Rhythm and rhythmic variation in british english: Subjective and objective evaluation of french and native speakers

Abstract

This paper presents results from an ongoing research on the evaluation of the prosody of British English spoken by French learners and native speakers. This pilot study examines two potential rhythmic criteria: the analysis of the anacrusis/narrow rhythm unit and that of the pairwise variability index (PVI). The method used is a comparative analysis of French and native speakers' productions with on the one hand a subjective evaluation of the prosody of the speakers including the natives, and on the other hand an objective evaluation aiming at correlating acoustic parameters with the level of the speakers. This preliminary study showed interesting results: even though the level of significance was not reached the two rhythmic parameters could be considered as relevant prosodic criteria and are in need of further investigation.