Prosody (linguistics)

In linguistics, prosody (from Ancient Greek προσῳδία prosōidía [prosɔː(i)díaː], "song sung to music; tone or accent of a syllable") is concerned with those elements of speech that are not individual phonetic segments (vowels and consonants) but are properties of syllables and larger units of speech. These contribute to linguistic functions such as intonation, tone, stress, and rhythm. Prosody may reflect various features of the speaker or the utterance: the emotional state of the speaker; the form of the utterance (statement, question, or command); the presence of irony or sarcasm; emphasis, contrast, and focus; or other elements of language that may not be encoded by grammar or by choice of vocabulary.

Attributes of prosody

In the study of prosodic aspects of speech it is usual to distinguish between auditory measures (subjective impressions produced in the mind of the listener) and acoustic measures (physical properties of the sound wave that may be measured objectively). Auditory and acoustic measures of prosody do not correspond in a linear way. The majority of studies of prosody have been based on auditory analysis using auditory scales.