Of course, as regards phrasal fluency it isn't just a matter of pauses.  Ask
students to say sentences with restrictive and non-restrictive adjective
clauses in them:  they will find that the restrictive are said, not only
with no pauses at start and finish, but also at the same pitch and volume as
the rest of the sentence, whereas the non-restrictive will not only have
pauses but also be pitched at a lower note and lower volume than the rest of
the sentence, being marginally of less importance than the main clause.

Try it now with

'The professor who had a bald head came in.' [restrictive -- his bald head
picking him out from the rest of the professors -- roughly same pitch
throughout, except for following the general rise and fall of the whole
statement]

and

'The professor, who had a bald head, came in.' [non-restrictive -- only one
professor being focused on in the context -- adjectival clause at lower
pitch and volume]

The voice goes down and up again.  It is a nice illustration of how
punctuation appears in speech -- since the students do this unthinkingly,
they already have a clue in their own heads as to where to put commas in.
The same applies to noun phrases in apposition ('The professor, a tall man,
. . .' ) and adjectival phrases after a noun ('The ship, listing and out of
control, . . . ')

 The same is true of hyphenated words.  If any of them miss hyphens out, you
can prove that they put them in when they speak.  Ask them to say 'a
half-baked pie' -- 'baked' is said at a lower pitch, clearly to ensure that
'half' doesn't get attached to 'pie' but to 'baked'.  I ask them "Which
would you rather have -- 'a half-baked pie' or 'a half baked pie'?"--
obviously the latter (no change of pitch, or even a slight raising of it for
'baked', for emphasis)!

Edmond


Dr. Edmond Wright
3 Boathouse Court
Trafalgar Road
Cambridge
CB4 1DU
England

Email: [log in to unmask]
Website: http://people.pwf.cam.ac.uk/elw33/
Phone [00 44] (0)1223 350256

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