Phono-pragmatic Analysis of Intonation in Kelly McGonigal's ‘How to make stress your friend

Abstract

Intonation plays a crucial role in understanding the intended and attitudinal meaning of speech since neglecting the study of intonation in motivational discourse leads to misunderstanding some pragmatic meanings. In "How to Make Stress Your Friend," McGonigal uses intonation to serve different purposes. Thus, the present paper aims to investigate the role of intonation in conveying Kelly's intentions, attitudes and her organization of the information as being new or given. The paper is based on a mixed approach utilizing Brazil's (1997), Roach's (2009), Carr's (2013), and Cruttenden's (2014) models to account for the phono-pragmatic analysis of intonation in the selected talk. The findings revealed that Kelly used all the intonation patterns to convey her message clearly. However, the most frequently used patterns were falling, rise-fall, and falling-rising due to the nature of the talk, which is motivational. The falling and rise-falling were used to assert a strong feeling of excitement, conviction, and conclusion. The falling-rising is employed to convey emphasis and contrast. Furthermore, the falling and rising-falling are associated with the new information she introduces to her audience based on scientific studies. On the other hand, the fall-rise pattern is used to introduce information that Kelly assumes to be part of the common ground.