This paper discusses an ongoing experiment in teaching the communicative values of intonation to second-year students in an English department at a French university. The communication needs of the learners are described in terms of academic activities (e.g., formal discussion) and social contact. A basic three-term structure -- opening, continuation, closing -- is established at different levels of discourse (interaction, transaction, exchange), and the communicative values of intonation, paralinguistic phenomena and kinesics are illustrated. Eight parameters are considered essential on the basis of their meaning potential and following an analysis of the students' performance before the course. They are, in order of decreasing importance: rhythm, tonicity, tonality, tone, key, loudness, tempo and articulation rate. They all contribute to the organization of discourse and the definition of interpersonal relationships. (Author/AM)