Tonality and intonation

Re: my previous reaction to Kress, I wanted to explore some of the issues further, and have discovered what "tonal" truly means. English is indeed not a tonal language (in which the tone of a word can change its meaning significantly), however, in this language, intonation is critical to meaning, and that was my mistake. I learned something important! But now I have to wonder how tonal languages avoid mass confusion in a written context. Obviously, I will never be a linguist!