How to intonate?

Question

I study English.

How should we decide to intonate a word?

For example COM puter or comPUter or compuTER

and if you say" shinkansen"(super express train),how to ?

Answer 1

What you are asking about is word stress, not intonation. Word stress in English is rather unpredictable, so the best thing to do is to mark the stress on the word in your vocabulary notes, and practise pronouncing it as you learn / revue.

Stress on computer is oOo (= three syllables, stress on the second)

If you arrange vocabulary notes with word families in groups and mark the stress (find it in a dictionary or ask a native speaker teacher) it might help you to remember it:

politics Ooo
political oOoo
politician ooOo

biology oOoo
biologist oOoo
biological ooOoo

Probably most English speakers would say 'shinkansen' as Ooo (3 syllables, stress on first) but we do have the term 'bullet train' as well.

E-mail me for more details on pronunciation if you want.

Answer 2

Intonation in any language is difficult to learn. I lived in Kagoshima for awhile and even speaking standard Japanese "hasi" and "hasi" had opposite intonations from Tokyo. So hasi was a chopstick in one place and a bridge in the other.

There are some rules for intonation that come over to us from Greek, for instance. But then we even change those,
so the best ways to learn intonation are to:

1. Use your dictionary. The intonation is written out
there for each word.

2. Find groupings of words with similar roots and
practice them.

For instance: PHO to graph
AU to graph
PHO no graph
STE no graph


Then be aware that if you add an ending the stress will
shift: phoTOgrapher
steNOgrapher

This does actually come over from the Greek where the
stress could not be on the fourth syllable from the end
of a word (it could only be on the last three).

So the accent stays on the third to last syllable in
PHO to graph and phoTOgrapher.

Because otherwise you would have PHOtographer
and the accent would be on the fourth syllable from the end.

But as you can see all these explanations are complex
and rooted in the historical development of the language,
which is why finding words that are similar and practicing them can help.

English also has a lot of exceptions, and as one answerer pointed out, there are variations between British English and American English.

Most foreigners don't know what "shinkansen" means.
It would be better to say "The Bullet Train". They all know what that means. Otherwise just pronounce it in proper
Japanese intonation and pronunciation. They will hear what they hear and mess it up anyway.

Maggie

P.S. It's comPUter. And I agree with the first responder
that listening to English is a good way to help get a gut
feel for the pronunciation/intonational patterns of the language.

Answer 3

Difficult question. You know that a lot of language is learned contextually. You knew that when you were a child- you learned grammar and vocabulary, but the sounds of the language were already in your mind. Similarly, intonation is generally one way, but can change slightly. That's where the study of phonetics is essential. There are slight differences in stress, pitch, duration (generally "intonation") when you say "George Bush lives in the White House, but my neighbor Joe lives in the white house on the corner."

Both White House and white house have similar (though not identical ) pronunciation.

But for a working suggestion, I'd pick a good online dictionary like Merriam Webster and use the link for the sound of the word.

In the example below, I've found the word "phonetics." If you click on the little speaker icon, you'll hear an unaccented voice speak the word.

This is good for one word. But as I referred to above, sometimes context changes the pronunciation of the word. Your English seems very good, certainly good enough to watch movies or television. CNN news seems ubiquitous, though a news-reader may not be your ideal person. But you're capable of finding a suitable model.

"Shinkansen" is a borrowed word. If the correct stress is on the first or second, I think English speakers would borrow it that way. We have trouble with stress on final syllables, so I'm guessing we'd not stress the last syllable. And if there is tone involved in the word, that would be completely ignored. Tone exists in English, but not at the morphemic level.

Hope I've helped you.

Answer 4

I think it depends on whether someone is a american or british, I'm british and I think our intonation is mostly on the middle syllable (comPUter, shinKANsen) or on the last syllable (penCIL) but then again not always...the best way is probably to listen to a lot of english tv or radio programs etc. until you get a feel for it.