Sentence stress is the music of spoken English. It is what gives English its rhythm.
Sentence stress is accent on certain words within a sentence.
Most sentences have two types of word:
- content words
- structure words
Content words are the important words, the main ideas. Structure words are not so important. If you remove the structure words from a sentence, you will probably still understand the sentence. If you remove the content words from a sentence, you will not understand the sentence.
Imagine you receive this telegram message:
| Will | you | SELL | my | CAR | because | I've | GONE | to | FRANCE |
 Listen | |||||||||
This sentence is not complete. It is not "grammatically correct". But you probably understand it. These 4 words communicate very well. Somebody wants you to sell their car for them because they have gone to France.
We can add more words:
We can add more words:
| Will | you | SELL | my | CAR | because | I've | GONE | to | FRANCE |
| Listen
| |||||||||
The new words help you to understand, but the information is basically the same.
We can add more words to make one complete, grammatically correct sentence:
We can add more words to make one complete, grammatically correct sentence:
| Content Words | |||||||||
| Will | you | SELL | my | CAR | because | I've | GONE | to | FRANCE. |
| Structure Words | |||||||||
| Listen | |||||||||
In the sentence, the 4 key words (sell, car, gone, France) are accentuated or stressed.
Why is this important for pronunciation? It is important because it adds "music" to the language. It is the rhythm of the English language. It changes the speed at which we speak (and listen to) the language.
The time between each stressed word is the same.
The time between each stressed word is the same.
In our sentence, there is 1 syllable between SELL and CAR and 3 syllables between CAR and GONE. But the time (t) between SELL and CAR and between CAR and GONE is the same.
We maintain a constant rhythm on the stressed words. To do this, we say "my" more slowly, and "because I've" more quickly.
We change the speed of the small structure words so that the rhythm of the key content words stays the same.
We maintain a constant rhythm on the stressed words. To do this, we say "my" more slowly, and "because I've" more quickly.
We change the speed of the small structure words so that the rhythm of the key content words stays the same.
| syllables | |||||||||||||
| 2 | 1 | 3 | 1 | ||||||||||
| Will | you | SELL | my | CAR | because | I've | GONE | to | FRANCE. | ||||
t1 | beat | t1 | beat | t1 | beat | t1 | beat | ||||||
Adapted from www.englishclub.com
Now, practice this sentence:
I am a proFESsional phoTOgrapher whose MAIN INterest is to TAKE SPEcial, BLACK and WHITE PHOtographs that exHIBit ABstract MEANings in their photoGRAPHic STRUCture.