Speech rhythm in Akan oral praise poetry
-
Tristan Michael Purvis
Abstract
This article reports a study of harmonic speech displayed in Akan oral praise poetry (apae). The study demonstrates that the recitation of Akan praise poetry—a fairly free verse form in terms of variable tempo and line length—is highly influenced by an isochronous rhythmic beat. Despite isolated occurrences of relatively long or short non-isochronous metrical accents, these poems are recited in a style that exploits tempo changes and ellipsis to maintain an oscillatory rhythm of beats at harmonic intervals, and this rhythm is found to remain constant through silent rest phases between individual poems as well as between lines. This research supports the notion that considerations of timing should be given more weight in linguistic theory and modeling.
© 2009 by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co. KG, D-10785 Berlin
Artikel in diesem Heft
- The expression of affect in discussions about HIV/AIDS
- “But it's all true!”: commercialism and commitment in the discourse of organic food promotion
- A study of interruption in Chinese criminal courtroom discourse
- Speech rhythm in Akan oral praise poetry
- Humor and image politics in parliamentary discourse: a Greek case study
Artikel in diesem Heft
- The expression of affect in discussions about HIV/AIDS
- “But it's all true!”: commercialism and commitment in the discourse of organic food promotion
- A study of interruption in Chinese criminal courtroom discourse
- Speech rhythm in Akan oral praise poetry
- Humor and image politics in parliamentary discourse: a Greek case study
