Questions tagged [syllables]
A unit of organisation for a sequence of speech sounds. Consists of a nucleus with optional preceding onset and optional following coda.
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How languages compare with the number of different syllables from all words?
Note: I am not a linguist, please provide any corrections for terminology.
I would like to find some approximate data (if it exists) comparing several languages with the number of different syllables ...
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Correct syllabification in (American) English
I need to figure out what the proper syllabification of words in American English is and why. PLEASE NOTE: I am interested in syllabification from a phonetic point of view, not in terms of hyphenation/...
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Are there any languages that only allow CV syllables?
In my research online, I have found a truism that CV is the most basic syllable type cross-linguistically, and is in fact present in all languages. Other syllable types are not present in all ...
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Why do languages have different syllable complexity from each other?
Assuming human vocal tracts are similar and equally capable of articulating different syllable structures, why is it that languages develop different syllable complexity? Why is it that it is not ...
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Are there any purely monosyllabic languages in use today?
All languages in the world that I know of use words with more than one syllable. Are there any where all words have strictly one syllable? That would mean that there is just one vocal cluster per word,...
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Can a syllable be open before a lenghtened consonant?
This thread (related to this problem) can be split into two questions, the first one being restricted to Ancient Greek, the second one being more general.
(1) Let's be, by example, two syllables, the ...
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Are there languages that disallow initial vowels and lack glottal stop?
Which, if any, of the world's languages have both the following features?
Syllable-initial vowels are disallowed; all syllables must begin with a consonant.
There is no glottal stop phoneme.
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Is syllable a phonetic or a phonological concept?
Is syllable a phonetic or a phonological concept? Consider 'syllable counting' as a task: would that be regarded as a phonetic task or phonological tasks? Would it depend on whether words are ...
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Cross-linguistically, how do syllabic consonants interact with morae?
I've read a bit about the moraic system found in Japanese, but as there isn't much complexity in the case of its syllabic consonants, I am left with a few questions.
1) Are there any natural ...
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Does pre-fortis clipping only operate within a syllable? If not, what is its actual scope?
English is known to have a phenomenon of "pre-fortis clipping": in certain contexts, vowel and sonorant phonemes before a fortis/voiceless consonant are realized with shorter duration than the same ...
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Is there a computational method to syllabify English words?
There are straightforward ways to convert English words to phonemes via a dictionary that contains such information. However, is there a way to automatically convert English text into syllables? I.e., ...
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What are the most commonly used Chinese syllables?
There are about 1200 or so unique (includes all tones) Mandarin Chinese syllables, according to some source I read a while back based off the Unihan database.
For my applications I'm limited to using ...
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Are the nasal portions of prenasalized consonants syllabic?
Prenasalized consonants occur in a number of natural languages. https://wikivisually.com/wiki/Prenasalized_consonant
When I hear someone pronounce a word that begins with a prenasalized consonant, ...
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Computationally differentiating between CVC, VCV and CV syllables
I want to develop a program which can differentiate between CVC, VCV, and CV syllable types.
I'm having trouble knowing when vowel has ended in CVC and CV syllables.
I want to read more about it. ...
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Mathematics of Rhyme (perfect, slant)
I have recently been working on some programming frameworks incorporating audio analysis of the English language, particularly whether words "rhyme" or not (pure rhyme, slant rhyme, etc.)
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Why is/was Gokana claimed to lack syllables?
Wikipedia says that Gokana has been argued to lack syllables, a radical claim because syllables are traditionally considered to be universal, offers no details, but points out that later the claim has ...
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Are there languages where all syllables start with a consonant and end in a vowel?
This is a relaxed version of this question Are there any languages that only allow CV syllables? asking for strictly CV-languages. Here I want to know if there are languages with the phonology CC*VV*, ...
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Is there any proof that diphthongs exist?
I was always taught that a word contains as many syllables as it has vowels. By definition, a vowel is a sound that produces a syllable.
On the other hand, in English phonology, by definition, ...
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