English Language · Lesson 15

Word stress

JAMBWAECNECO

What the syllabus asks

JAMB: Oral forms: stress (word stress and emphatic stress) and intonation

WAEC: word stress (two-, three- and polysyllabic words), stress shift between nouns and verbs, sentence (emphatic) stress, intonation (falling and rising tunes)

NECO: word stress (two-, three- and polysyllabic words), stress shift between nouns and verbs, sentence (emphatic) stress, intonation (falling and rising tunes)

What you will learn

Count syllables and identify the stressed one.
Apply the noun/verb stress rule for two-syllable pairs.
Use suffix rules to place stress in long words.
Know high-frequency words that Nigerian speakers commonly mis-stress.
Choose the word that answers an emphatic-stress question.
Identify falling and rising intonation.

Key points

Stress = louder, longer, higher pitch on one syllable; unstressed vowels often become /ə/.
Two-syllable pairs: noun first (REcord), verb last (reCORD).
-tion, -sion, -ic, -ity, -ical, -graphy, -logy: stress the syllable before.
-ee, -eer, -ese, -ette, -oon, -aire take the stress; -ment, -ness, -ful, -ly do not move it.
Stress shifts in word families: PHOtograph, phoTOgraphy, photoGRAphic.
Compound nouns stress the first part; phrasal verbs stress the particle.
Emphatic stress marks the word being corrected; the right question offers a different word there.
Falling tune: statements, commands, wh- questions; rising tune: yes/no questions, unfinished lists.

Start here: What is stress?

When we say a word of more than one syllable, one syllable stands out. It is said a little louder, longer and on a higher or moving pitch, and its vowel is said fully. That syllable is stressed. The other syllables are weaker and often reduce to the schwa /ə/.

Say water: WA-ter /ˈwɔːtə/. The first syllable is strong; the second is weak. Say begin: be-GIN /bɪˈɡɪn/. Now the second is strong.

In exam questions, the stressed syllable is written in CAPITALS: inTERpret, PHOtograph, phoTOgraphy. In dictionaries, a mark ˈ is placed before it: /ɪnˈtɜːprɪt/.

Stress matters for meaning and for being understood. Saying deSERT when you mean the dry land (DEsert) changes the word to a verb meaning "to abandon". Stressing the wrong syllable can make an otherwise good speaker hard to follow, especially for listeners outside Nigeria.

Many Nigerian languages are tone languages: pitch changes word meaning (Yoruba ọkọ́ hoe, ọkọ̀ vehicle, ọkọ husband). English uses stress instead, and every syllable does not get equal weight. Nigerian English often gives syllables more equal weight or places the stress differently, which the exam treats as non-standard.

Worked example 15.1

Show the stress and syllables in banana, hotel, Saturday.

Banana: ba-NA-na (3 syllables, second stressed). We listen for the full vowel /ɑː/.
Hotel: ho-TEL (2 syllables, second stressed).
Saturday: SA-tur-day (3 syllables, first stressed).

baNAna, hoTEL, SAturday

⚠️ Common mistake: counting letters instead of vowel sounds when counting syllables. Queue has five letters and one syllable.

Try it yourself. Mark the stress in tomato and vegetable.

Show solution

toMAto; VEGtable (usually 3 syllables: /ˈvedʒtəbl/).

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Practice questions

1. Choose the word with the correct stress (capitals show the stressed syllable).

comMITtee
COMmittee
commitTEE
COMMITtee

Show answer

A: comMITtee
Standard stress is on the second syllable: comMITtee.

2. Choose the word stressed on the FIRST syllable.

reCORD (verb)
reCEIVE
beLIEVE
RECord (noun)

Show answer

D: RECord (noun)
Two-syllable nouns usually take first-syllable stress.

3. Which word is stressed on the THIRD syllable?

eDUcative
EDucator
eduCAtion
EDucate

Show answer

C: eduCAtion
Words ending in -tion stress the syllable just before it: edu-CA-tion.

4. Which word has a different stress pattern from the others?

window
agree
table
mother

Show answer

B: agree
Agree is stressed on the 2nd syllable (aGREE); the others on the 1st.

5. Choose the correct stress: CONduct (noun) vs conDUCT (verb). In "His conduct was poor", the stress falls on

CON
DUCT
both equally
neither

Show answer

A: CON
Two-syllable nouns usually take first-syllable stress.

Key words

Syllable: A unit of sound built around one vowel sound.
Stress: Greater loudness, length and pitch on a syllable.
Primary stress: The strongest stress in a word.
Secondary stress: A weaker stress in a long word.
Stress pattern: The position of the stressed syllable, often shown in capitals.
Emphatic (contrastive) stress: Stress placed on a word to show contrast or new information.
Intonation: The rise and fall of the voice across a sentence.
Falling tune (Tune 1): Pitch drops at the end; used for statements and commands.
Rising tune (Tune 2): Pitch rises at the end; used for yes/no questions.
Suffix: An ending added to a word, e.g. -tion.
Prefix: A beginning added to a word, e.g. un-.
Compound word: A word made of two words, e.g. blackboard.

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