(of a language) characterized by a rhythm in which primary stresses occur at roughly equal intervals, irrespective of the number of unstressed syllables in between. English is a stress-timed language.
（语言）重音时制的，重音节拍的。与SYLLABLE-TIMED 相对
Contrasted with syllable-timed
Example sentencesExamples
There is not total agreement among linguists about the stress-timed nature of English.
Native speakers do it automatically, but the speaker of a syllable-timed language who tries to learn a stress-timed language will probably have great trouble mastering the new arrangement of sound patterns.
Many accents of English are said to display mainly stress-timed rhythm.
It is called the stress-timed rhythm of English.
If syllables tend to be pronounced faster in longer words, van Santen suggests that this may be because there is more phonetic redundancy in long words, rather than because English is ‘stress-timed’.
Japanese is probably the most perfect example of a syllable-timed language, but French and Brazilian Portuguese are also syllable-timed while Russian and English are markedly stress-timed languages.
In other languages, which are not stress-timed the stress would fall more equally on each word and syllable.
Therefore some researchers argue for a distinction between stress-timed languages and syllable-timed languages.
Definition of stress-timed in US English:
stress-timed
adjectivestrɛs taɪmd
(of a language) characterized by a rhythm in which primary stresses occur at roughly equal intervals, irrespective of the number of unstressed syllables in between. English is a stress-timed language.
（语言）重音时制的，重音节拍的。与SYLLABLE-TIMED 相对
Contrasted with syllable-timed
Example sentencesExamples
If syllables tend to be pronounced faster in longer words, van Santen suggests that this may be because there is more phonetic redundancy in long words, rather than because English is ‘stress-timed’.
In other languages, which are not stress-timed the stress would fall more equally on each word and syllable.
Many accents of English are said to display mainly stress-timed rhythm.
There is not total agreement among linguists about the stress-timed nature of English.
Native speakers do it automatically, but the speaker of a syllable-timed language who tries to learn a stress-timed language will probably have great trouble mastering the new arrangement of sound patterns.
Japanese is probably the most perfect example of a syllable-timed language, but French and Brazilian Portuguese are also syllable-timed while Russian and English are markedly stress-timed languages.
Therefore some researchers argue for a distinction between stress-timed languages and syllable-timed languages.