• Syllables (English) vs Mora (Japanese)

What is a syllable?

A syllable (Ancient Greek: óõëëáâÞ) is a unit of organization for a sequence of speech sounds. It is typically made up of a syllable nucleus (most often a vowel) with optional initial and final margins (typically, consonants).

Syllables are often considered the phonological "building blocks" of words. They can influence the rhythm of a language, its prosody, its poetic meter, its stress patterns, etc.

A word that consists of a single syllable (like English cat) is called a monosyllable (such a word is monosyllabic), while a word consisting of two syllables (like monkey) is called a disyllable (such a word is disyllabic).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syllable

Q. Can you think of an English word with three syllables? Four syllables? Five? More?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Longest_word_in_English#.22Official.22_longest_word

Syllable is a unit of structure (organization) AND a unit of timing in English.

Syllable is a unit of structure (?) and MORA is a unit of timing in Japanese.

(MORA is similar to kana in Japanese)

Q. What is the longest word you can think of in Japanese?

http://www.sf.airnet.ne.jp/ts/japanese/message/jpnEvOa-UATEvOV25cD.html

Q. Can you write a haiku in English?

• 1. Syllable structure

open syllables: (C)(C)(C) V only

closed syllables: (C)(C)(C) V C (C)(C)(C)

Q. Is every kana an open syllable?

• ENGLISH syllable structure : (C)(C)(C)V (C)(C)(C)

Syllable internal structure : onset (C) vs. rhyme V (C)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syllable

• JAPANESE syllable structure : Strong mora (weak mora) = (C)V (W)

This reflects Japanese mora structure :

(strong mora) (C)V (weak mora) [:] or [n] or [Q]

Syllable internal structure : head (C) V coda (C)

heavy syllable = has two moras

light syllable = has only one mora

2. Syllable (mora) timing vs. stress timing

Syllable or mora timing: each syllable (or mora) takes about the same time when pronounced

Question: In Japanese: do /shinbun/ and /furikake/ take the same amount of time?

Stress timing: some syllables are more "important" than others; that is, they are stressed and others are unstressed, and the beat falls on the stressed syllables. English, German, Dutch

Timing carries over into English : Hawaiian English, Japanese English, Chinese English, Spanish English are syllable-timed.

3. Syllable structure and timing are connected:

Languages with more complex syllables usually have stress timing.