out two things that matter for the description that follows and
stand out clearly. On the one hand, variations of language in different situations it is used in
are various and numerous, but, on the other hand, all these varieties have much in common
as they are realizations of the same system. That means that there are regular patterns of
variation in language, or, in other words, language means which constitute any utterance are
characterized by a certain pattern of selection and arrangement.
The principles of this selection and arrangement, the ways of combining the elements
form what is called "the style". Style integrates language means constructing the utterance,
and at the same time it differentiates one utterance from another.
It must be noted that the category of style is not new in linguistics. The branch of
linguistics that is primarily concerned with the problems of functional styles is
called functional stylistics. Stylistics is usually regarded as a specific division of linguistics,
as a sister science, concerned not with the elements of the language as such but with their
expressive potential.
It has been suggested that a functional style can be defined as a functional set of
formal patterns into which language means are arranged in order to transmit information. A
considerable number of attempts have been made in recent years to work out a classification
of functional styles. But in spite of this fact it is still an open question in linguistics. In other
words, there is no universal classification that is admitted by all analysts.
This fact can be accounted for by the following reasons. Language events take place in
situations. The factors that determine the usage of certain language means are quite
numerous and various. Their interdependence and interconnection are of complex nature.
Consequently it is difficult to decide which of the factors are of primary importance and
should be considered the most reliable criterion.
In addition, language as a means of communication is known to have several
functions. In the well-known conception suggested by academician V. V. Vinogradov, three
functions are distinguished, that is the function of communication (colloquial style), the
function of informing (business, official and scientific styles) and the emotive function
(publicistic style and the belles-lettres style). Classification of this kind actually reflects
some of the aspects of stylistic phenomena. However, the criterion of distinguishing styles
does not seem accurate enough. It is obvious that what is called the emotive function is the
general task of literature but not of style. Besides, the language of fiction should not be
treated on the same footing with the functional style of a language.
The other two above-mentioned functions cannot serve as a basis for distinguishing
functional styles because there is no simple correspondence between the function and the
style. For example, scientific style is used not only for informing people but also for
communication of scientists in discussions, talks, speeches and so on. Colloquial speech, in
its turn, always combines those two functions. What is to be taken into account here is the
difficulty of distinguishing those two functions, which is one of the basic problems. In fact
communication is the process of exchanging information. The actual difference between

2
communicating and informing can be marked primarily in a dialogue — monologue
opposition.
There exist various classifications of functional styles. The terms that are most-
commonly dealt with are: scientific style, publicistic style, business style, belles-lettres style
and colloquial style. The latter functions predominantly in everyday oral speech, though
most scholars share the opinion that there is no simple correspondence between the styles
and the forms of language realization.
We should note here that in the process of studying the characteristics of functional
styles phonetic level of analysis has been completely ignored.
However, nobody would want to deny now that oral speech has its own specific
characteristics and the quality of various forms and kinds of oral speech is by far larger than
in written speech. So it is quite clear that description and comparison of all these variations is
a matter of severe complexity as, on the one hand, each form is specific and, on the other
hand, there are regular patterns of partial likeness between them. Now one thing is evident,
that the sets of phonetic style-forming features do not correspond to functional styles in pure
linguistic approach. They are characterized by different qualities.
We have mentioned above that certain nonlinguistic features can be correlated with
variations in language use. The latter can be studied on three levels: phonetic, lexical and
grammatical. The first level is the area of phonostylistics.
Summarizing, we may say that phonostylistics studies the way phonetic means are
used in this or that particular situation which exercises the conditioning influence of a set of
factors which are referred to as extralinguistic. The aim of phonostylistics is to analyse all
possible kinds of spoken utterances with the main purpose of identifying the phonetic
features, both segmental and suprasegmental, which are restricted to certain kinds of
contexts, to explain why such features have been used and to classify them into categories
based upon a view of their function.
2. Extralinguistic situation and its components.

Before describing phonetic style-forming factors it is obviously necessary to try to

explain what is meant by extralinguistic situation. We should note here that if a systematic
exhaustive and ultimately realistic view of phonostylistic differentiation of oral speech is to
be attained an orderly analysis of the communicative extralinguistic situation appears to be
mandatory. The analysis shows that it can be defined by three components, that is purpose,
participants, setting. These components distinguish situation as the context within which
interaction (communication) occurs. Thus a speech situation can be defined by the co-
occurrence of two or more interlocutors related to each other in a particular way, having a
particular aim of communicating, communicating about a particular topic in a particular
setting.
Firstly, a situation is connected with the purpose and the topic of the communication.
For us purpose can be defined as the motor which sets the chassis of setting and participants
going, it is interlinked with the other two components in a very intricate way. The purpose
which is of interest to us here directs the activities of the participants throughout a situation
to complete a task. Such purposes can be viewed in terms of general activity types and in
terms of the activity type plus specific subject matter.

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 There appear to be a considerable number of quite general types of activities, for
example: working, teaching, learning, conducting a meeting, chatting, playing a game, etc.
Such activity types are socially recognized as units of interaction that are identifiable.
It is reasonable to assume that activity types available to members of a society are not simply
random lists of all possibilities but are organized into clusters of activities that seem to be of
the same order. So we might suggest that academic activities such as university lecturing,
high-levelled school teaching, scientific reports, discussions, etc. as related to activity types
are opposed to other groups of activity types, such as, for example, casual chat, whether of
dentist and patient to schoolmates or neighbors. (One of the bases of such an opposition
might be the degree of spontaneity or degree of preparedness of speech that would reveal
clusters of pronunciation markers.)
It should be noted that activity type alone does not give an adequate account of the
purpose in a situation. It only specifies the range of possible purposes that participants will
orient toward in the activity but not which specific one will be involved. People do not set
out to lecture or to chat on something, they intend to lecture on physics, or literature, or art,
to chat on weather or a book they have read. The notion of purpose requires the specification
of contents at a more detailed level than that of activity type. This we shall call "subject
matter" or "topic" and we shall assume isomorphy between subject matter of the speech
activity and topic of speech ignoring such situations when, for example, participants might
be cooking while chatting about their work. But we should like to point out here that subject
matter, in large part, will determine the lexical items encountered, the pronunciation being
very slightly affected. That is why when the study of functional variants of pronunciation is
concerned it is activity types that form the notion of the purpose of communication.
Now let's consider another component of situation that is participants. Speech varies
with participants in numerous ways. It is a marker of various characteristics of the individual
speakers as well as of relationships between participants. Characteristics of individuals may
be divided into those which appear to characterize the individual as an individual and those
which characterize the individual as a member of a significant social grouping. The
individualistic characteristics are not a primary focus of this volume. So let us turn our
attention to social relationships. The taking on of roles and role relations is commonly
confounded with settings and purposes. When Dr. Smith, for instance, talks like a doctor and
not like a father or someone's friend it is likely to be when he is in a surgery or a hospital and
is inquiring about the health of a patient or discussing new drugs with a colleague. Such
confounding may well be more true of occupational roles than of non-occupational roles
such as strangers or friends, adults or older and younger children, etc.
Usually age of participants is also an important category for social interaction. Among
other things age is- associated with the role structure in the family and in social groups, with
the assignment of authority and status, and with the attribution of different levels of
competence. The speech behavior of a person not only conveys information about his or her
own age but also about the listener or the receiver of the verbal message. Thus, old people
speak and are spoken to in a different way from young people. For instance, an elderly
person usually speaks in a high-pitched voice, people generally use higher pitch-levels
speaking to younger children.
There is another factor, which is included into the "participants" component of a
speech situation. That is the sex of the speaker. Sex differences in pronunciation are much
more numerous than differences in grammatical form. For instance, there is a consistent
4
tendency for women to produce more standard or rhetorically correct pronunciation which is
generally opposed to the omission of certain speech sounds. Girls and women pronounce
the standard realization of the verb ending in -ing (reading, visiting, interesting) more
frequently than boys and men who realize -in (readin, visitin, interestin) more often; female
speakers use a more "polite" pattern of assertive intonation ('Yes. Yes, I ˎknow.) while male
speakers use a more deliberate pattern (ˎYes. ˎYes. I ˎknow.); women tend to use certain
intonation patterns that men usually do not (notably "surprise" pattern of high fall-rises and
others).
It should be noted here that the capacity of phonetic means to realize sex differences is
undoubtedly of immense importance and interest. But further clarification of rather intricate
questions can only come from more observations of living speech and would naturally
require a detailed examination of a much larger corpus.
Talking about "participants" component we should add one more characteristic that
needs consideration. That is the emotional state of the speaker at the moment of speech
production which is likely to reveal pronunciation markers which would be a fascinating
problem of research.
The last component we have to consider is called setting, or scene. It is defined by
several features. The first of them is a physical orientation of participants. This is to some
extent determined by the activity they are engaged in; thus in a lecture the speaker stands at
some distance from and facing the addressees whereas in a private chat they are situated vis-
a-vis each other. It is quite obvious now that speech over an intercom and speech in face-to-
face communication is obviously phonologically distinguishable in a number of ways.
Scenes may be arranged along dimensions: public — private, impersonal — personal,
polite — casual, high-cultured — low-cultured, and many other value scales. In large part
these diverse scales seem to be subsumed — for participants as well as analysts — under one
bipolar dimension of formal — informal. The kind of language appropriate to scenes on the
formal or "high" end of the scale is then differentiated from that appropriate to those on the
informal or "low" end. From the acquaintance with English we can speculate that such
differentiation follows universal principles, so that high forms of language share certain
properties, such as elaboration of syntax and lexicon, phonological precision and
rhythmicality, whereas "low" forms share properties including ellipsis, repetition, speed and
slurring. If this is so we may expect pronunciation features to be markers of the scene or at
least of its position in the formal — informal dimension.
3. Style-forming and style-modifying factors.

We have attempted to show what is generally understood by an extralinguistic

situation and what components may be considered as its constituents. It is, perhaps, easy to
see how numerous the main factors determining variation in language usage are. What we
are interested in here is variations of phonetic means. A framework for understanding and
describing them has to deal with the constant and decisive features of the situational
circumstances of language event that are relevant for phonetic level of analysis. It would be
true to say that this problem was given a good deal of attention and there is a lot of data
obtained with the help of special investigation. It allows us now to single out, a number of
factors which result in phonostylistic varieties. They are:
1) the purpose, or the aim of the utterance;
2) the speaker's attitude;
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3) the form of communication;
4) the degree of formality;
5) the degree of spontaneity (or the degree of preparedness or the reference of the oral text to
a written one).
It should be mentioned right here that the purpose or the aim of the utterance may be
called a phonetic style-forming factor. All other factors cause modifications within this or
that style and that is why may be referred to as style-modifying factors.
There is one more thing that should be pointed out here. All these factors are
interdependent and interconnected. They are singled out with the purpose of describing
phonetic phenomena so that to give a good idea of how the system works.
Now we shall try to consider each of the above-mentioned factors and to explain what
sort of phonetic variations may correlate with each of them.
The first factor we should consider is the purpose of the utterance and the subject
matter. As was mentioned earlier, we should assume isomorphy between these two
constituents. As the subject matter in large part determines the lexical items, it is the aim of
the utterance that affects pronunciation. So in this respect the aim could be spoken of as the
strategy of the language user and so it may be called a style-forming factor. On the phonetic
level there are variations related to describe what language is being used for in the situation:
is the speaker trying to persuade? to exhort? to discipline? Is he teaching, advertising,
amusing, controlling, etc.? Each of the above-mentioned variants makes the speaker select a
number of functional phonetic means with the purpose of making the realization of the aim
more effective. In terms of phonostylistics we may analyse various phonetic ways of
reflecting the speaker's purposive role in the situation in which the text occurred.
Another extralinguistic factor most often referred to is the speaker's attitude to the
situation or to what he is saying or hearing. It is common knowledge that a communicative
situation is part of a human being's everyday life situation. So it is natural for a language user
to consider the situation from his point of view, revealing his personal interest and
participation in what he is saying. The thing he is talking about may satisfy him or not, may
please him or not, may elicit his positive or negative response, his emotions. This factor
forms a complex bundle with another characteristic feature of oral speech. It is no new
notion that any oral text is addressee-oriented. This means that the listener is always
concrete, no matter whether communication takes place in public or private atmosphere. This
factor can well be said to greatly differ oral form of language realization from its written
form. In sum, this factor can be considered a relevant feature of oral speech. It’s most
common linguistic realization is intonation varieties which can be numerous like varieties of
attitudes and emotions an individual can express in various life situations. Concluding we
might say that subjective colouring of oral speech is one of its most integral characteristics.
Considering the form of communication we should say that nature of participation in
the language event results in two possible varieties: a monologue and a dialogue. It should
be mentioned here that a distinction between a monologue and a dialogue is a fairly
conditioned one but we note this distinction for a number of reasons.
Monologuing is the speaking by one individual in such a way as to exclude the
possibility of interruption by others. Dialoguing (conversing) is speaking in such a way as to
invite the participation of others. It is quite possible for one person to communicate with
another and to be the only speaker. Similarly two people can monologue at each other.
Monologuing is taken to be the user's medium relationship in those speech situations in
6
which the other people present do not join in or at least are not meant to, except, perhaps, to
show approval or disapproval. From the linguistic point of view only one feature is
considered to be relevant, i.e. the length of the utterance. Monologues are usually more
extended. They are also characterized by more phonetic, lexical and grammatical cohesion.
This means that monologues usually have more apparent continuity and self-containedness
than conversation. Phonetic organization of either of the two varieties cannot he analogical
since each kind is characterized by specific usage of language means of all the three levels.
If we look upon a dialogue and a monologue from psycholinguistic point of view it turns out
that the latter are more complex units. It can be proved by the fact that people who find
themselves abroad learn dialoguing quite easily, while monologuing requires special training
even in the native language. There are a lot of people who use their native language while
dialoguing quite adequately but who fail to produce an extended utterance in case they are
supposed to.
Among the social factors determining the usage of stylistic means it is the formality
of situation which is very often referred to.
It is obvious that the process of speaking is very often a recognition of social roles and
relationship. The interaction of individuals depends upon their learning and accepting the
roles of social behaviour. A certain individual may possess a certain rank in an organization
which entitles him to be addressed in a certain fashion by his subordinates, in another way by
his equals and in a third way by his superiors. So to come to terms with how roles and
relations are realized in language we speak of formality of discourse. Formality reflects
how the addresser (the speaker) interacts with the addressee (the listener). The relationship is
the situational category, the extralinguistic reality.
Formality results from mutual relations among participants in language events. When
the relationship is considered on the personal axis, variations ranging from extreme degrees
of formality to extreme degrees of informality are relevant. So we might say that spoken
language shapes relationships, it defines and identifies them, and it is the category of
formality which marks speaking "the right" kind of language.
Considering a communicative situation from the point of view of sociolinguistics we
would have to admit that it makes the language user realize the importance and necessity of
stylistic demands for his language consciousness. So the dichotomy formal — informal
(official — unofficial) can be understood here as the absence or presence of socially realized
necessity to follow certain rules while generating an utterance. Informal communication does
not make the speaker use obligatory forms, it allows using them. In discussing this factor we
have to admit that the category of formality is generally included into the set of style-
differentiating factors applied. It suggests that a language user possesses the ability to speak
in different styles. It is the case with people whose professions are highly verbal ones. Such
people usually have a very cultural background. In the opposite case the linguistic behaviour
of a speaker in a formal situation does not differ from his behaviour in an informal situation.
The influence of this factor upon the phonetic form of speech is revealed by variations of rate
of articulation. So we might say that the variable along which styles of speaking differ is
mainly sounds. In a formal situation the language user tends to make his speech distinct,
thorough and precise. His conscious attention to the form of production makes him choose
the full style of pronunciation. The notion of the appropriateness of speaking slow enough is
presumably part of the cultural code which insists that it is rude to talk fast and less explicit
in such situation. In an informal situation he would prefer less explicit and more rapid form
7
because this form would be more appropriate and would function efficiently as a mode of
communication.
It would be a vast oversimplification to assume that there are only two varieties of
pronunciation. There are, certainly, many more of them. Indeed there is an infinite number
and they have no definable boundaries, each merges imperceptibly into the next.
The two polar varieties that have been mentioned above illustrate the role of degree of
formality as an extralinguistic category.
We should point out here that there is another factor which is very often referred to as
the one related to degree of formality. What we mean is the quantity of addressees. This
factor determines the distinction of public and non-public oral texts. Speech is qualified as
public when a speaker is listened to by a group of people. Non-public communication occurs
in face-to-face situations. It would be fair to mention that there are no direct correlations
between the formality of situation and public — non-public character of presentation.
Linguistic realization of the formality on both segmental and suprasegmental levels is
very important for a student of another language. He brings to his learning task all the habits
and knowledge of his mother tongue and his culture. Learning a foreign language involves
suspending these and acquiring others. The student, however, will often continue to interpret
situations as he would in his own culture. In other words his grasp of formality of situation is
incomplete. He may often have a formal way and perhaps a relatively informal one but he
may not know the gradation in between the extremes. The result may be an un-appropriate
usage of intonation structure with the wrong meaning. For example, in English Good-
bye! pronounced with a low falling tone sounds fairly rude, while rising tone makes it
neutral.
Analyzing extralinguistic factors we should add some more to the above-mentioned
ones. They are: the speaker's individuality, temporal provenance, social provenance,
range of intelligibility, sex and age of the speaker. The first thing to know about them is
that they are incidental concomitant features. They are characteristic of a language user and
cannot vary, with very little exception, like all the above-mentioned ones. So they are not
deliberately chosen by the speaker at the time of text production, though they may very well
serve as his identifying features, thus from this point of view they may be considered in-
formative.
One of the most important style-modifying factors is the degree of spontaneity. So if
we examine the situations in which people speak rather than write from the point of view of
psychology we can distinguish between those in which they are speaking spontaneously as
opposed to those in which they are speaking non-spontaneously as the actor and the lecturer
are most often doing. The types of speech situations which lead to spontaneous speech
include classroom teaching, television and radio interviews, sporting commentaries on radio
and television of an event actually taking place, conversation between experts in a particular
field of everyday conversations. We should realize, of course, that between two poles of
spontaneity there are a number of more delicate distinctions. For example, the sporting
commentator has studied notes and has described this sort of thing before; the people whose
professions are highly verbal ones such as the journalist, the politician, the teacher, the
lawyer and the stage entertainer become accustomed to producing spontaneous texts and are
very often called upon to speak spontaneously about the same area of experience. This
means that although they have no written text in front of them there are elements of
preparation and repetition in their speaking performances which give them some of the
8
characteristics of written modes. These characteristics are most clearly identified at the
phonetic level of analysis.
If an utterance is qualified as fully spontaneous from linguistic point of view it means
that its verbal realization is taking place at the moment of speaking, though, of course, it
could be thought over in advance. There are situations where this kind of speech activity is
not possible. The reason that accounts for that results from three things: a) the utterance is
too long to be remembered because, as we know, there are memory constraints; these are
utterances produced in the form of lectures, reports, etc.; b) the time of the speaker is limited,
so the message has to be conveyed without any hesitation; for example, news over the radio
and TV; c) the speaker is realizing somebody else's utterance, for example, reading a piece of
prose, quoting, etc. In the above-mentioned cases the utterance or rather its verbal realization
is prepared in advance, i.e. written on a sheet of paper. This script version is used at the
moment of production — it is read. This type of presentation is qualified as fully prepared.
The speaker may use the written variant just to help himself remember the logic succession
of the uttered contents. In this case the speech is also fully prepared. In either of the above-
mentioned cases a written text was made with the purpose of being produced orally. It serves
as a means of optimization of the process of transmitting the message. This kind of written
text should be distinguished from literary written texts which are not to be read aloud though
such possibility is not completely excluded The latter differs from the former in fairly
specific organization of lexical and grammatical means which is one of the most important
characteristics.
Now if we look upon the degree of spontaneity as a style-modifying factor we should
admit that it has a decisive influence on the phonetic organization of an oral text. In other
words, the primary distinction that should be drawn is the distinction between two kinds of
speech activity, i.e. speaking and reading (speech without and with reference to the written
text). This distinction is included by most phoneticians into the set of influencing factors no
matter what aspect of speech is analyzed. Actually the two kinds of oral texts differ quite
considerably in the way the phonetic means of the language are used. If we want to describe
the difference we would have to admit this is where phonetics overlaps with
psycholinguistics, a new interdisciplinary subject.
Psycholinguistics as a distinct area of science developed in early sixties of the 20th
century though the contact of linguistics and psychology is known to have lasted for more
than a hundred years. Language is considered to be an instrument of human psychics and so
information from psychology plays an important and practically useful part in the
development of linguistics.
It is true that investigation of speech cannot be carried out without considering the
structure and organization of activities due to which production and perception of speech
take place, the latter being psycholinguistics study area. Language is known to be a human
activity. Any human activity can exist in two forms, i.e. in the form of the process and in the
form of the product as the result of the process. So it is perfectly clear that it is impossible to
interpret phonetic characteristics of living speech without having an idea of the psychic laws
of speech perception and speech production.
Before we go on to describing phonetic characteristics of the above-mentioned kinds
of speech realizations we would like to give an idea, a very sketchy one, of what these two
processes are like.

9
 The point is that speaking and reading being processes of communication and varieties
of speech activity are two different psychic processes, i.e. the sounding utterance is
generated in quite different ways. When a written text is being read aloud, a reader has got a
verbal realization before his eyes, the script which has been prepared in advance either by
himself or by another person. So he need not think of what to say or rather of how to put the
ideas into words. The only thing he has to do is to make the graphic symbols sound, i.e. to
realize orally the ideas verbally expressed by means of vocabulary and grammar of the
language. Oral realization should be made according to pronunciation rules of a particular
language. Besides, if he is to read with comprehension the graphic symbols of the language
he must learn to supply those portions of the signals which are not in the graphic
representation themselves. He must supply the significant stresses, pauses and tone
sequences. In short, the reader should learn to use the phonetic means of a language to be
able to express the ideas of the written text adequately. If he has acquired this sort of habit,
psychologically he is quite sure of what he is going to produce. As a result the usage of
phonetic means is characterized by a very high degree of regularity. Melodic, temporal,
rhythmic organization of the text is even; pauses are made at syntactical junctures within and
between the sentences. The text sounds loud and distinct (both sounds and intonation are
meant).
While spontaneous speech is taking place (when no notes are used) the process of
psychic activity consists of two equally important items, i.e. a) the process of searching
(remembering) information and the ways of expressing it verbally and b) the process of
giving (transmitting) information. The speaker has got an intention to express some ideas
and he should choose an adequate linguistic form to express these ideas and in this way to
generate the utterance.
Naturally the psychic mechanisms of generating the spoken utterances are quite
different. Consequently, phonetic means of the language are also used differently, the
difference being the marker of the form of speech activity.
Analyzing most important characteristics of a spoken spontaneous text we should first
of all mention a phenomenon called hesitation. The point is that while generating a text a
speaker has no time or rather not enough time to make sure of the correct form of the
expression he has chosen, because he is simultaneously planning what he is going to say next
and also monitoring what he is saying. The wording is taking place simultaneously with
pronouncing. Consequently, the speaker hesitates. He hesitates to remember a further piece
of information, to choose a correct word, a correct grammar structure and so on. This
hesitation phenomenon breaks the regularity and evenness of phonetic form. There appear
micropauses, pauses of different length and quality which seldom occur at the syntactic
juncture; lengthening of sounds within the words and in the word final position. A
spontaneous text is characterized by a number of relevant features both on segmental and
suprasegmental levels: various kinds of assimilation, reduction, elision which manifest
simplification of sound sequences; uneven rhythm, fragments melody contour, abundance of
pauses, varying loudness (from very loud to very low), narrow range of voice, varying tempo
(from very fast to very slow).
Among the features distinguishing the two described kinds of speech realization there
is one that needs a more detailed description. That is the delimitation. In reading pauses
occur at the syntactic junctures, so an intonation group coincides with what is called a
"syntagm(a)". In a spontaneous text hesitating often prevents the speaker from realizing a
10
full syntagm(a). There may appear a hesitation pause which breaks it. so an intonation group
does not coincide with a syntagm(a). Pauses at the end of the phrase are often optional,
because the speaker does not realize the rules of phrasing, i.e. of making pauses at the
moment of speaking.
Summarizing we may say that all the above-mentioned features may be referred to as
the main phonetic markers of a spontaneous text. It should be borne in mind that phonetic
peculiarities are noticeable together with specific grammatical, mainly syntactical, structures
of the utterance.
In teaching English, especially spoken English, one should be well aware of specific
phonetic markers of living speech. They are its integral and most natural characteristics. A
student of English should be specially taught such peculiarities. Otherwise a spoken text
would sound like a read one which would be unnatural and wrong.
Summarizing briefly we may say that we have tried to describe the main
extralinguistic situational factors that make the language user choose the appropriate code of
phonetic realization of the generated text. The ones that are proposed here are not all that
need to be considered. They will, however, form a temporary framework for the description
of phonetic styles. We should point out here that their role as style-modifying factors is
different. Some of them, spontaneity, for example, play the decisive role, others, for
example, the number of listeners, seem to have less marking power. The idea that should be
realized is that in everyday life situations all of them are interconnected and interdependent
and it is normally the combination of several of them that determines the style.
We have established so far that certain non-linguistic features can be correlated with
variations of phonetic means. Now we turn to discuss what patterns of variation are
interpreted by the listener as modifying a given utterance. In other words what perceptional
characteristics of an oral text should be considered to have a style-differentiating value. Here
we should note that while comparing things or phenomena we are first of all attracted by
differentiating features while common characteristics are taken for granted.
It may be well to begin with a special voice colouring which is sometimes
called speech timber. The speaker's attitude to the communicative situation, to what he is
saying, the relationships of the partners are revealed by timber. Timber combined with non-
verbal system of communication, kinesic system, is a marker of some specific attitude, or
emotion which would be a permanent characteristic of a language user in a given
communicative act.
Delimitation is another characteristic which is commonly referred to as a style-
differentiating feature on the perceptive level. As was mentioned earlier, it is the
extralinguistic factors, mostly of psycholinguistic character, that determine the laws and pho-
netic means of delimitation. Among the latter pauses should be considered and described
independently.
There are different patterns of phonetic delimitation of an oral text. The terms most
often referred to denote fragments of speech continuum into which the whole text is naturally
divided are as follows: a phonopassage (in monologues), a semantic block (in dialogues), a
phrase, an intonation group.
A third characteristic which is usually referred to the set of style-differentiating ones is
the accentuation of semantic centres. By semantic centres we mean parts of the utterance
that have a considerable value in realization of functional utterance perspective, i.e. in
expressing the main contents of the utterance. It is for the most part intonation that permits to
11
do this. Intonation marks those parts of the utterance contrasting them to the rest of the text.
The degree of contrast can vary, the variable being the marker of the style. For example, in
spontaneous speech the contrast between accented and non-accented segments of an ut-
terance is greater than in reading, due to the fact that in speech the unaccented elements are
pronounced at a lower pitch.
In describing phonetic style-differentiating characteristics (both on segmental and
suprasegmental level) we would have to deal with a certain amount of notions such as
variations of pitch direction, pitch range, pitch level, loudness, tempo (which includes both
pauses and speech rate), rhythm and some others, the meaning of which will become clear as
the book proceeds.
Talking about style-differentiating means of phonetic level we should remember that
their usage is no aim in itself. Phonetic means of the language in interacting with vocabulary
and grammar optimize the process of realization of ideas by verbal means.
4. Classification of phonetic styles.

Now that we have described style-forming factors and style-differentiating

characteristics it seems logical enough to give a bird's eye view on the problem
of classification of phonetic styles.
It would be an oversimplification to say that there is a classification admitted by most
analysts. However, there is one thing that stands out clearly: while classifying various speech
realizations from phonostylistic point of view an analyst should single out criteria that are
different from the ones used as a basis for distinguishing functional styles of language. We
make it clear by means of an example. We might suggest that various speech realizations can
be grouped on the basis of some most general common phonetic characteristics. Thus such
speech realizations as informative reading over radio and TV, a text produced behind the
screen, lectures, reports, etc. can be grouped together since they are monologues with
reference to written texts. From the point of view of functional stylistics they are referred to
different styles: reading over the radio is qualified as a text belonging to the functional
sphere of publicistics, while a lecture is referred to scientific functional style. So we may see
that the kinds of oral texts traditionally referred to different functional styles are
characterized by common phonetic features.
There could be brought about examples of the opposite kind. Texts that are
traditionally referred to different functional styles turn out to have identical phonetic
organization. For example, the phonetic experiments carried out recently show that texts
belonging to different functional styles (an extract from prose — an extract from a guide for
tourists) read with identical pragmatic aim do not reveal any difference in phonostylistic
aspect.
Among the well-known classifications of phonetic styles we would like to mention the
following two.
One of them belongs to S. M. Gaiduchic. He distinguishes five phonetic styles: solemn
(торжественный), scientific business (научно-деловой), official business (официально-
деловой), everyday (бытовой), and familiar (непринужденный). As we may see the above-
mentioned phonetic styles on the whole correlate with functional styles of the language.
They are differentiated on the basis of spheres of discourse.
The other way of classifying phonetic styles is suggested by J. A. Dubovsky who
discriminates the following five styles: informal ordinary, formal neutral, formal official,
12
informal familiar, and declamatory. The division is based on different degrees of formality or
rather familiarity between the speaker and the listener. Within each style subdivisions are ob-
served. But as the author himself writes it is rather the principle of presenting the texts for
description and analysis because "no theory has yet created a completely symmetrical
classification of speech acts".
M. Sokolova considers the problem of classifying phonetic styles according to the
criteria described above we should distinguish so far between segmental and suprasegmental
level of analysis because some of them (the aim of the utterance, for example) result in
variations of mainly suprasegmental level, while others (the formality of situation, for
example) reveal segmental varieties. So for the sake of describing and explaining
phonostylistic varieties it seems preferable to consider each level separately until a more
adequate system of correlation is found.
The style-differentiating characteristics mentioned above give good grounds for
establishing intonational styles suitable not only for sociolinguistic research but also for the
purpose of learning and teaching a foreign language.
It might be generally assumed that there are five intonational styles singled out mainly
according to the purpose of communication and to which we could refer all the main
varieties of the texts generated in everyday communication of a modern man. They are as
follows:
1. Informational style.
2. Academic style (Scientific).
3. Publicistic style (Oratorial).
4. Declamatory style (Artistic).
5. Conversational style (Familiar).
But differentiation of intonation according to the purpose of communication only is
definitely not enough. As was mentioned above, there are other factors that affect intonation
in various extralinguistic situations.
We could add that any style with, very little exception is seldom realized in its pure
form. Each generated text is likely to include phonetic characteristics of different styles. In
such cases we talk about overlapping (fusion) of styles.
To summarize we could say that the distinction of phonetic styles is a purely formal
one because any particular theory while in use should control and give meaning to the
descriptive statement. So in this respect the suggested classification is near to adequate way
of reflecting numerous speech realizations, on the one hand, and on the other, it is the way to
understand and interpret the system. If we attempted to systematize all our observations and
account for all the options the task would prove daunting. What we need to do in teaching is
simply to call attention to the most marked features of the style ignoring the relatively stable
features.
We might conclude by saying that we hope this will be a useful piece of knowledge
for a learner because both the foreign student and the would-be teacher of English need to
develop the awareness of different phonetic styles of the language. He should be taught to
analyse and describe the speaking habits of English people. He should learn to discover the
patterns which differentiate style varieties to explain as far as possible why people speak in a
certain way and to determine what form of phonetic expression they may choose because the
style should be as natural as dress and fit the time, the place and the person. Besides he
should be able to teach other people the same things because teaching a spoken foreign
13
language means teaching the ability to communicate, the art of communication being part of
the individual's culture. It is for this reason that this textbook includes this chapter. The
chapters that follow will be based on the idea that stylistic differentiation of oral speech
cannot be ignored in teaching both a foreign language and a mother tongue.
5. The phonostylistic analysis of the text.

We would like to start the phonostylistic analysis of the reading, in which some
customs and traditions of Cambridge University life are described.

MAY WEEK IN CAMBRIDGE

(Reading)

The → most 'interesting and bizˋzare time of the year to visit ˎCambridge | is during ˎMay
Week. || This is → neither in ˌMay |, nor it is a ˎweek. || For → some ˌreason ⌇ which nobody
now re>members | ˋMay Week is the 'name 'given to the ↑ first 'two 'weeks in ˎJune |,
the →very end of the University ˋyear. |||1

The ↘paradox is ↘pleasantly ˋquaint, | but is ↘also ↘in a way ↘apt. || ↘May Week denotes 'not
so much a particular ˋperiod of ˌtime | as the ↘general 'atmosphere of rela'xation and
unˎwinding ⌇ at the → end of the year's ˎwork. |||
1
— communicative centre of a phrase.
—communicative centre of a phonopassage.

Any phonostylistic analysis falls into several steps. Obviously the first procedure will
be the description of the speech situation which comprises the purpose, setting and
participants. In reference to this text we may say that this is a descriptive narrative, the main
purpose of the reader being just to give information, it has no secondary aim which creates a
definite atmosphere of impartiality, thus the voice timbre is distinctly resonant, the speaker
sounds dispassionate and rather reserved.
The presenter of the text is a student of Oxford University who has a clear advanced
RP accent. The reading is directed to a group of students, Russian learners of English.
The next step is to define other extralinguistic factors, the degree of
preparedness among them. The analyzed text may be characterized as half prepared
or quazispontaneous as it was read through beforehand. Now to the characteristics on the
prosodic level. One should undoubtedly begin with the delimitation. The text is split into
phonopassages, then into phrases, then into intonation groups, correspondingly, the length of
pauses is varied according to the text units. Pauses are made at syntactical junctures within
the phrase and between them. However, potential syntagms are also quite common. The
relevant length of pauses makes the reading careful and distinct so that the listeners could
understand it without worrying over the meaning of a few difficult words.
Among the prosodic features we should mention the following:
Loudness is relatively stable and normal, but within phonopassage boundaries there is
a gradual decrease of it. Thus it is easy to spot the boundaries by loudness contrasts between
the final and initial intonation groups of two adjacent phonopassages. The same could be
14
said about levels and ranges: there is a distinctly marked decrease of them within the
phonopassage.
The rate of utterances is normal or rather slow, not noticeably varied. Together with
the medium length of pauses the general tempo may be marked as moderate.
The rhythm may be characterized as systematic, properly organized, interpausal
stretches have a marked tendency towards the rhythmic isochrony.
One of the main style differentiating features on the prosodic level is the accentuation
of the semantic centres. It is expressed commonly by terminal tones, pre-nuclear patterns,
pitch range and pitch level degree of loudness on the accented syllables, and also by the
contrast between the accented and non-accented segments of the utterance. In view of this
particular text we may say the following.
Terminal tones are commonly expressed by a low falling tone: occasionally expressive
high falls are used, this usage conveys the meaning directly; in non-final segments mid-level
tones and low rising ones are quite frequent:
The → most 'interesting and biˋzzare time of the year to visit ˌCambridge | is during
ˎMay Week.
Pre-nuclear patterns are not greatly varied; falling and level types of heads prevail.
Also several falls within an intonation group are typical for the reader:
The ↘ paradox is ↘ pleasantly ˋquaint | but is ↘also↘in a way ↘apt.
The contrast between accented and unaccented segments of phrases is not great, which
is known to be a marker of any reading in general; the stress is decentralized, i.e. equally
distributed on accented syllables of pre-nuclear patterns.
The Invariant of Phonostylistic Characteristics
of Informational Educational Descriptive Texts Reading
Timbre impartial, dispassionate, reserved, resonant

Delimitation phonopassages — phrases — intonational groups; pauses

are mostly at syntactical junctures, normally of medium
length but for the end of the passage

Style-marking Loudness normal (piano) throughout the text, varied at the

prosodic features phonopassage boundaries
Levels and ranges decrease of levels and ranges within the passage
Rate normal (moderate) or slow, not variable
Pauses mostly syntactical of normal length, occasional emphatic
ones for the semantic accentuation
Rhythm systematic, properly organized isochronic, decentralized
accentuation
Accentuation of Terminal tones common use of final categoric falls; in non-final segments
semantic centres mid-level and low rising tones are often used
Pre-nuclear patterns common use of falling and level heads or several fails
within one interpausal unit
Contrast between not great
accented and unaccented
segments

15