Stress and tonality are not uniquely Chinese

Whenever I see an article about Chinese tonality or stress, I usually think about whether it also applies to my mother tongue, English.[1]

The article The importance of stress in Chinese utterances by Victor Mair (Language Log) describes a “a single sentence of seven morphosyllables spoken in seven different ways according to what the speaker wishes to emphasize.”

“Wǒ méi shuō tā tōu wǒ qián.

“我沒說她偷我錢。

““I didn’t say that she stole my money”.”

The article lists all of the ways that you can change stress in Chinese and create a different meaning. He rewords the English sentence and indicates the stress word in English as well.

However, the stressing in English can be applied to the original sentence without changing it at all.

Read the sentences out loud or in your head with stress on the bold word. The first version is unstressed and neutral, simply expressing a single thought. The subsequent sentences prioritize a different meaning by stressing a word.

• I didn’t say that she stole my money.
• I didn’t say that she stole my money. (someone else said it)
• I didn’t say that she stole my money. (I indicated it some other way)
• I didn’t say that she stole my money. (someone else stole my money)
• I didn’t say that she stole my money. (she did something else with my money)
• I didn’t say that she stole my money. (she stole someone else’s money)
• I didn’t say that she stole my money. (she stole something else)

Huh. Seven different meanings, all without changing a single letter.