Advances in Spoken Discourse Analysis

220 Advances in spoken discourse analysis

going, then there will be good reason for presenting either of these verbs
prominently.)
The question of which kind of reading we equate with citation is crucial
in this kind of discussion. If we take it to be either of those discussed under
(1) and (2) above, both of the examples will, indeed, have the tonic syllable
in the last content word. It is the versions that exhibit Stage 3 involvement
that display a difference in phonological treatment, a fact which arises because
the form we start with is, in fact, already determined by extra-sentential
considerations. Once this is recognized, there scarcely seems to be a problem
to wrestle with.
It is worth pointing out, in passing, another minor source of possible
confusion which arises from the way matters like this are commonly discussed:
the terms ‘citation’ and ‘citation form’ have a quite different connotation
from that which they have when used in connection with words, as, for
instance, earlier in this chapter.

ENGAGEMENT: 4

Let us now suppose that

//p it was HARD to beLIEVE //r she was ONly TWENty //

represents the preferred version for the reading out of this single sentence.
There is little doubt that a reading which retained this phonological shape
when it was read as part of, let us say, this stretch of language would be
heard as odd:

I had no reason to doubt anything else she said. It was hard to believe

she was only twenty.

What we expect a reader to do is to relate the sentence, not to the skeletal
world of presupposition that the sentence alone suggests, but to the state of
speaker/hearer understanding that the material immediately preceding it has
precipitated. After

I had no reason to doubt anything else she said

we might expect

//r (but) it was HARD to believe //p she was ONly TWENty //

since the notion of being—or not being—hard to believe is now already in
play and the possibility of her being only twenty is presented as something
not included in the already mentioned anything else.
We can, then, recognize a further stage of engagement, one at which the
reader’s intonation choices are in line with each newly created context of
interaction that the progressive revelation in the text sets up.
To illustrate further the difference between Stage 4 and Stage 3 engagement,
let us take the preferred single sentence readings of the following: