Phonological properties of Czech verse and prose compared
| Authors | |
|---|---|
| Year of publication | 2016 |
| Type | Article in Proceedings |
| Conference | Beiträge zum 19. Arbeitstreffen der Europäischen Slavistischen Linguistik (Polyslav) |
| MU Faculty or unit | |
| Citation | |
| Field | Linguistics |
| Keywords | phonology; syllable; euphony; phonological corpus; poetry; prose; verse |
| Description | This paper provides a quantitative phonological analysis of the complete works of six Czech poets in comparison with three Czech prose texts. The comparison is focused on degrees of euphony according to criteria proposed posthumously by a Czech phonetician. It is shown that verse obtains lower values for most of the supposedly more euphonious phonological properties (such as the comparative frequency of vowels or open syllables), a finding that is supported by previous statistical analyses, even though these were based mostly on prose. Whether this means that prose is more euphonious than verse or that the criteria used are not reliable, is an open question, but it strongly suggests that verse should be paid more attention in phonological analyses of Czech. |
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