PROSODIC PECULIARITIES OF ENGLISH STANDARD COMMANDS IN SHIPPING DISCOURSE AND IN THE FILM DISCOURSE

Abstract

The article deals with the investigation of prosodic organization of English standard commands used in two types of discourses – in the shipping discourse in the process of professional maritime communication and in the film discourse where these commands serve as elements of personages’ speech. The complex phonetic research including auditory and electroacoustic analysis based on the author’s classification of words of command has been held. Comparative analysis of prosodic peculiarities of authentic commands with the commands taken from British and American films on a maritime theme made it possible to state more vivid and diverse prosodic organization of English commands in film discourse. Maritime commands in film discourse are characterized by a larger number of Ascending, Scandent and Broken Scales, as well as a larger number of High Falling, Rising and complex terminal tones, namely the Fall-Rise and the Rise-Fall. Maritime commands in film discourse are also characterized by quickened or slow tempo unlike authentic commands which are marked by normal or slow tempo. Authentic commands unlike commands in film discourse are characterized by normal loudness compared with increased loudness in imitation. Maritime commands in film discourse are characterized by wider frequency range, higher average frequency as well as wider frequency range in terminal tones. Temporal peculiarities of maritime commands in film discourse are manifested in quicker tempo of articulation and shorter average length of pauses compared with those of authentic commands. Thus the instrumental analysis of the oral English maritime commands has proved the preliminary hypothesis that there exists a certain set of melodic, temporal and dynamic parameters capable of differentiating between authentic commands and maritime commands in film discourse.