What is a syllable stress

Table of Contents

What is a stressed syllable?

If you want to find out more about syllables in English, how to count syllables, how to divide syllables or stress in english intonation then this syllables lesson is for you.

Last week I was talking to you about rhythm and stress in english intonation and specifically how speaking in a stress timed rhythm would help you to sound much more confident and much more at ease speaking British English. So be sure to check out my channel and find out more about word stress in British English.

And as a part of the video I mentioned syllables and I said if you don’t know what a syllable was that you should go onto Google and check it out and it would give you the answer and I thought well maybe I should make you a video about syllables and so this is what I am doing and I’m gonna talk about syllables and the number of syllables in words but more importantly and more relevant how to stress those syllables in words in British English.

So here goes…

What is a syllable?

And what is a stressed syllable?

A syllable is essentially a single unit of speech and that unit of speech tends to contain a vowel sound and that may have a consonant after it or before it, it may even have what is called a cluster of consonants, which means more than one consonant before it or after it. That’s a pretty standard definition of syllable.

So for instance ‘at’ is a single syllable. It happens to be a word but it’s a single syllable word; to’, ‘if’, ‘a’, so these are single syllable words in another name for those are mono-syllabic words and here are a few more:

at
to
bit
can
bite
stack
thwart
click
our
or
are

Stressed, Unstressed, and Secondarily-Stressed Syllables

Spoken English follows a loose, rhythmic pattern of soft beats. Stressed syllables form the underlying basis of that rhythm. Unstressed and secondarily-stressed syllables are necessary off-beats that fill the space between stressed syllables in spoken English.

Stressed syllable dictionary notation / ˈ/

When a word has more than one syllable, a single syllable within the word is given more emphasis than any of the other syllables. That syllable is considered to be the stressed syllable. The vowel sound of the stressed syllable is emphasized by being pronounced longer, louder, and often at a higher pitch than the surrounding syllables. Vowel sounds of stressed syllables are more likely to be phonetic (pronounced as the spelling would suggest).

The symbol / ˈ/ is used to represent the stressed syllable of a multi-syllable word.

Unstressed syllables and schwa notation /ə/

Within a multi-syllable word, an unstressed syllable is frequently located next to a stressed syllable. Often, this vowel sound is not phonetic (not pronounced the way it is spelled), and is instead pronounced with a quick, neutral vowel sound called schwa. Because schwa is a function of syllable stress and not spelling, schwa can have almost any spelling.

In dictionary transcriptions, the vowel sound schwa is represented with an upside-down e: /ə/.

Secondarily-stressed syllable dictionary notation / ˌ /

Secondarily-stressed syllables most often occur two beats off a main stress. They are given more emphasis than unstressed syllables, but not as much as a stressed syllable. Secondarily stressed syllables are more likely to be pronounced phonetically than unstressed syllables.

The symbol / ˌ / is used to represent secondarily-stressed syllables of a multi-syllable word.

Representing syllable stress with dots:

●

• 🌑

Along with the symbols for stressed and secondarily-stressed syllables, dots are used to show the rhythm of spoken English stress patterns. A large dot represents a stressed syllable, a medium dot represents a secondarily-stressed syllable, and a small dot represents an unstressed syllable.

comˈpete
• 🌑

Words are made up of letters and those letters create syllable sounds. You can recognize a syllable by remembering that each one contains a vowel sound. For example, in the word computer, there are three syllables: com / pu / ter. The word bike, however, has only one syllable. A single syllable may contain as little as just one letter, or as many as five:

idea – i / de / a (three syllables)

cough – cough (one syllable)

In words that have more than one syllable, one syllable will be stressed. In English, there are a number of word syllable stress patterns.

Counting Syllables

You can check how many syllables a word has by putting your hand under your chin and saying a word. Each time your chin moves to make a vowel sound, count a syllable. For example, the word difficult moves your chin three times. Therefore, difficult is three syllables.

Exercise

Count the number of syllables in each of these words. Answers are below.

house
jacket
glasses
encyclopedia
employer
information
troublemaker
thought
happy
incoherent

Answers

1 (house)
2 (ja / ket)
2 (gla / sses)
6 (en / cy / clo / pe / di / a)
3 (em / ploy / er)
4 (in / for / ma / tion)
4 (trou / ble /ma / ker)
1 (thought)
2 (ha / ppy)
4 (in / co / her / ent)

Word Syllable Stress

In multi-syllable words, the stress falls on one of the syllables. The other syllables tend to be spoken quickly. This leads to sounds that are not clear (muted) on unstressed syllables. In order to improve your pronunciation, focus on pronouncing the stressed syllable clearly. However, don’t be afraid to mute (not say clearly) the other unstressed vowels.

For example:

Listen to these specific examples. Notice where the syllables are stressed:

PersonNEL
TOtally
InDUstrial
ToMAto
FanTAstic

One Syllable – Stressed

All one-syllable words have the stress on the one syllable. The intonation should go down.

Listen to the general pattern.

EAT
DRINK
SIGN
WELL