To speakers of many other, more "flat"-sounding languages, English speech can sound sound rather melodious and varied in its delivery. Learners of English are often especially surprised by how "exaggerated" Americans make some of their words appear! One of the main reasons behind this is syllable stress.
Syllable stress means that some syllables in English are pronounced louder, longer, and higher in pitch than others. The vowel in a stressed syllable is always pronounced fully and never reduced to the neutral vowel "schwa" (see: Content and Function Words).
Take these two words: (noun) and contract (verb). The main difference in how they sound difference is that the stress, or the "beat" of the word, falls on the first syllable of contract, and the second one of contract.
Every word in English that is two or more syllables in length will have one of its syllables stressed. Take a look at some examples below:
- Bigger (2 syllables, first stressed)
- Hotel (2 syllables, second stressed)
- Enterprise (3 syllables, first stressed)
- Important (3 syllables, second stressed)
- Uncompromising (5 syllables, second stressed)
In ShadowTalk's practice videos, all stressed syllables are underlined. Make sure to emphasize them by saying them a little bit louder, longer, and higher in pitch than the rest.
💡Learn next: Content and Function Words, or how certain words do not receive any stress at all!
💡Learn more: learn about secondary stress (not marked in this version of the app.)