Rhythm in Speech, Prose and Verse: A Linguistic Description 9783832528454, 3832528458

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Jurgen ¨ Esser

Rhythm in Speech, Prose and Verse A Linguistic Description

λογος

J¨ urgen Esser

Rhythm in Speech, Prose and Verse A Linguistic Description

Logos Verlag Berlin

λογος

Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available in the Internet at http://dnb.d-nb.de .

c Copyright Logos Verlag Berlin GmbH 2011

All rights reserved. ISBN 978-3-8325-2845-4

Logos Verlag Berlin GmbH Comeniushof, Gubener Str. 47, D-10243 Berlin Tel.: +49 (0)30 / 42 85 10 90 Fax: +49 (0)30 / 42 85 10 92 http://www.logos-verlag.de

This book is dedicated to all my former students of microlinguistics who shared my interest in the Prague School, British contextualism and corpus linguistics. I am particularly thankful to those who were keen to find out more by themselves and for the insights they have given me.

Acknowledgements I am indebted to my dear younger colleagues who accompanied me while this book was in preparation: Vera Benninghoven, Sanna Engell, Rolf Kreyer (University of Marburg), Sebastian Patt and Sharmila Vaz. They were most helpful in many ways: I have benefited from their unbiased, critical advice in many discussions and their critical eye on the typescript in its final stage. Bonn May 2011

Jürgen Esser

Table of Contents Typographical Conventions 1 The nature and meanings of rhythm 1.1 Brief historical background 1.2 Rhythm in language typology 1.3 Rhythm in speech and prose 1.4 Rhythm in verse

1 1 4 9 10

2 Critical evaluation of rhythm-related concepts 2.1 Syllable 2.2 Stress 2.3 Foot 2.4 Accent 2.5 Isochrony: The rhythmic speech fallacy 2.6 Metre

13 13 15 19 22 27 29

3 Levels of abstraction 3.1 Introduction 3.2 Medium-independent units and structures: wording 3.3 Medium-dependent phonic units and structures: sounding 3.3.1 Spoken citation forms 3.3.2 Decontextualized lexical stress 3.3.3 Spoken context forms in tone units 3.4 Medium-dependent graphic units and structures: writing 3.4.1 Written word forms in orthographic sentences 3.4.2 Layout of orthographic sentences

35 35 44 47 47 51 52 55 55 59

4 A linguistic definition of rhythm

63

5 Types of rhythm 5.1 Overview 5.2 Medium-independent rhythm 5.3 Medium-dependent phonic rhythm 5.3.1 Syllable rhythm 5.3.2 Accent rhythm 5.3.3 The interaction of phonic rhythm features 5.4 Medium-dependent graphic rhythm

71 71 75 77 78 82 85 88

6 Rhythm in textual rhetoric 6.1 Overview 6.2 The principle of rhythmic arrangement 6.3 Author-defined lining

91 91 94 98

7 Rhythm in oral presentation 7.1 Spontaneous speech 7.2 Reading prose 7.3 Reading verse

103 103 105 110

8 Conclusions

121

References

125

Index

135

Typographical Conventions

Written word form(s)

>abc