AD+CELSE-MURCIA

I am sorry, but Celse-Murcia rocks. I love this book. In the first part she discusses the history of teaching pronunciation, describing superficially the methods and approaches (of ESL/EFL) used for the last two centuries and how they deal with pronunciation. For example, the author explains that exists two ways of approching pronunciation in the classroom: intuitive-imitative approach --> the students listen and try to repeat / imitate the speaker analytic-linguistic approach --> teachers use tools such as the IPA, pictures of the vocal apparatus, etc. to elicit to students how to produce the sounds; it creates methods to analyze the production of speech. It doesn't substitute the first the intuitive-imitative approach, but complements it.

Thoughout history, some approaches didn't care about pronunciation (__Grammar Translation, reading-based approaches, and Cognitive approach__), because it was not the focus, or because the belief that nativelike pronunciation is an unrealistic goal and can't be achieved. (p. 2-5) Other approaches used more frequently the intuitive-imitative approach, what is the case of __Direct Method, naturalistic methods, and Community Language Learning__. Within these methods, the pronunciation was already a concern, but not the main aim. In the __audiolingualism__ pronunciation is taught from the start, using minimal pairs, for example, and the use analytic-linguistic approach is usually effiicient. The other approach that uses analytic-linguistic approach is the __Communicative Language Teaching (or Communicative Approach__), and it mixes the intuitive-imitative approach too. The aim is communication, intelligible conversation, so attention is directed to pronunciation practices.

Some of the ways of teaching pronunciation are explained: 1- Listen and imitate 2-Phonetic training 3- Minimal pair drills 4- Contextualized minimal pairs 5- Visual aids 6- Tongue twisters 7- Practice of vowel shifts and stress shifts related by affixation 8- Reading aloud / recitation 9- Recording of learners' production As you can see, only the last two ones are useful to teach intonation, the others are more related to segmental features.

There are some excerpts from this part the maybe we can quote: "McNerney and Mendelsohn (1192: 186) express the position [of Communicative Approach towards teaching pronunciation] very clearly: '... a short term pronunciation course should focus first and foremost on suprasegmental [i.e., rhythm, stress, and intonation] as they have the greatest impact on the comprehensibility of the learner's English. We have found that giving priority to the suprasegmental aspects of English not only improves learners' comprehensibility but is also less frustrating for students because greater change can be effected in a short time."

The second part of the book is related to the segmental features (consonant, vowel systems) and to the suprasegmental features (rhythm, stress, connected speech, prominence and intonation), "being" these last two items (prominence and intonation) our focus in the essay, right? In the chapter 6, we are presented to details about prominence and intonation.

Each word has its own prominence, but in a sentence there are intonation units (or thought groups). Each intonation unit: - is set by pauses before and after - contains one prominent element - has an intonation contour of - has a grammatically coherent internal structure

Although the prominence depends in a large scale on the intention of the speaker, in a "neutral/common discourse" it is predictable as it follows: - prominence is set on the last content item (noun or adjective) in the intonation unit. - prominence is placed on new information - emphatic stress --> special emphasis on a particular element, usually new information too, but with greater degree of emphasis. - contrastive stress --> two parallel elements: "Is it a LOW or a HIGH impact aerobics class?" There are in the chapter some examples of activities to practice prominence with students, if you want examples I can write here later on.

About intonation patterns, it's shown that there are four levels of phonetic pitch or tone in English: 4-Extra High, 3-High, 2-Middle, 1-Low. In almost every intonation unit in the language, we have to general patterns of contour: raising-falling contour, or raising intonation. Examples are given to elict when we use these contours and what levels are achieved in each sample utterance:

With raising-falling contour, we have: Declarative Statements: 2-3-1 --> John is SICK. He's taken an ASpririn. WH-Question: 2-3-1 --> Who will HELp? What about JONathan? Commands and command-form requests: 2-3-1 --> Fix me some SOUp. Please add NOODles. Unfinished Statements: 2-3-2 --> She said she was aLONE (... but I'm not sure I believe her.) Unfinished Statements creating suspense: 2-3-2 --> I opened the old SUITcase (...and I found a million dollars). I told her the NEWs (... and she fainted.) Tag question eliciting agreement: 2-3-1, 3-1 --> We really ought to VIsit him, SHOULDn't we?

With raising intonation, we have: Yes-No question with question word order: 2-3 --> Have you GOT a minute? [pitch level 2 until "you", 3 until "minute" with prominence on "got"] Can I ask you a QUEStion? Open-Choice alternative questions: 2-3 --> Would you like some coffee or TEA? Yes/No questions with statement word order: 2-3 --> The plane LEFT already? Echo questions: 2-3 --> What am I DOing? I'm going SKIing. [2-3, 2-3-1 as answer to the question "what are you doing thsi weekend?"] Repetition questions: 2-3 or 2-4 --> WHAT are you doing? or You are doing WHAT? [both end in high pitch] Tag question signaling uncertainty: 2-3-2, 2-3 --> He usually arrives around NOOn, DOESn't he? ["does" prominent, but high pitch (3) until the end "he".

Other Patterns: Series intonation: 2-2, 2-3, 2-3-1 --> Bob's car needs a new TAILpipe, new SHOCKS, and a new BATtery. [pitch only goes down after "BAT".] Closed-choice alternative questions: 2-3, 2-3, 2-3-1 --> Will you be paying by CASH, CREDit card, or CHECK? [pitch only goes down after "check".] Appositive constructions: 1-2-1 --> MiTOsis, a term for CELL division, is a complicated PROcess.

In the book, the explanation of the contours is clear, beacuse they have the contour drawn, but I don't have this option here, so I may explain to you later. We can select an exercise to put in the essay as example. We can also suggest a pedagogical priority to talk about in the essay, according to our goals as a group.