Within-speaker variability; Between-language differences

Tempo of Speech. Types of Tempo in Speech

Plan:

1. 
   Introduction
   

Definiton for the word “Tempo”;

2. 
   Main body
   

Measurements of speech tempo;

Within-speaker variability;

Between-language differences;

3. 
   Conclusion
   
4. 
   Bibliography
   

«Tempo» of Speech. Types of «Tempo» in Speech

Tempo is a person’s speaking rate or rate of speech. Tempo is a component of prosody. However, it is also a constituent of rhythm. Rhythm in turn is a product of stress and accent. So, whilst it is convenient to consider the components of prosody separately, we must not lose sight of the fact that this is simply a convenience for discussion. The various elements of prosody (rhythm, pitch, loudness, intonation and tempo) interact in complex ways to set up a listener’s expectations about a speaker, to signal their attitude towards situations, people and things, to hint at their emotional state, and so on. Every speaker has a norm which characterises his usual individual style. Some people speak more quickly, some more slowly; some people use more variations of tempo than others.  Tempo is not one of the more frequently explored areas of speech research, and any possible consequences of tempo variation for other phonetic phenomena have all too often been taken for granted. The rate of speaking varies constantly. The speed of utterance becomes slower or faster according to the number of unstressed syllables between the stressed ones. Differences of rate help the listener to differentiate the more important (slow rate) and the less important (fast rate) parts of the utterances. Rate also performs emotional and attitudinal functions. It varies according to the emotional state of the speaker and the attitude conveyed. Fast rate may be associated with anger. Slower than normal rate may be associated with doubt, blame, accusation. Variations of rate of speech and pausation are connected with dif. phonetic styles, shades of meaning and the structure of the intonation group. Rate is varied by the speaker in accordance with the situation in which he is involved. The speaker should always choose the proper rate suitable for the occasion, if he wants to be clearly understood.  By pause we generally mean an act of stopping in the flow of speech. They break our speech or texts into paragraphs, sentences, int. groups. In English there are three main degrees of pauses: unit pause (one-unit) – used to separate int. groups, double (two-unit) – to sep. sen-ces, and treble (three-unit) – to sep. paragraphs.

What meanings does tempo convey? Tempo varies both between and within speakers. Such variations in tempo are readily noticeable by listeners. However, as Schnoebelen (2009:3) points out: “Tempo doesn’t mean one thing; nor can we say that “fast tempo” means something particular. A fast tempo has multiple meanings. Depending upon what other variables it combines with, it can mean happy, New Yorker, angry, con artist, and a number of other things. Its meaning is indeterminate and requires other cues—some of which are linguistic, others which are not. This doesn’t stop people from explicitly commenting on what “fast talkers” are like or what kinds of people talk fast.” Who talks fast and slow? Kendall (2009) claims that tempo correlates with such things as geographical region, ethnicity, gender and age. In addition, psychologists associate tempo not only to demographic categories such as these but also to personality types and emotions.  Having said this, Schnoebelen’s (2009) pilot study of 50 people gave the following answers when asked: