On the phonetics of rhythm: Evidence from Swedish

Abstract

Rhythmic alternation among sequences of unstressed syllables in Swedish utterances was examined from phonetic starting points. The results of a series of pilot experiments using both reiterant nonsense speech and original sense speech can be summarized as follows. The rhythmic alternation among unstressed syllables is reflected in the temporal domain as an alternation in syllable duration. This alternation between longer and shorter syllables can be seen as a reflex of the postulated alternation between strong and weak syllables forming rhythmic subgroups within stress groups. It appears to be quite systematic, although the size of this difference is considerably less than for a corresponding comparison of stressed versus unstressed syllables. The temporal relations also seem to be in accord with the hypothesis that the alternation is governed from the upcoming stress, so that the prestress syllable is relatively shorter, the preceding one is relatively longer, and so on by way of alternation.