| When confronted with polysyllabic words the wise man;
a) counts the syllables b) identifies the stressed syllable |
Quand il est confronté à des mots polysyllabiques, le sage;
a) compte les syllabes b) identifie la syllabe accentuée |
|
| But where is the stress? Not always an easy question to answer. | Mais où est l’accent tonique ? Pas toujours facile d’y répondre. | |
| Here are some words we can make stress rules about.
Where is the stress in each case? (on, before or after which syllable?) |
Voici quelques mots pour lesquels on peut énoncer des règles d’accentuation.
Où est l’accent tonique dans chaque cas ? (sur, avant ou après quelle syllabe ?) |
Exercise 1: Stressed syllables
- problematic / diplomatic / automatically / hypothetical
- typical / topical / tropical
- deficiency / proficiency / efficient
- employee / trainee / interviewee
- recommendation / distribution / unconditional / completion
- ambiguous / deciduous / impetuous / obvious
- instantaneous / simultaneous / extraneous
- actually / eventually / residual
- commercial / specially
- diversify / specify / clarify
- retina
- evolved
Exercise 2: “Syllabic trips”
| This is my term for those words which are identical in French, to within one (sometimes two) syllable(s) | C’est mon terme pour des mots identiques en anglais à une (parfois deux) syllabe(s) près. | |
| Do these words (all easily identifiable) have one more or one less syllable than their French near equivalents? (and where is the stress?) | Est-ce que ces mots (tous facilement identifiables) comportent des syllabes en moins ou en plus que leurs équivalents en français ? (et où est l’accent tonique ?) |
- theoretical
- femininity
- investment
- approximately
- presenters, programmers
- dilation
- compartment, government
- results
- change, exam
- empiricism
- retina
- evolved
STRESSFUL STRESS