Gender specific syntagmatic peculiarities of phrasal rhythm in the course of extemporaneous reading aloud (American English)

Abstract

The article considers the methods, the major stages and results of the study of how gender influences the syntagmatic properties of phrasal rhythm in the course of extemporaneous reading aloud in contemporary American English. The given description is the second stage of the study focusing on the influence of gender on phrasal rhythm in the type of language activity being considered. Previously, gender specific male and female “repertoires” of statistically valid types of rhythmical groups (i.e. the paradigmatic properties of rhythmical groups) were determined. A rhythmical group is understood as a suprasyllabic prosodic unit comprising one stressed and a number of unstressed syllables adjacent to it. The position and the number of the unstressed syllables in the rhythmical group determine its type. At this stage of the study, the peculiarities of the combinability of different types of rhythmical groups and their valency are being scrutinized. In the realm of combinability peculiarities of rhythmical groups, the statistics of the types and kinds of observed contacts are being analyzed: contrastive/non-contrastive increase/decrease of rhythm, the rate of rhythm changes as well as cases of unchanged rhythm. Statistically valid genderfactored differences are being determined. Among the statistical tools the following were mostly employed: measures of central tendency (the mean value), measures of variability (dispersion) and the probability theory (to determine the valency). It has been established that the type of the language activity, which is being considered here, allowing almost no freedom of the speakers to organize the phrasal rhythm at their own discretion, greatly influences the results. Thus, male and female manifestations in a vast number of indicators show no statistically relevant differences, especially when group mean values are considered. The majority of statistically valid gender specific differences are observed only in the values of dispersion, which show the degree of uniformity, immutability of the events. The discussion section of the article represents the author’s speculation about the accuracy and efficiency of the auditory-functional method that is being employed to determine the contrastive/non-contrastive rhythm modulation: by the difference in the number of unstressed syllables between the adjacent rhythmical groups without regard given to their positions relevant to the stressed syllable. Eventually the author concludes that the controversy of the method is to be smoothed out by the acoustic analysis of the actual data.