TONICITY – Exceptions to LLI rule.

TONICITY- Where does the nucleus go?

(Check butgraphin a separate PDF)

* - CONTRAST is a wildcard; it overrides all other rules. So whenever there is

contrast, the nucleus will be on the contrasted material.
A: Peter invited Susan.
B: No, I invited Susan.

1- In general, the nucleus goes on the last lexical item.

I like playing tennis.

2- We tend to deaccent what has already been mentioned.

A: I watched Jurassic Park last night.
B: Oh, I hated Jurassic Park.

A) However, we do accent repeated material when the whole, or the whole of the
meaningful part, of the utterance is repeated. Echo questions are a typical example.
A: I'm having lunch.
B: You're having lunch? It's only 10:00 a.m.

B) When the material has lost focus (because we've talked about something else in
the middle), we need to reaccent it.
A: You haven't studied. That's why you don't know the answer.
B: I have studied. I spent all weekend studying. I don't know the answer, because the
question is tricky.
The focus here changed from "answer" to "studying", so “answer” had to be
reaccented.

C) Sometimes the pause is just there because the phrase is too long. In that case, the
nucleus usually goes on the last lexical item, regardless of whether it was mentioned
or not, or whether it was understood or not.
A: I'm planning to buy a house.
B: Why are you planning to buy a house|if you're leaving the country?

3- We tend to deaccent something if the context makes it clear that we are referring
to it.
[Two people looking at a painting]
A: This looks like my kid's homework.
B: Yeah, and his other paintings|are also terrible.
B here deaccents "paintings", understanding A is talking about the painting before them,
and "terrible", understanding he doesn't like it.

A) See point 2.c.

1
 TONICITY – Exceptions to LLI rule.

4- A synonym of a word already mentioned can be deaccented.

A: I've got a dog.
B: Oh, I love pets.

A) However, there are actually two types of synonyms, hypernyms and hyponyms.
The former are more general (and thus less specific) than the original word and thus
do not add meaning; accordingly, they are unaccented. The latter, however, are
more specific than the original word and thus add meaning; accordingly, they are
accented.
So:
A: I've got a dog.
B: Oh, I love pets.

But:
A: I've got a dog.
B: Oh, don't tell me it's another Poodle.

5- Vocatives are usually deaccented.

Tell me the truth, Jane.

A) They are accented, however, when they have their own chunk.
6- Final adverbials are usually deaccented.
I never went there.
A) See point 5.a.

B) They are, however, accented when the idea is incomplete without them.

7- Although most instances of idiomatic tonicity are cases where the nucleus falls on
a potentially deaccentable last lexical item (breaking either rule number 2 or rule
number 3), there are some cases where the last lexical item is deaccented1.
Now there's a thought.

8- Final verbs tend to be deaccented.

I'm getting the house painted.

A) Final infinitives are usually accented.

I'm ready to go.

A) 1- They are deaccented, however, when preceded by their object.

I have a job to do.
1
1 We could have chosen to include idiomatic tonicity as exceptions to rules number 2 and 3, but in alltruth, idioms aresimply irregular. We
could have also chosen to call it another wildcard, but the fact, mentionedabove, that most cases ofidiomatic tonicity are accented on the
last lexical item makes that really unnecessary.

2
 TONICITY – Exceptions to LLI rule.

9- Event sentences are made up of a subject followed by an intransitive verb. They

are either instances of appearance, disappeareance or misfortune, or calls for action.
They are accented on the subject.
The baby's crying.

10- Final empty words are deaccented.

I went to my mum's place.

11- Pro-forms are basically words that replace other words or concepts that have
been mentioned; (e.g. "one", "so", etc.) and thus they are usually not accented.
A: Which car do you like?
B: The blue one.

A) There are, however, 6 exceptions with the word "one":

"first one", "last one", "right one", "wrong one", "only one" and "which one".

12- Reflexive pronouns are unaccented when necessary, because in that case they
are function words.
I hurt myself.

A) They are, however, accented when they are unnecessary, because in that case
they are there for emphasis.
I did it myself.