Rhythm

Stress-timing and syllable-
timing
Szczecin University
May 19th, 2009

Issues to be discussed

• Definition of rhythm
• Traditional units of speech rhythm: the foot, the syllable

and the mora

• Rhythm classes: stress-timed and syllable-timed languages
• Alternative approaches to the problem of rhythm in

language

• Influence of speaking tempo on the rhythmic structure of

language

Rhythm

• Rhythm - the pattern of intervals between

movements, or between their beginnings or peaks,
or the pattern of durations of movements

• Most human activities, such as walking, breathing,

running or heart beat, are rhythmical

• Speech production is inseparably linked with

respiration

• Rate of respiration depends on the amount of

carbon dioxide in the blood.

Traditional rhythm classes

• Stress-timed languages - English, Russian,

German, Arabic, Dutch, Swedish, Yoruba,

Telugu, Brazilian Portuguese

• Syllable-timed languages – Spanish, Italian,

Continental Portuguese, Greek.

• Mora-timed languages – Japanese, Ancient

Greek.

• Mixed types – Polish, Catalan

The foot

• The foot (metrical foot) – the amount of

time taken between each two stressed

syllables.

• An element of metrical structure consisiting

of a stressed syllable and an associated

unstressed syllable (or syllables).

• The feet of an utterance are believed to be

of equal duration

Bounded and unbounded foot

• The element that receives primary stress is called

the head. This segment is obligatory.

• A foot made up of a head and any number of

unaccented syllables is referred to as an

unbounded foot.

• There can be left-headed (Czech) and right-headed

unbounded feet (French).

• A minimal foot consists of one syllable only.
• Bounded feet are made up of two syllables only –

one stressed and one unstressed.

Most common feet in English

• A trochaic foot is a bounded left-headed

foot.

• An iambic foot is a bounded right-headed

foot

• (x .) (. x)
• σ σ σ σ
• promise collect

Examples of trochee

• Edgar Alan Poe – The Raven

Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak

December

• William Shakespeare

Double, double, toil and trouble;
Fire burn and cauldron bubble

• Nursery rhymes

Peter, Peter pumpkin-eater
Had a wife and couldn't keep her

Examples of iamb

• Iambic pentameter is one of the most

commonly used measures in English and

German poetry.

• A line of iambic pentameter comprises five

consecutive iambs.



To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield. -

Alfred Tennyson, "Ulysses"



A horse! A horse! My kingdom for a horse! -

William Shakespeare, Richard III

Relationship between strong and weak
elements

Extrametricality

• Syllables that find themselves either at the

beginning or the end of a word may fall outside
the effects of stress rules as they never receive
primary stress.

• As they are not associated with a foot they are

extrametrical

• They

ˈcouldn’t have ˈchosen a ˈbetter ˈtime for their

ˈholiday.

The Borrowing Rule (compression)

• Full-vowelled syllables take more or less

the same amount of time.

• A full-vowelled syllable is shortened when

immediately followed by a reduced syllable.

• It is only one-degree reduction of duration
• speed – speedy – speedily

Stress-timing in English

• The

ˈ

handsome

ˈ

landlord

ˈ

put the

ˈ

wristwatch

in his

ˈ

wife’s

ˈ

handbag

Foot duration in English

Influence of speech rate on rhythm in English

0,4794

0,5774

0,2814

0,8784

0,369

0,524

0,3068

0,3414

0,2128

0,6106

0,2366

0,3746

0

0,2

0,4

0,6

0,8

1

1

2

3

4

5

6

Fo

ot

n

um

be

r

Duration of the feet

fast speech
slow speech

Stress-timing in Russian

• Фи

ˈ

зиолог

ˈ

Павлов ос

ˈ

тавил ог

ˈ

ромное

теоре

ˈ

тическое нас

ˈ

ледство

Foot duration in Russian

Influence of speech rate on rhythm in Russian

0,4673

0,844

0,5377

0,859

0,7742

0,481

0,3022

0,392

0,3172

0,484

0,5657

0,326

0

0,2

0,4

0,6

0,8

1

1

2

3

4

5

6

F

o

o

t

n

u

m

b

er

Duration of the feet

fast speech
slow speech

The syllable

• Syllable – part of word consisting of a central

element (usually a vowel) and, optional elements
that are less sonorous than the central segment.

• In an utterance the constituent syllables (stressed

or unstressed) are thought to be equally long.

• Syllable structure exerts considerable influence on

its duration.

• Compare [pa] vs [ʑd͡ʑbwɔ]

Syllable duration in Polish
do dżdżystych 0.095/0.312/0.0138 msec.

Syllable duration in Spanish
propositos 0.130/0.134/0.126/0.137ms.

CV syllables containing [a]
karawana 0.096/0.120/0.140/0.178

The mora

• The mora can be understood as an equivalent of a

CV syllable containing a short vowel.

• Any syllable with either a long vowel or an onset

made up of two and more consonants, has to be
counted as two morae.

• CV – 1 mora
• CCV – 2 morae
• CV: - 2 morae

Changes in the rhythmical structure
of a language

• Fast speech phenomena typical of stress-timed

languages are also observable in non-stress-timed

languages.

• Given that stressed vowels are reduced to a lesser

extent than unstressed ones, CVCV structures

should exhibit some tendency towards stress-

timing.

• Cross-linguistically, we can expect the same

articulatory timing to be preferred on the basis of a

shared articulatory mechanism.

Interstress intervals (ISIs)

• The amount of time taken from the onset of

one stressed vowel to the onset of the next

stressed vowel

• This approach disregards the traditional

stress-timed/syllable-timed dychotomy

• There is no more tendency for interstress

intervals to clump together in English than

in other languages

ISIs in Polish

• Roboty drogowe spowodowały ogromne

opóźnienia autobusów komunikacji
miejskiej

Duration of ISIs in Polish

Influence of speech rate on rhythm in Polish

0,477

0,394

0,492

0,53

0,943

0,522

0,506

0,376

0,384

0,294

0,38

0,467

0,72

0,428

0,429

0,3

0,3

0,21

0,312

0,352

0,58

0,331

0,343

0,246

0

0,2

0,4

0,6

0,8

1

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

F

o

o

t

n

u

m

b

er

Duration (s)

fast speech
natural speech
slow speech

ISIs in Spanish

• Este maestro constantemente está metido en

algún tipo de lío innecesario

• The teacher is always involved in some

kind of trouble

Duration of ISIs in Spanish

Influence of speech rate on rhythm in Spanish

0,521

1,077

0,675

0,394

0,637

0,288

0,504

0,869

0,286

0,441

0,98

0,546

0,289

0,519

0,29

0,432

0,677

0,249

0,372

0,76

0,3

0,222

0,293

0,227

0,296

0,5

0,218

0

0,2

0,4

0,6

0,8

1

1,2

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

F

o

o

t

n

u

m

b

er

Duration (s)

fast speech
natural speech
slow speech

Bertinetto’s approach to rhythm

•

Stress-timing vs. syllable timing:

•

vowel reduction vs. full articulation of unstressed vowels

•

relative uncertainty vs. certainty in syllable counting

•

tempo acceleration obtained (mainly) through

compression of unstressed syllables vs. proportional

compression

•

complex syllable structure, with relatively uncertain

syllable boundaries vs. simple structure and well-defined

boundaries

•

tendency of stress to attract segmental material in order

to build up heavy syllables vs. no such tendency

•

relative flexibility in stress-placement (cf. the so-called

‘rhythm rule’) vs. comparatively stronger rigidity of

prominence

Alternative methods of describing rhythm

• The rhythmic structure of a language depends on

phonological properties, which are determined by its sound

inventory and by its phonotactics

• Three variables, namely %V, ∆V and ∆C suffice to

account for the traditional stress-timed/syllable-timed

dichotomy as well as to argue for the possibility of other

classes of rhythm

• (%V) - length of vocalic intervals divided by the total

length of the sentence.

• ∆V - standard deviation of the duration of vocalic intervals

within the sentence, thus it reflects the durational aspect of

vowel reduction

• ∆C - standard deviation of the duration of consonantal

intervals within the sentence

Languages

Vocalic
intervals

Consonantal
intervals

%V (SD)

∆V(SD)

∆C(SD)

English

307

320

40.1 (5.4)

4.64 (1.25)

5.35 (1.63)

Polish

334

333

41.0 (3.4)

2.51 (0.67)

5.14 (1.18)

Dutch

320

329

42.3 (4.2)

4.23 (0.93)

5.33 (1.5)

French

328

330

43.6 (4.5)

3.78 (1.21)

4.39 (0.74)

Spanish

320

317

43.8 (4.0)

3.32 (1.0)

4.74 (0.85)

Italian

326

317

45.2 (3.9)

4.00 (1.05)

4.81 (0.89)

Catalan

332

329

45.6 (5.4)

3.68 (1.44)

4.52 (0.86)

Japanese

335

334

53.1 (3.4)

4.02 (0.58)

3.56 (0.74)

Distribution of languages over the (%V,
∆C) plane

Distribution of languages over the
(%V, ∆V) plane

Problems with classifying
languages

• Which sentence better represents the

rhythm of Polish?

• Mama dała Basi kota
• W Szczebrzeszynie chrząszcz brzmi w

trzcinie

Conclusion

• So far rhythm in language hasn’t been

described satisfactorily.

• Additional rhythm classes should be created
• Rhythm constitutes a continuum with ideal

syllable-timeness and stress-timeness as its
opposite poles

• Rhythm does not exist!!!

References

•

Allen, Sidney W. 1973. Accent and rhythm. Prosodic features of Latin and

Greek: A study in theory and reconstruction. Cambridge: CUP

•

Bertinetto, Marco. 1989. “Reflections on the dichotomy ‘stress’ vs. ‘syllable-

timing’”, Belgique: Revue Phonétique Appliquée, 98-130.

•

Crystal, David (ed.). 1982. Linguistic controversies. London: Edward Arnold.

•

Dauer, Rebbeca, M. 1983. “Stress-timing and syllable-timing reanalyzed”,

Journal of Phonetics 11, 51-62.

•

Dziubalska-Kołaczyk, Katarzyna. 2002a. Beats-and-Binding phonology.

Wien: Peter Lang.

•

Ramus, Franck – Mehler, Jacques. 1999. “Language identification with

suprasegmental cues: A study based on speech resynthesis”, Journal of the

Acoustical Society of America, 105: 512-521.

•

Ramus, Franck – Nespor, Marina – Mehler, Jacques. 1999. “Correlates of

linguistic rhythm in the speech signal”, Cognition 73: 265-292.

•

Roach, Peter. 1982. “On the distinction between ‘stress-timed’ and ‘syllable-

timed’ languages”, in: Crystal, David (ed.) 73-79.