Language Rhythm Research Articles

Tactus, Mensuration, and Rhythm in Renaissance Music by Ruth I. DeFord

Reviewed by: Tactus, Mensuration, and Rhythm in Renaissance Music by Ruth I. DeFord Kimberly Hieb Tactus, Mensuration, and Rhythm in Renaissance Music. By Ruth I. DeFord. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015. [xii, 504 p. ISBN 9781107064720 (hardcover), $130; ISBN 9781316236734 (e-book), $104.] Music examples, index of signs, bibliography, index. At first blush, Renaissance musical notation appears to have a lot in common with modern musical notation. The note shapes and colors look alike, and the notes are placed on a staff made up of lines and spaces. However, to assume an exact correlation between our present-day notation, especially our methods of notating rhythm, and systems of Renaissance mensural notation, is to be quite certainly mistaken. In her book, Tactus, Mensuration, and Rhythm in Renaissance Music, Ruth DeFord describes how composers and theorists of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries conceived of and notated rhythm and musical time and addresses the many difficulties in understanding rather foreign rhythmic structures. The thoroughness of DeFord’s research is enviable. She leaves no stone unturned when considering the various options for interpreting Renaissance rhythmic notation. The fastidious nature of DeFord’s survey, however, is not for the faint of heart. Rather than providing straightforward guidelines for applying a single theorist’s ideas, she presents the reader with a variety of options and ideas. Throughout the book, she describes mensural notation and Renaissance rhythm not as a “single, unified system, but as a collection of diverse practices that varied with time, place, genre, and composer” (p. 3). DeFord’s volume is divided into two parts, the first focused on theoretical sources and the last steeped in practical concerns regarding repertoire. Following a brief introduction that lays out the basic issues at hand in the volume, she explores the extant sources pertaining to Renaissance rhythm. In chapter 2, an essential introduction to specialized terminology eases the reader into the complexities of Renaissance rhythm, making the information that follows accessible to a wider audience of students and scholars. Chapters 3 through [End Page 287] 7 address topics related to musical tactus, a unit of musical time which DeFord describes as the juncture between the abstract values of mensural notation and actual time values in performance. The final section of the book focuses on repertoire, honing in on the works of some of the most well-known composers of the period: Ockeghem, Busnoys (or Busnois), Josquin, Isaac, Palestrina, and Rore. DeFord concludes Part II with a brief chapter on popular song, which contrasts sharply with the largely sacred, vocal repertoire discussed earlier in the section. A succinct conclusion contains a list of the important ideas that govern tactus, mensuration, and rhythm, and leaves the reader with descriptions of how these concepts affect the process of editing and performing Renaissance music. Chapters 1 and 2 provide a foundation. The first chapter is a thorough guide to the fifteenth- and sixteenth-century theoretical sources. In chapter 2, DeFord goes back to the basics, introducing the different mensuration signs, note shapes, and ligatures, and describing the various levels of mensural organization from largest to smallest: mode, tempus, and prolation. DeFord establishes her own vocabulary to refer to elements of mensural organization, which is especially important considering the terminological inconsistencies in the extant theoretical and musical literature. After setting the basic parameters of this familiar, yet foreign, rhythmic language, DeFord presents the methods of complicating rhythms. Finally, she outlines the indicators of particular mensurations in the absence of signs, which are especially important because many Renaissance composers did not consistently notate mensurations. In the remaining theoretical chapters (3–7), DeFord explores the idea of tactus, which she describes as having three primary meanings: (1) the physical motion measuring time in performance, (2) the unit of time that governs the contrapuntal structure of the piece (compositional tactus), and (3) the unit of time associated with a mensuration sign in music theory (theoretical tactus). In chapter 3, a thorough study of the works of fifteenth- and sixteenth-century theorists shows how tactus contributes to both the theoretical and audible structuring of time in music. In chapter 4, “Tactus and Rhythm,” DeFord examines how tactus creates effects such as surface rhythm, syncopation, and hemiola...

Poetry, Prosody, Parody

AbstractMy essay, “Poetry, Prosody, Parody: Mark Twain's Rhythmic Thought,” argues that although Mark Twain was primarily a prose writer and thinker, poetry and prosody nevertheless exerted a significant influence on his writing and thinking. I begin by analyzing a few of Twain's poems in order to establish his basic prosodic competence. I then look to Twain's prose writings, in particular Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, in order to demonstrate poetry's influence on his exploration of death and the limits of language. Finally, I allude to the ways in which Twain employs the rhythms of language in his humor and in his explorations of race, class, and gender. I conclude that Twain's work exhibits the sort of “word-musicianship” that he finds lacking in the fiction of James Fenimore Cooper and that, furthermore, prosody helps Twain to think through a variety of crucial issues.

Noun/verb distinction in English stress homographs: an ERP study.

Sensitivity to speech rhythm, especially the pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables, is an important aspect of language acquisition and comprehension from infancy through adulthood. In English, a strong correlation exists between speech rhythm and grammatical class. This property is well illustrated by a particular group of noun/verb homographs that are spelled the same but are pronounced with a lexical stress on the first syllable when used as a noun or on the second syllable when used as a verb. The purpose of this study was to further examine the neural markers of speech rhythm and its role in word recognition. To this end, event-related brain potentials were recorded while participants listened to spoken sentences containing a stress homograph either in a noun or a verb position. The rhythmic structure of the stress homographs was manipulated so that they were pronounced with a stress pattern that either matched or mismatched their grammatical class. Results of cluster-based permutation tests on the event-related brain potentials revealed larger negativities over the centrofrontal scalp regions when the stress homographs were mispronounced, in line with previous studies on lexical ambiguity resolution. In addition, differences between rhythmically unexpected nouns and verbs could be seen as early as 200 ms, suggesting that listeners are sensitive to statistical properties of their language rhythm. Together, these results support the hypothesis that information about speech rhythm is rapidly integrated during speech perception and contributes to lexical retrieval.

PERVALE-S: a new cognitive task to assess deaf people's ability to perceive basic and social emotions.

A poorly understood aspect of deaf people (DP) is how their emotional information is processed. Verbal ability is key to improve emotional knowledge in people. Nevertheless, DP are unable to distinguish intonation, intensity, and the rhythm of language due to lack of hearing. Some DP have acquired both lip-reading abilities and sign language, but others have developed only sign language. PERVALE-S was developed to assess the ability of DP to perceive both social and basic emotions. PERVALE-S presents different sets of visual images of a real deaf person expressing both basic and social emotions, according to the normative standard of emotional expressions in Spanish Sign Language. Emotional expression stimuli were presented at two different levels of intensity (1: low; and 2: high) because DP do not distinguish an object in the same way as hearing people (HP) do. Then, participants had to click on the more suitable emotional expression. PERVALE-S contains video instructions (given by a sign language interpreter) to improve DP’s understanding about how to use the software. DP had to watch the videos before answering the items. To test PERVALE-S, a sample of 56 individuals was recruited (18 signers, 8 lip-readers, and 30 HP). Participants also performed a personality test (High School Personality Questionnaire adapted) and a fluid intelligence (Gf) measure (RAPM). Moreover, all deaf participants were rated by four teachers for the deaf. Results: there were no significant differences between deaf and HP in performance in PERVALE-S. Confusion matrices revealed that embarrassment, envy, and jealousy were worse perceived. Age was just related to social-emotional tasks (but not in basic emotional tasks). Emotional perception ability was related mainly to warmth and consciousness, but negatively related to tension. Meanwhile, Gf was related to only social-emotional tasks. There were no gender differences.

Effects of Persian Language Quantitative Characteristics of Rhythm on Children's English Songs

Linguists believe that languages have different rhythms. Rhythm is one of the important connections between speech and songs. One of the quantitative rhythmic differences between stress and syllable timed languages have been demonstrated by Grabe and Low (2002). In this method they measured the length of a syllable by vowel length which resulted in greater variability in syllable length where as a language with little variation in vowel length would have little overall variation in syllable length. This model to measure the amount of durational variability in a language is called the normalized pair wise variability index (nPVI). In this research in order to find out the effect of Persian language rhythm on the rhythm of children‘s English songs, the duration of vowels of l0 Persian songs and l0 English songs, that had been sung by Iranian children between 3 to 5 years of age, which had been recorded with a Shure microphone in a silent room, have been measured. Then the relative duration of vowels have been measured by nPVI. The results of this study indicate that means of durational variability of vowels in Persian and English vowels are different and the nPVI Values differ as well. Therefore the Persian rhythm affects the rhythm in English songs read by children of 3 to 5 years old.

Perception of speech rhythm in second language: the case of rhythmically similar L1 and L2.

We investigated the perception of developmental changes in timing patterns that happen in the course of second language (L2) acquisition, provided that the native and the target languages of the learner are rhythmically similar (German and English). It was found that speech rhythm in L2 English produced by German learners becomes increasingly stress-timed as acquisition progresses. This development is captured by the tempo-normalized rhythm measures of durational variability. Advanced learners also deliver speech at a faster rate. However, when native speakers have to classify the timing patterns characteristic of L2 English of German learners at different proficiency levels, they attend to speech rate cues and ignore the differences in speech rhythm.

Foreign language learning in French speakers is associated with rhythm perception, but not with melody perception.

There has been increasing interest in links between language and music. Here, we investigate the relation between foreign language learning and music perception. We administered tests measuring melody and rhythm perception as well as a questionnaire on musical and foreign language experience to 147 monolingual French speakers. As expected, we found that musicians had better melody and rhythm perception than nonmusicians and that, among musicians, there was a positive correlation between the total number of years of music training and test scores. Crucially, we also found a positive correlation between the total number of years learning foreign languages and rhythm perception, but we found no such relation with melody perception. Moreover, the degree to which participants were better at rhythm than melody perception was also related to foreign language experience. Results suggest that both music training and learning foreign languages (primarily English, Spanish, and German in our sample) are related to French speakers' perception of rhythm, but not to their perception of melody. These results are discussed with respect to the rhythmic properties of French and suggest a common perceptual basis for rhythm in language and music.

The Case for Pace

I wish to suggest category that can be helpful in focusing our attention on rhythm of free verse, that is similarly applicable to metrical verse. The category of pace, which I am offering here, has advantage of operating across several levels of a given text and its perception. In linguistics, finds that (often termed tempo, and at times inaccurately meshed with duration) is a suprasegmental parameter that sometimes appears as a component of rhythm in ordinary language. (1) As a crude working definition, can begin to think of as speed of a stretch of language. Changes in can explain some of flexibility in metered verse (two iambic pentameter lines can have differing dynamics), and can also operate in free verse regardless of metrical element. In context of traditional distinction between meter and rhythm, can be found on side of rhythm: is not metrical, and it operates both inside and outside of a metrical context. Furthermore, does not necessarily rely on a regularity or recurrence of numerical elements in any strict sense. It is rhythmical by virtue of engaging reader in an experience of speed, and therefore temporality. Researchers in linguistics or psycholinguistics classify pace, which they call into two or three components. The first is the tempo of articulating an utterance, excluding any silent pauses, but including non-linguistic speech material such as filled pauses [=any gap in verbal structure of a speaking-turn filled by non-linguistic material] and prolongations of (Laver 539). This is measured in number of syllables or words per time units, for example, number of syllables per millisecond. The other two variables, embedded under term pause have to do with number and duration of pauses in examined utterance. In a stretch of speech, overall impression of tempo has to do both with speed/pace/rate of words uttered and (sometimes independently) with frequency and duration of pauses interspersed between syllables or words uttered. John Laver points out that there are different relationships possible. For example, a stretch of speech can be characterized by a fast articulation rate, but could still exhibit a relatively slow speaking rate, if speech has frequent or long silent pauses (541). Empirical research on speaking rate has produced a myriad of results, which hint at significance of in poetry, though area of investigation is not poetic. (2) John Ciardi, American poet and critic, stands out as giving most attention to as key to illuminating effects of poetry. In his book, How Does a Poem Mean?, Ciardi states plainly that [a] poem, by very fact of its existence in time rather than in space, has duration and pace (994, emphasis in original). Earlier Ciardi argues that one poem obviously urge voice at a faster than does another. Within same poem, moreover, part urge itself much more rapidly than another. Even within an individual line, phrase clearly be indicated as moving more rapidly or more slowly than another (920). In fact, it seems that for Ciardi, is definitive element of rhythm in poetry, and he makes an effort to systematically account for devices that affect a poem's pace. When Ciardi claims that part of poem may urge itself much more rapidly or more slowly than another, he is suggesting not just that changes throughout poem, and is therefore relative, but also that poem itself indicates its pacing. Although becomes physically manifested when poem is read out loud (and echoes of can be heard by an attentive silent reader in proverbial mind's ear), there are cues or indicators of within written text, and we are not solely in realm of subjective performance whereby any string of words can be performed at various speeds at will. …

From "Sisters" to "Comadres": Translating and Transculturating Tomson Highway's The Rez Sisters

Since theNative Canadian playwright Tomson Highway imagines his plays in Cree beforetranslating them into English, his dramatic texts are, in the words of Gayatri Spivak, “a history of the languagein-and-as-translation. “ As he acknowledges, Highway’s English is permeatedwith the rhythm of the Cree language: “I am actually using English filteredthrough the mind, the tongue and the body of a person who is speaking inCree” Highway’s text introduces Cree orOjibway words and phrases, providing English translations for them infootnotes. The other characteristic which makes Highway’s plays distinct istheir sexual content, as transmitted both in the spoken text and in the stagedirections. Highway explains in an article titled “Why Cree is the Sexiest ofAll Languages,” that talking about sex in English is a terrifying experience, whereasin Cree it is the funniest, most hysterical and most spectacular thing in theworld.” In addition, visceral and sexual language is an essential component ofthe play, This paper will explore the process of translation andtransculturation involved in the translation of Highway’s play The Rez Sisters, in the light of translationstudies theories and the notion of transculturation as coined by Fernándo Ortizand expanded by Norman Cheadle in his book CanadianCultural Exchanges.

THEORETICAL EXPLORATIONS IN AFRICAN MUSIC - Gerhard Kubik. Theory of African Music,Volumes I and II. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1994, 2010. Chicago Studies in Ethnomusicology. Volume I: 464 pp. Volume II: x + 368 pp. List of Musical Examples. Artists and Authors. Song Titles. Index. 2 CDs. $30.00 (each volume). Paper.

Gerhard Kubik. Theory of African Music, Volumes I and II. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1994, 2010. Chicago Studies in Ethnomusicology. Volume I: 464 pp. Volume II: x + 368 pp. List of Musical Examples. Artists and Authors. Song Titles. Index. 2 CDs. $30.00 (each volume). Paper.Gerhard Kubik's Theory of African Music, published in two volumes, derives largely from fieldwork conducted in the 1960s, a time when African music scholarship, like the field of ethnomusicology itself, was still in its formative stages. Broad disciplinary issues highlighted in the book include the challenge of reconciling emic and etic standpoints, the balancing of ethnographic research and musicological analysis, and the ways in which the methods of historiography can be integrated effectively into ethnomusicological research. With specific reference to African music, Kubik's volumes generate important perspectives about the challenge of interpreting African rhythmic language, how music articulates social boundaries, the cultural significance of musical storytelling, ensemble practices, and the connections between migration and musical practice.Thematic diversity is matched by a study of multiple traditions from different parts of sub-Saharan Africa. There is indeed a sense in which reading the different chapters of the book evokes Kubik's voyage across different parts of the continent, the difficult terrains of which Kubik sometimes paints in the book. In one such narrative he describes how local people helped him to survive hazardous conditions during one particular journey from western Nigeria through Cameroon, the Central African Republic, all the way to Zaire and southern Sudan. In the first part of this review I provide a summary of the topics covered in the book. In the second section I look at some of the main issues in greater detail.Scope and DefinitionThe introduction deals with a number of issues, notably, the challenge of defining African music in a way that accounts for cross-cultural commonalities as well as differences emanating from the continent's varied geographies and ethnicities, the relationship between music and language, the integral connections between music and society, and the historical processes that help to shape musical practice. Kubik signals his interest in applying the methods of historiography to the analysis of African music forms and practices, with particular reference to the impact of the migration of the NigerCongo Bantu population to central, east, and southern Africa. History is also demonstrated to be at play in the cultivation of certain musical instruments. With reference to Yoruba music, for example, he draws our attention to the religious contexts in which igbin (cylindrical skin) drums were used during the classical Yoruba era between the tenth and the fourteenth centuries. It was not until the fifteenth or sixteenth century that the dundun hourglass drum- now generally considered Yoruba's most important instrument-was used. In discussing the relationship between music and language, Kubik draws parallels between the locations of the four prevailing super-families of African languages (namely, Niger-Kordofanian, Nilo-Saharan, Afroasiatic, and Khoisan) and the continent's musical topography. For example, he distinguishes between the music of southern African Khoisan speakers, the music of the Pygmies in central Africa, and that of the mainstream Niger-Congo speakers. As expected, the introduction prepares the ground for a wideranging discussion spread over five chapters in each of the two volumes.Chapters 1 and 2 focus on two different instrumental traditions.* The first chapter discusses xylophone music in southern Uganda, while the second examines the harp music of the Azande people of northeastern Zaire and southern Sudan, and similar groups in the Central African Republic. Kubik's discussion here, as in other parts of this book, derives from interviews with indigenous performers as well as missionaries who did some initial work on the kundi (harp music) in East Africa. …

Reading Aloud as a Technique for Developing Teachers’ Awareness of English Phonology

Reading Aloud as a Technique for Developing Teachers’ Awareness of English Phonology

The relevance of rhythmical alternation in language processing: An ERP study on English compounds

This study investigates the influence of rhythmic expectancies on language processing. It is assumed that language rhythm involves an alternation of strong and weak beats within a linguistic domain. Hence, in some contexts rhythmically induced stress shifts occur in order to comply with the Rhythm Rule. In English, this rule operates to prevent clashes of stressed adjacent syllables or lapses of adjacent unstressed syllables. While previous studies investigated effects on speech production and perception, this study focuses on brain responses to structures either obeying or deviating from this rule. Event-related potentials show that rhythmic regularity is relevant for language processing: rhythmic deviations evoked different ERP components reflecting the deviance from rhythmic expectancies. An N400 effect found for shifted items reflects higher costs in lexical processing due to stress deviation. The overall results disentangle lexical and rhythmical influences on language processing and complement the findings of previous studies on rhythmical processing.

L2 ACQUISITION OF PROSODIC PROPERTIES OF SPEECH RHYTHM

This study examines the development of speech rhythm in second language (L2) learners of typologically different first languages (L1s) at different levels of proficiency. An empirical investigation of durational variation in L2 English productions by L1 Mandarin learners and L1 German learners compared to native control values in English and the learners’ L1s showed that the L1 groups followed comparable developmental paths in their acquisition of vocalic variability and accentual lengthening. However, the two L1 groups diverged in the proportion of vocalic materials in their L2 utterances, exhibiting L2 acquisition patterns that are consistent with direct transfer from the L1. The results support a multisystemic model of L2 rhythm acquisition in which the various linguistic-systemic properties that contribute to speech rhythm are acquired at different proficiency levels and depend on different acquisition processes with respect to L1 influence and universal effects. We conclude that theories of L2 phonology need to be able to accommodate the multisystemic nature of L2 prosodic acquisition. Additionally, L2 phonological acquisition theories, and SLA theories more generally, should take into account the nonuniform manner in which the various prosodic properties of the interlanguage reflect L1 transfer effects as well as universal constraints on acquisition.

Rhythm's gonna get you

Dr Marion Long explains how the natural rhythm of language can be used as a classroom tool to improve literacy levels, particularly among reluctant readers.

The rhythm of style and language in Ayi Kwei Armah's novels

The rhythm of style and language in Ayi Kwei Armah's novels

The Evolutionary Origins of Rhythm: A Top-down/bottom-up Approach to Temporal Patterning in Music and Language

Music and language are two of the most prominent human features. Both systems rely, among others, on the human cognitive ability for rhythm (Kotz & Schwartze, 2010; Patel, 2003, 2006), intended as patterning over time (McAuley, 2010). It is however unclear: (i) when and how humans evolved rhythmic abilities, (ii) whether these were direct results of pressures for language or music, or simply by-products of other evolutionary processes (Patel, 2010), and (iii) the degree of overlap between rhythm in language and music cognition (Cason & Schön, 2012). At the same time, rhythm and synchronization are truly cross-disciplinary concepts, broadly employed not only in musicology and linguistics, but also in cognitive psychology, biology, and physics (Cummins, 2012; Greenfield & Roizen, 1993; Patel & Daniele, 2003; Pikovsky, Rosenblum, & Kurths, 2003; Strogatz & Stewart, 1993; Winfree, 1986). This often creates conflicts between definitions and assumptions from different disciplines (Cummins, 2012). In this talk, I present my ongoing work, trying to unveil the evolutionary bases of time patterning, and to build a unifying, theoretical framework for rhythm, transcending specific disciplines. I argue how a broad comparative approach, comparing different animal species (including humans), can inform us on the evolutionary origins of the cognitive ability to process rhythm (Fitch, 2012; Honing et al., 2012; Ravignani et al., 2013). I describe three parallel and complementary lines of research to understand the origins of rhythm. First, I introduce a theoretical framework providing a common platform for the interdisciplinary study of rhythm in music and language (Ravignani, Bowling, & Kirby, in press). The framework I propose, the “hierarchy of coupled oscillations”, attempts to connect human music, dance and phonology on one side, to occurrences of synchronization and chorusing in non-human animals (as in fireflies or crickets) on the other side (Hagen & Bryant, 2003; Hagen & Hammerstein, 2009). Second, I present some preliminary results on group synchronization in an agent-based model of chorusing, aimed at investigating rhythmic abilities in pre-musical hominids (Merker, Madison, & Eckerdal, 2009). In particular, I suggest how rhythmic complexity can emerge from simple, local interactions. This bottom-up approach is particularly useful in finding out which rhythmic features can in principle exist without centralized processing (Ravignani, 2014). In parallel, using a top-down approach, I describe some experimental pilot work investigating the cognitive abilities for rhythm in our closest living relatives: the chimpanzees. Chimpanzees naturally “drum” in the wild (Arcadi, Robert, & Boesch, 1998). Building on this natural predisposition, I describe the development and pilot testing of a new tool to sonify apes’ movements (Ravignani et al., 2013). Ongoing experiments with this “Prima-Drum” will serve to: (i) investigate the temporal nature of drumming patterns in chimpanzees, (ii) compare them to those found in music and language, and (iii) ascertain chimpanzees’ abilities in discriminating and copying human-produced rhythms (as described in phonology and music theory research).

A Parallel Connection-Simulation Paradigm of Intelligent Robot - Based on Integrated Control of Language, Music and Motion Rhythm by Human Brain

In light of the integrated control of language, music and motion rhythm by human brain, the paper proposes a preliminary scheme to overcome a long-standing obstacle in the design paradigm of contemporary intelligent robot, i.e., by employing a set of simulated rhythm sensing systems and without changing the hard drive capacity, it offers a solution to the contradiction between synchronization of perception, planning and execution and excessive calculation task, thus fulfilling the long dream of "bottleneck breaking through"

“Cries and cracks”: “animal” rhythms in Ezra Pound’s translations from Arnaut Daniel

This article looks at Ezra Pound’s translation of the troubadour Arnaut Daniel’s canso “L’aura amara” as a way of studying what Pound’s practice of translation shows us about his conception and practice of rhythm. According to Pound, the interest in Daniel’s canso lies in its onomatopoeia, its imitation of birdsong; this view accords with suggestions in Pound’s writings that rhythm in language is a manifestation of physiology. But Pound also sees rhythm through the prism of translation, suggesting for example that foreign-language poems may be a source of rhythms for English verse. The article thus looks at the way Pound’s translation builds on the sound patterning of Arnaut’s canso to distort and specify the rhythms of English. The purpose of the article is to show that rhythm in Arnaut Daniel’s canso may be described as the interaction of phonemic composition, accentual prominence, and syntax; and that Pound’s translation works with several aspects of Arnaut’s writing—the use of short lines, enjambment, and the specific prosodic treatment of the pronoun mi—to make his translation a prosodic experiment, inseparable from contemporary work on the possibilities of free verse. In that it makes English speech rhythms “unnatural” and ambiguous, Pound’s “L’aura amara” invents a specific subject of self-estrangement refracted through the discourse of courtly love, a translating subject.

Chorusing, synchrony, and the evolutionary functions of rhythm.

A central goal of biomusicology is to understand the biological basis of human musicality. One approach to this problem has been to compare core components of human musicality (relative pitch perception, entrainment, etc.) with similar capacities in other animal species. Here we extend and clarify this comparative approach with respect to rhythm. First, whereas most comparisons between human music and animal acoustic behavior have focused on spectral properties (melody and harmony), we argue for the central importance of temporal properties, and propose that this domain is ripe for further comparative research. Second, whereas most rhythm research in non-human animals has examined animal timing in isolation, we consider how chorusing dynamics can shape individual timing, as in human music and dance, arguing that group behavior is key to understanding the adaptive functions of rhythm. To illustrate the interdependence between individual and chorusing dynamics, we present a computational model of chorusing agents relating individual call timing with synchronous group behavior. Third, we distinguish and clarify mechanistic and functional explanations of rhythmic phenomena, often conflated in the literature, arguing that this distinction is key for understanding the evolution of musicality. Fourth, we expand biomusicological discussions beyond the species typically considered, providing an overview of chorusing and rhythmic behavior across a broad range of taxa (orthopterans, fireflies, frogs, birds, and primates). Finally, we propose an “Evolving Signal Timing” hypothesis, suggesting that similarities between timing abilities in biological species will be based on comparable chorusing behaviors. We conclude that the comparative study of chorusing species can provide important insights into the adaptive function(s) of rhythmic behavior in our “proto-musical” primate ancestors, and thus inform our understanding of the biology and evolution of rhythm in human music and language.

The Classification of Languages and Dialects into Rhythm Classes and the Production of Non-native English Prosody: A Comparative Study

The world's languages are generally classified into two categories on the basis of their rhythmic organization. The most well-known classification, proposed by Pike (1945), is the stress-timed language classification, in which stresses tend to recur at regular time intervals. English is one example of such a language category. Syllable-timed languages, where all syllables - stressed or unstressed - are produced at equal duration, are exemplified by French. Later, a third group was equally proposed: mora-timed languages, exemplified by Japanese and Tamil. A mora is a unit of timing. Each mora takes the same length of time to say (Ladefoged, 1975). However, the main problem in categorizing these types of languages was trying to find experimental evidence or acoustic correlates of language rhythm in the speech signal. Since the late 1960s, linguists have been trying to provide empirical support for the isochrony/regularity theory with varying degrees of success. The most that can be said for its legitimization is that a tendency toward isochrony is best felt at a perceptual level. In this research, it was hypothesized that a perceptual study could generate more convincing results relevant to rhythm typology. This approach has been adopted by using discrimination experiments based on spectral inversion in order to decide the rhythmic status of many languages as well as many Arabic and English dialects. Based upon the results of this study, it made sense for listeners to use rhythm as an essential cue to classify languages and dialects according to their rhythmic properties. Listeners were also able to perceive rhythmic differences between languages and dialects belonging to the same rhythm class. This implies the possibility of subclasses of broad rhythmic categories (Ghazali et al., 2002; Hamdi et al., 2005; Ben Abda, 2004). When non-native speakers of English produced read and spontaneous speech, they tended to use some of their first language prosodic features in the production of English suprasegmentals, which resulted in differences between native and non-native English in terms of rhythm and stress.