Lesson 4: Contrastive Stress | English Phonetics for Academic Presentations

Welcome to Part 4 of a 5-part training series on phonetics for academic presentations. This research-based series covers essential suprasegmental speaking skills for multilingual presenters – skills such as stress, intonation, and vowel length.

Contrastive stress refers to how to emphasize specific words in sentences to convey your intended meaning. Research indicates contrastive stress can impact how well a speaker is understood by listeners (Jenkins, 2001).

In addition to making a big difference in comprehension, contrastive stress is also easy to learn. Watch this video to learn with me!

References:

Jenkins, Jennifer (2000). The Phonology of English as an International Language: New Models, New Norms, New Goals. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Chapter 6 Pedagogic priorities 1: Identifying the phonological core, pp 123-163.