Chunking the grammar

As we have just seen, the speaker has considerable discretion over the size and therefore the number of intonation phrases into which to divide the spoken message. Nevertheless, there are some strong tendencies exerted by the grammar over tonality. Some components of syntactic structure are more likely than others to be made into separate IPs, set off by intonation breaks.

First, there is normally an intonation break at every sentence boundary. This is a major break (||), more important than the intonation breaks within sentence:

A second basic rule is that each clause tend to be said as a separate IP. So if a sentence consists of several clauses, there will usually be an intonation break at each clause boundary:

In general, the speaker can insert an intonation boundary anywhere where it will make the grammatical structure clearer. An intonation boundary signals a boundary between syntactic constituents. In the next example, version (i), pronounced as a single IP, is ambiguous:

This can mean either "his gaze was directed up the street" (like _he was gazing up the street_, where _up_ is preposition) or "he was searching for the street in the list" (like _he was looking up the name_, with _look up_ as a phrasal verb). The speaker can resolve ambiguity by placing an intonation boundary as appropriate, (ii) or (iii): In a very mannered version, however, with intonation boundaries in both places, the ambiguity returns: If a new sentence involves a change of grammatical subject, the subject (particularly if it's not a pronoun) tends to have its own IP:

There is usually an intonation break between coordinate clauses:

If, however the subject of coordinate clauses is ellipted, there is usually no intonation break:

Where the object or some other complement is ellipted, again there is usually no intonation break after the first verb, providing the subject is unchanged:

Inserting an intonation break in the last example would suggest reading with no ellipted object: In coordinate clauses with different subjects and verbs but an ellipted object, as in the next example, an intonation break after each verb is virtually compulsory:

The structure here is that Mary prepared a delicious meal, and we've all just eaten it. The NP a delicious meal is the object of both verbs.

Simple structures like the following count as a single clause, and are usually said with a single IP.