Emphasis is an amazing part of everyday speech. Word choice and word pronunciation provide most of the understanding, or miscommunication in all speech. Like body language, the tone, structure and emphasis of a word or phrase gives off the meaning behind the phrase, whether it be somber or satirical.

This is one of the biggest problems with language.

As in dmd's write-up above, the choice of emphasis changes the entire meaning of the piece.

This is where relationship problems occur. If girls were able to express their feelings and meanings, and boys were able to say what they actually meant instead of partial sentances in between thoughts. Then girls would understand their desires, and boys were able to understand completely what girls meant, imagine what a world it would be!