Hi everyone and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast.

My name is Mandy and this is our 59th episode. Last week I talked about pitch boundaries

and the proper way of using a rising pitch on a statement.

I want to emphasize again that there is a right way and a wrong way of using a rising pitch boundary on a statement.

Use a rising pitch boundary when you're not finished speaking and the next thing you say is directly related to what you just said.

Overusing rising pitch boundaries makes you sound less confident, and that is true for native and non-native speakers.

Today I'm going to talk about how to use a falling pitch boundary

on a yes-no question. Most students were told to use a rising final pitch on yes-no questions

and have never been told that there is also a purpose for a falling pitch.

A yes-no question, in case you're not familiar with the terminology,

is a question that is formed by inverting the subject and auxiliary verb

and can be answered with yes, no, or any version of, I don't know. These questions can have a rising

pitch or a falling pitch, and it all depends on context. First, let's talk about the more common rising pitch.

A rising pitch is used when the person asking the question really does not know the answer.

If the question is not part of an ongoing conversation, the pitch will probably rise higher than if the question relates to

what is already being talked about.

So, if you walk into a co-worker's office and want to know if that person would like to go

to lunch with you, you might say, do you want to go to lunch? The pitch was rising at the end of the word

lunch because the speaker does not yet know the answer. Here's another example. You need to get

across town quickly, but you don't own a car. So you call your friend and ask,

can I borrow your car this afternoon? You really didn't know what the answer would be when you

asked the question. Now let's talk about falling pitch boundaries on yes-no questions.

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