This study describes the verse design of Old English poetry in terms of modern phonological theory, developing an analysis which allows all OE verse lines to be described in terms of single metrical design. Old English poetry is typified by a single type of line of variable length, characterised by four metrical peaks. The variation evident in the lengths of OE metrical units has caused previous models to overgenerate acceptable verse forms or to develop complex typologies of dozens of acceptable forms. In this study, Metrical phonology and Optimality theory are used to highlight some aspects of the relationship between syntax, phonology and verse metrics in determining how sentences and phrases interact with the verse structure to create variation. The main part of the study is a metrical model based on the results of a corpus analysis. The corpus is centred on the OE poems Genesis and Andreas, complemented by selected shorter poems. A template of a prototypical line is described based on a verse foot which contains three vocalic moras, and which can vary between 2 and 4 vocalic moras distributed across 1 to 4 syllables. Each standard line is shown to consist of four of these verse feet, leading to a line length which can vary between 8 and 16 vocalic moras. It is shown that the limited variation within the length of the verse foot causes the greater variation in the length of lines. The rare, longer ‘hypermetric’ line is also accounted for with a modified analysis. The study disentangles the verse foot, which is an abstract metrical structure, from the prosodic word, which is a phonological object upon which the verse foot is based, and with which it is often congruent. Separate sets of constraints are elaborated for creating prosodic words in OE, and for fitting them into verse feet and lines. The metrical model developed as a result of this analysis is supported by three smaller focused studies. The constraints for creating prosodic words are defended with reference to compounds and derivational nouns, and are supported by a smaller study focusing on the metrical realisation of non-Germanic personal names in OE verse. Names of biblical origin are often longer than the OE prosodic word can accommodate. The supporting study on non-Germanic names demonstrates how long words with no obvious internal morphology in OE are adapted first to OE prosody and then to the verse structure. The solution for the metrical realisation of these names is shown to be patterned on derivational nouns. The supporting study on compound numerals describes how phrases longer than a verse are accommodated by the verse design. It is shown that compound numerals, which consist of two or more numeral words (e.g. 777 – seofonhund and seofon and hundseofontig) are habitually rearranged within the text to meet the requirements of verse length and alliteration. A further supporting study discusses the difference between the line length constraints controlling OE verse design and those for Old Norse and Old Saxon verse. Previous studies have often conflated these three closely related traditions into a single system. It is shown that despite their common characteristics, the verse design described in this study applies to all OE verse, but not to ON or OS.

Made available in DSpace on 2014-06-11T19:32:48Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 Previous issue date: 2010-08-20Bitstream added on 2014-06-13T20:43:48Z : No. of bitstreams: 1 costa_ds_dr_arafcl.pdf: 4693120 bytes, checksum: ac0e9a0c46593fd4bab80819608c224c (MD5) / Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq) / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES) / Esta tese de doutorado tem por objetivo confirmar a possibilidade de uma conexão entre a música e a linguística no desenvolvimento de uma nova metodologia para o estudo da prosódia de línguas mortas ou de períodos anteriores de línguas vivas. Tal metodologia baseia-se, resumidamente, na observação das proeminências musicais de textos poéticos musicados, na observação das proeminências linguísticas do texto dos poemas, junto com a observação da estrutura métrica dos mesmos. Sendo assim, partiu-se da ideia de que o tempo forte do compasso musical (o primeiro tempo) marca preferencialmente uma proeminência no nível linguístico, podendo servir de base para a localização das sílabas tônicas das palavras do texto, o que poderia fornecer pistas para o estudo do acento lexical de palavras em línguas que já não possuem falantes, nem registros orais. O corpus utilizado na pesquisa que sustenta essa tese constitui-se de um recorte das cem primeiras Cantigas de Santa Maria de Afonso X, tomadas a partir das suas versões transcritas por Anglés (1943) para a notação musical atual. Os dados foram coletados por meio da elaboração de fichas de análise, as quais mostram, de maneira clara, as coincidências entre proeminências nos níveis musical e linguístico. Vale ressaltar que foram coletadas trinta e oito mil e dezoito palavras, por meio das quais foi possível analisar a atribuição do acento lexical nas três pautas prosódicas existentes no português arcaico (oxítonas, paroxítonas e proparoxítonas), além e abrirmos uma discussão a respeito da tonicidade de monossílabos e o status prosódico de clíticos; também foi possível analisar a ocorrência do acento secundário, uma das maiores contribuições deste trabalho para a descrição da prosódia dessa língua. Dialogando com os trabalhos de... / This thesis aims to confirm the possibility of a connection between Music and Linguistics on the development of a new methodology applied to the study of the prosody of dead languages or ancient periods of living languages. This methodology is based on the observation of musical prominences of poetic texts with musical notation, and on the observation of linguistic prominences of the texts, considering their metrical structure. There is a great probability of the musical stresses (the first beat of the measure) to coincide with the stressed syllable of the words. This fact provides clues for the study of lexical stress in past periods of the language. The corpus used for this research is composed by the first hundred Cantigas de Santa Maria, which were compiled by Alfonso X and transcribed for the contemporary musical notation by Anglés (1943). The data were collected by means of the elaboration of boards which show the coincidences between prominences at musical and linguistic levels. It is important to point out that thirty eight thousand and eighteen words were collected; this fact enabled the analysis of the attribution of the lexical stress in Medieval Portuguese. Moreover it was possible to discuss the prominence grade of monosyllables and to analyze the occurrence of secondary stresses, maybe the largest contribution of this research in the description of the prosody of that language. Dialoguing with previous researches such as Massini-Cagliari (1995, 1999, 2005) and Costa (2006) - regarding the attribution of the lexical stress in Medieval Portuguese - and Collishonn (1994) - regarding the secondary stress in Brazilian Portuguese - we could verify that the methodology developed in this thesis brought significant contributions for the description of the Medieval Portuguese phonological component as it allowed the analysis of... (Complete abstract click electronic access below)

Orientador: Gladis Massini-Cagliari / Banca: Gisela Collischonn / Banca: Flaviane Romani Fernandes Svartman / Banca: Rosane de Andrade Berlinck / Banca: Marcia Valeria Zamboni Gobbi / Resumo: Esta tese de doutorado tem por objetivo confirmar a possibilidade de uma conexão entre a música e a linguística no desenvolvimento de uma nova metodologia para o estudo da prosódia de línguas mortas ou de períodos anteriores de línguas vivas. Tal metodologia baseia-se, resumidamente, na observação das proeminências musicais de textos poéticos musicados, na observação das proeminências linguísticas do texto dos poemas, junto com a observação da estrutura métrica dos mesmos. Sendo assim, partiu-se da ideia de que o tempo forte do compasso musical (o primeiro tempo) marca preferencialmente uma proeminência no nível linguístico, podendo servir de base para a localização das sílabas tônicas das palavras do texto, o que poderia fornecer pistas para o estudo do acento lexical de palavras em línguas que já não possuem falantes, nem registros orais. O corpus utilizado na pesquisa que sustenta essa tese constitui-se de um recorte das cem primeiras Cantigas de Santa Maria de Afonso X, tomadas a partir das suas versões transcritas por Anglés (1943) para a notação musical atual. Os dados foram coletados por meio da elaboração de fichas de análise, as quais mostram, de maneira clara, as coincidências entre proeminências nos níveis musical e linguístico. Vale ressaltar que foram coletadas trinta e oito mil e dezoito palavras, por meio das quais foi possível analisar a atribuição do acento lexical nas três pautas prosódicas existentes no português arcaico (oxítonas, paroxítonas e proparoxítonas), além e abrirmos uma discussão a respeito da tonicidade de monossílabos e o status prosódico de clíticos; também foi possível analisar a ocorrência do acento secundário, uma das maiores contribuições deste trabalho para a descrição da prosódia dessa língua. Dialogando com os trabalhos de... (Resumo completo, clicar acesso eletrônico abaixo) / Abstract: This thesis aims to confirm the possibility of a connection between Music and Linguistics on the development of a new methodology applied to the study of the prosody of dead languages or ancient periods of living languages. This methodology is based on the observation of musical prominences of poetic texts with musical notation, and on the observation of linguistic prominences of the texts, considering their metrical structure. There is a great probability of the musical stresses (the first beat of the measure) to coincide with the stressed syllable of the words. This fact provides clues for the study of lexical stress in past periods of the language. The corpus used for this research is composed by the first hundred Cantigas de Santa Maria, which were compiled by Alfonso X and transcribed for the contemporary musical notation by Anglés (1943). The data were collected by means of the elaboration of boards which show the coincidences between prominences at musical and linguistic levels. It is important to point out that thirty eight thousand and eighteen words were collected; this fact enabled the analysis of the attribution of the lexical stress in Medieval Portuguese. Moreover it was possible to discuss the prominence grade of monosyllables and to analyze the occurrence of secondary stresses, maybe the largest contribution of this research in the description of the prosody of that language. Dialoguing with previous researches such as Massini-Cagliari (1995, 1999, 2005) and Costa (2006) - regarding the attribution of the lexical stress in Medieval Portuguese - and Collishonn (1994) - regarding the secondary stress in Brazilian Portuguese - we could verify that the methodology developed in this thesis brought significant contributions for the description of the Medieval Portuguese phonological component as it allowed the analysis of... (Complete abstract click electronic access below) / Doutor

It is well-known that the early assignment of prominence in sequences like THIRteen MEN vs. thirTEEN, (defined as the Rhythm Rule, or post-lexical stress shift), is an optional phenomenon. This dissertation examines some of the factors that encourage the application of stress shift in English and how it is phonetically realised. The aim is to answer two sets of questions related to why and how stress shift occurs in English: 1a) Does prosodic boundary strength influence stress shift? 1b) Does the adjacency of prominences above the level of the segmental string encourage stress shift? 2) How is stress shift realized? a) Is stress shift only a perceptual phenomenon? and b) Which syllables, if any, change acoustically when stress shift is perceived? To answer these questions, four experiments were designed. The first three experiments test whether the strength of the prosodic boundaries before and after the target word (e.g., canteen) influence stress shift. The effect of the strength of the left-edge prosodic boundary was investigated by comparing perceived stress patterns of the target (e.g., canteen) as produced in isolation where it is preceded by an utterance- and a phrase- initial prosodic boundary (the Isolated condition) with its rendition when embedded in a frame sentence (e.g., Say canteen again) where the left prosodic boundary before canteen is weaker (the Embedded condition). Results show a very clear tendency towards late phrasal prominence on the final accentable syllable (e.g., -teen in canteen) in the Embedded condition while in the Isolated condition this pattern appeared in less than half of the targets, showing that the stronger left boundary increased the incidence of stress shift. Two more experiments manipulated the strength of the boundary to the right of the target (#) respectively by changing the syntactic parse of the critical phrase (e.g. canteen cook) in sequences like (1) and by manipulating constituent length as in (2). Results showed that the syntactic manipulation significantly affected the strength of the prosodic boundary between the clashing words which was stronger in (1b) relative to (1a), and affected the incidence of stress shift, which was higher in (1a) relative to (1b). The length manipulation also affected the rate of stress shift, which was significantly higher in the phrase with the shorter word, e.g., soups (2a) relative to phrase with the longer word, e.g., supervisors (2b). (1) Example from the Syntax Experiment a. Who is the canteen (#) cook these days? (Pre-modifier + Noun) b. How do the canteen (#) cook these days? (NP + VP) (2) Example from the Length Experiment a. It should include the canteen (#) soups again. (Shorter constituent) b. It should include the canteen (#) supervisors again. (Longer constituent) Whilst we knew from the literature that the grouping of the clashing words within one Intonational Phrase (IP) encourages stress shift, results from the Syntax and Length experiments indicate that this (i.e., the phrasing of the clashing words within same IP) is not sufficient condition for the occurrence of stress shift, and that fine-grained degrees of boundary strength below the Intonational Phrase can drive changes in prominence pattern. The fact that higher rates of stress shift (and associated significant acoustic changes) were driven by manipulations of constituent length --for sequences with the same syntactic structure-- provides support for the idea that prosodic (rather than syntactic) boundaries directly influence stress shift. The fourth experiment tests the definition of stress clash in English in cases like fourteen candles where the two main lexical prominences are strictly adjacent along the time dimension, in fourteen canoes where the prominences are not adjacent in time, but adjacent at the higher levels of the metrical hierarchy, and in fourteen canteens where the main lexical prominences are not adjacent, and do not clash. This experiment highlighted and resolved an unacknowledged disagreement about what clash status sequences with one weak intervening syllable (e.g., fourTEEN caNOES). The fourTEEN caNOES type were shown to behave like metrically clashing sequences (e.g., fourteen CANdles) in attracting stress shift, and differently from the non-metrically-clashing sequences (e.g., fourteen CANTEENS) in discouraging it. These results provide empirical support for the Standard Metrical Theory (e.g. Selkirk, 1984; Nespor & Vogel, 1989) claim that 1) stress clash matters in triggering stress shift and that 2) stress clash in English is defined at the higher prosodic levels and not restricted to the level of the segmental string as indirectly assumed in a growing body of research (e.g., Vogel, Bunnel & Hoskins, 1995; Tomlinson, Liu & Fox Tree, 2014). Along with the establishment of prosodic boundary strength as one of the predictors influencing stress shift, another important contribution of the thesis is providing empirical evidence that the English Rhythm Rule is not solely a perceptual phenomenon and that it is associated with acoustic correlates. The main correlates of perceived stress shift consistently appearing across experiments is the decrease in the duration of the main lexical prominence of the target (e.g., -teen in canteen) and the increase of fundamental frequency and Sound Pressure Level peaks and on the initial syllable (e.g., canin canteen), when followed by a main clashing phrasal prominence. The acoustic analysis shows that the first accentable syllable also contributes in the perception of stress shift. This latter result does not lend support to the deletion formulation of the Rhythm Rule (Gussenhoven, 1991) which stipulates that the impressions of stress shift are solely associated with changes of prominence in the last accentable syllable of the target (e.g. -teen in canteen). Along with the determination of the acoustic correlates of perceived stress shift in English, the present research 1) indicates that fine-grained gradations of prosodic boundary strength can influence stress shift, 2) shows that while stress clash can increase the incidence of stress shift, stress shift can take place even in environments completely free of stress clash, and 3) provides evidence that stress clash should not be construed simply as the concatenation of two main lexical prominences along the time dimension.