Prosodic end-weight reflects phrasal stress

Ryan, Kevin M.

doi:10.1007/s11049-018-9411-6

Cited by 11 publications

(11 citation statements)

References 88 publications

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“…Weight based on onset sonority is attested in various metrical systems, including prosodic end-weight, metrics, textsetting, and stress. First, low sonority onsets are treated as heavier than high sonority onsets in prosodic end-weight, in which heavier syllables are generally preferred in final position (Cooper & Ross 1975, Campbell & Anderson 1976), one explanation being that that is the locus of greater stress (Ryan 2019a). Syllable weight in end-weight is a function not just of the nucleus and coda, where greater length and sonority contribute to greater weight, as they normally do, but also a function of the onset, where less sonority contributes to greater weight.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Onset Prominence in Wubuy Reduplication

Ryan

Heath

2022

AMP

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Wubuy (also known as Nunggubuyu; Australia) exhibits a regular and productive pattern of partial reduplication by which the reduplicant is one syllable if its base begins with an obstruent and two if it begins with a sonorant. We compare two approaches to the synchronic analysis of this pattern based on phonotactics and weight, respectively, ultimately arguing for the latter. As we show, an analysis in terms of general markedness constraints (e.g. invoking the unmarkedness of obstruent onsets or regulating sonority combinations across syllables) is not viable. A weight-based account, by contrast, recognizes that obstruent onsets pattern as heavier than sonorant onsets in a number of languages and weight-sensitive systems. Thus, a typologically principled analysis is available in which the reduplicant must be at least as heavy as an obstruent-initial syllable.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Onset Prominence in Wubuy Reduplication

Ryan

Heath

2022

AMP

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“…The main claim behind the association of EW to phonology, and specifically prosody, is that there is an optimal alignment of heavier constituents and prosodic focus; constituents that pattern as heavy, are preferred closer to the right edge so as to coincide with the most prominent point of the prosodic phrase: nuclear stress (Selkirk 1995). This alignment encompasses the prosodically motivated manifestation of EW in particular, named Prosodic End-weight (Ryan 2019a) (here used interchangeably with EW) and seems to be in accord with other manifestations of the stress-weight interface (Gordon 2006).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 93%

“…The phenomenon of End-weight (henceforth EW) refers to the tendency of heavy or complex constituents to be found closer to the right edge of a phrase or sentence. While the first reference to EW (Quirk et al 1972) was not within a phonological framework, more recent studies interpret the phenomenon as crucially associated with phonology, especially in the domain of constituent ordering within clauses (Anttila 2008, Anttila et al 2010) and that of binomials (Ryan 2019a). The main claim behind the association of EW to phonology, and specifically prosody, is that there is an optimal alignment of heavier constituents and prosodic focus; constituents that pattern as heavy, are preferred closer to the right edge so as to coincide with the most prominent point of the prosodic phrase: nuclear stress (Selkirk 1995).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Regularities and Oddities in Greek Binomials

Kikiopoulou

Topintzi

2022

AMP

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Our study looks into End-weight (EW) manifestations in Standard Modern Greek (Greek). EW refers to the tendency of certain constituents which pattern as heavy to occur closer to the right edge of the prosodic phrase, in order to align with its most prominent locus, nuclear stress (Ryan 2019). This phenomenon ties in with other known manifestations of the stress-weight interface in quantity-sensitive (QS) languages. We constructed two forced choice tasks – one with real words, the other with nonce words – aiming to explore the possible influence of vowel quality, word-final coda presence, and word length (in syllables) on the internal coordination of binomials. Our findings show that Greek manifests regular EW effects and words with back vowels, word-final codas, and more syllables pattern as heavy and are preferred closer to the right edge. The oddity mainly lies in the fact that in Greek, a quantity-insensitive language (QI), no constituents are expected to pattern as heavy. We further find that lapse effects might be more relevant in the language than previously believed. We theorize that our more experimentally-oriented approach to the language potentially reveals a gradient-weight system.

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“…From the perspective of linguistics, the definition of the stress, as Robert Ladd holds, is always used as "supersegment feature of fundamental frequency, duration and intensity" [1]. Mispronunciation of English sentence stress is always a striking phenomenon which exists and should be paid more attention to avoid the "Foreign accent" [2]. Incorrect placement of sentence stress will be detrimental to the comprehensible message which the speaker intends to convey and to the understanding in utterance.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

An Optimality‐Theoretic Analysis of the Acquisition of English Sentence Stress Based on Acoustic Data

Liu

2021

Complexity

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The present study adopts both empirical and theoretical methods for the analysis of the acquisition of English sentence stress based on Optimality Theory, aiming to overcome mispronunciation of English sentence stress. Optimality Theory has a dramatic impact on most areas in linguistics besides phonology. The acoustic software Praat is chosen to collect and label data as the basis of the empirical method. Then, through analyzing the four major principles of distribution of sentence stress (content words stressed principle, rightmost words stressed principle, leftmost words stressed principle, and new information priority principle) and based on the analysis of Optimality Theory, the software Praat, and SPSS, the researcher can present the following findings: firstly, the constraint hierarchical ranking of nonnative speakers is DEP-IO >> NEW-IP >> ALIGN-IP-LEFT >> ALIGN-IP-RIGHT. Secondly, the native speakers also undergo the demotion of constraint hierarchical ranking: NEW-IP >> DEP-IO >> ALIGN-IP-RIGHT >> ALIGN-IP-LEFT. Thirdly, the constraint in each demotion of constraint hierarchical ranking during different stages is as follows: NEW-IP constraint moves from the undominated position to the dominated position in the hierarchy; ALIGN-IP-RIGHT and ALIGN-IP-LEFT constraints move from the dominated position to the lower position in the hierarchy. Through the specific analysis, the researcher draws a conclusion that the varied reasons affect the nonnative speakers to master the distribution of sentence stress due to their incorrect position in the demotion of constraint hierarchical ranking.

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Prosodic end-weight reflects phrasal stress

Cited by 11 publications

References 88 publications

Onset Prominence in Wubuy Reduplication

Onset Prominence in Wubuy Reduplication

Regularities and Oddities in Greek Binomials

An Optimality‐Theoretic Analysis of the Acquisition of English Sentence Stress Based on Acoustic Data

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