美語口音訓練第一冊第17課

Exercise 1-10 individual practice.

Now let’s see what you can do with the same sentence just by changing the stress around different words. I’ll tell you which meaning to express. When you hear the tone, say the sentence as quickly as you can. Then I’ll say the sentence for you. To test your ear, I’m going to repeat the sentences in random order. Try to determine which word I am stressing. The answers are given in the printed sheet but don’t look unless you really have to. Here we go.

1.Indicate that he borrowed the money and didn’t steal it.

I didn’t say he stole the money, maybe he just borrowed it.

2.Indicate that you deny having said that he stole it.

I didn’t say he stole the money. That’s not true at all.

3. Indicate that you think he stole something besides money.

I didn’t say he stole the money. He may have taken some jewelry

4. Indicate that you are not the person to say it.

I didn’t say he stole the money. Someone else said it.

5. Indicate that you don’t think that he was the person who stole it.

I didn’t say he stole the money. I think someone els took it.

6. Indicate that you didn’t say it out right, but did suggest it in some way.

I didn’t say he stole the money. I only suggest the possibility.

7. Indicate that he may have stolen a different amount of money.

I didn’t say he stole the money. But rather some other money.

Overdo it. Practise these sentences on your own. Really exagerate the words you think should be stressed. In the beginning, you are going to feel that this is ridiculous. Nobody stresses this hard. Nobody talks like this. People are going to laugh at me. Yet as much as you may stress, you are probably only going to stress about half as much as you should. Pause the CD and practise the sentences ten times. Another reason you must over-exagerate is because when you get tired, emotional, or relaxed, you’ll stop paying attention. When this happens, like a rubber band, you’ll snap back to the way you originally were sounding 10%. So if you just stretch yourself to the exact position where you ideally want to be, you’ll go back almost completely to the old way when you relax. For practice then, stretch yourself far beyond the normal range of intonation, 150% or so. So when you relax, you’ll relax back to a standard American sound 100%. We all do it. Possibly about this time you are thinking, “well, maybe you do this in English, but in my language, I just really don’t think we do this!” I’d like you to try a little exercise.