Full Description
Intonation, rhythm, and general "melody" of language are among the first aspects of speech that infants attend to and produce themselves. Yet, these same features are among the last to be mastered by adult L2 learners. Why is this, and how can L2 learners be helped? This book first presents the latest linguistic theories of intonation, in particular, how intonation functions in discourse not only to signal sentence types and attitudinal meanings but also to provide turn-taking and other conversational cues. The second part of the book examines the research in applied linguistics on the acquisition of L2 phonology and intonation. The third section offers practical applications of how to incorporate the teaching of intonation into L2 instruction, with a focus on using new speech technologies. The accompanying CD-ROM makes a unique addition in allowing for simultaneous audio playback and visual display of the pitch contours of utterances contained in the book. Users can start or stop the playback at any point in the utterance and can observe first-hand how such visual and audio representations could be useful for L2 learners.
Contents
1. Introduction; 2. Part I. Linguistic Theory: Intonation in L1; 3. 1. Intonation, suprasegmentals, prosody; 4. 2. Phonological organization of prosody: Theories of intonation; 5. 3. Meaning and function of intonation; 6. Part II. Applied Linguistic Research: Intonation in L2; 7. 4. Research agenda of the past: Structuralism and the first attempts to teach intonation; 8. 5. Research agenda for the present and future: Communicative proficiency and discourse intonation; 9. Part III. From theory to practice: Teaching discourse intonation; 10. 6. Teaching stress and rhythm; 11. 7. Teaching discourse intonation; 12. Bibliography; 13. Subject index; 14. Author index
