Intonation and the assessment of information1

1. It is now a commonplace that one of the functions of intonation in English is to divide a discourse into ‘units of information’ and to structure these units by singling out within each one a focal part which contains what the speaker is presenting to the listener as ‘new’, in the sense of ‘newsworthy’ (Halliday, 1967; Quirk et at. , 1972; Bolinger, 1958, 1972). The remainder of the information unit (if there is a remainder - some units are all focus) is said to contain ‘given’ information. 2 According to some versions of the theory, many information units – in fact the majority of those with ‘unmarked tonicity’ (Halliday), or with the focus in the ‘neutral position’ ( Quirk et at .) – are ambiguous in structure, and the choice between two or more structural possibilities is made in accordance with the context. The principle is illustrated in the following examples, in which the A-sentences provide the context, the nuclear syllable is marked with an accent, and the focal unit is in capitals (Halliday's term for the focal unit is the ‘domain of focus’; Quirk et al. speak of the ‘new element’ or the ‘unit marked as new’)