Hostname: page-component-6766d58669-tq7bh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-05-18T02:12:52.766Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Meter, prosody and performance: evidence from the Faroese ballads

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2019

Daniel Galbraith
Daniel Galbraith*
Affiliation:
Stanford University, Department of Linguistics, Margaret Jacks Hall, Bldg. 460, Stanford, CA 94305, USA
*
Email for correspondence: dagalb@stanford.edu
Get access

Abstract

In this paper, I argue that the folk ballad tradition of the Faroe Islands, to date never examined in detail by metrists, offers substantial empirical support for the necessity of maintaining the classic metrical template, as well as the distinction between metrical and prosodic structure: meter is an abstraction which can neither be collapsed into phonology, nor fundamentally detached from it (Kiparsky 2006, Blumenfeld 2015, pace Hayes & MacEachern 1998, Fabb & Halle 2008). The ballad performances also reveal a unidirectional correspondence from strong metrical positions to strong dance steps and strong musical beats, indicating that metrical prominence plays a significant role in determining rhythm. The Faroese tradition thus provides a window into the relation between metrical structure and performance. In support of my conclusions I draw upon both the ballad texts and audio-visual recordings of sections of sample ballads I made on the Faroe Islands.

Keywords

metricsballad meterphonologyprosodymetrical template

Information

Type
Research Article
Information
Nordic Journal of Linguistics , Volume 42 , Issue 3 , December 2019 , pp. 227 - 261
Copyright
© Nordic Association of Linguistics 2019 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Árnason, Kristján. 2011. The Phonology of Icelandic and Faroese. Oxford: OUP.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blumenfeld, Lev. 2015. Meter as faithfulness. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 33, 79–125.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blumenfeld, Lev. 2016. End-weight effects in verse and language. Studia Metrica et Poetica 3(1), 7–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Clausen, Marianne. 2003. Faroese dance. In Clausen, Marianne (ed.), Introduction to Føroya kvæði, vol. 8. Hoyvík: Stiðin.Google Scholar
Dehé, Nicole & Wetterlin, Allison. 2013. Secondary stress in morphologically complex words in Faroese: A word game. In Härtl, Holden (ed.), Interfaces of morphology: A Festschrift for Susan Olsen, 229–248, Studia Grammatica 74, Berlin: Akademie Verlag.Google Scholar
Egholm, Sverri (ed.). 1996. Nýggja kvæðabókin [2 vols.]. Tórshavn: Lindin.Google Scholar
Fabb, Nigel & Halle, Morris. 2008. Meter in Poetry: A New Theory. Cambridge: CUP.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fafner, Jørgen. 1979. Digt og form: Klassisk og moderne verslære. København: C.A. Reitzel.Google Scholar
Grundtvig, Svend, Bloch, Jørgen, Djurhuus, N & Matras, Christian. 1941–2003 [8 vols.]. Føroya kvæði: Corpus carminum faroensium, København: Munksgård.Google Scholar
Halle, Morris & Keyser, Samuel Jay. 1966. Chaucer and the study of prosody. College English 28, 187–219.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Halle, Morris & Keyser, Samuel Jay. 1971. English Stress: Its Form, its Growth and its Role in Verse. New York: Harper and Row.Google Scholar
Hanson, Kristin & Kiparsky, Paul. 1996. A parametric theory of poetic meter. Language 72, 287–335.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hayes, Bruce & Kaun, Abigail. 1996. The role of phonological phrasing in sung and chanted verse. The Linguistic Review 13, 243–303.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hayes, Bruce & MacEachern, Margaret. 1998. Quatrain form in English folk verse. Language 74, 473–507.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hayes, Bruce & Moore-Cantwell, Claire. 2011. Gerard Manley Hopkins’ sprung rhythm: Corpus study and stochastic grammar. Phonology 28, 235–282.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hayes, Bruce, Wilson, Colin & Shisko, Anne. 2012. Maxent grammars for the metrics of Shakespeare and Milton. Language 88, 691–731.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ito, Junko & Mester, Armin. 2008. The onset of the prosodic word. In Parker, S. (ed.), Phonological Argumentation: Essays on Evidence and Motivation. London: Equinox.Google Scholar
Jonsson, Bengt. 1977. Om strofformer och rim i den nordiska ballad-traditionen. Stockholm: Svensk visarkiv.Google Scholar
Kiparsky, Paul. 1977. The rhythmic structure of English verse. Linguistic Inquiry 8, 189–247.Google Scholar
Kiparsky, Paul. 1989. Sprung rhythm. In Kiparsky, Paul & Youmans, Gilbert (eds.), Rhythm and Meter, 305–340. San Diego: Academic Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kiparsky, Paul. 2006. A modular metrics for folk verse. In Dresher, B. Elan & Friedberg, Nila (eds.), Formal Approaches to Poetry, 7–49. Berlin: Mouton.Google Scholar
Lehrdahl, Fred & Jackendoff, Ray. 1983. A Generative Theory of Tonal Music. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Luihn, Astri. 1979. Føroyskur dansur: Studier i sangtradisjonen på Færøyene. MA thesis, Universitet i Oslo. Trondheim: Rådet for folkemusikk og folkedans.Google Scholar
Piera, Carlos. 1980. Spanish Verse and the Theory of Meter. Ph.D. dissertation, UCLA.Google Scholar
Prince, Alan. 1989. Metrical forms. In Kiparsky, Paul & Youmans, Gilbert (eds.), Rhythm and Meter, 45–80. Orlando, FL: Academic Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Riad, Tomas. 2017. The meter of Tashlhiyt Berber songs. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 35, 499–548.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Selkirk, Elisabeth. 1996. The prosodic structure of function words. In Morgan, James L. & Demuth, Katherine (eds.), Signal to Syntax, 187–213. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Tarlinskaja, Marina. 1992. Metrical typology: English, German and Russian dolnik verse. Comparative Literature 44(1), 1–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tarlinskaja, Marina. 1997. Rhythm and syntax in verse: English iambic tetrameter and dolnik tetrameter (nineteenth and twentieth centuries). Poetics Today 18(1), 59–93.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Temperley, David. 2000. Meter and grouping in African music: A view from music theory. Ethnomusicology 44(1), 65–96.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Þráinsson, Höskuldur, Petersen, Hjalmar P., í Lon Jacobsen, Jógvan, Svabo Hansen, Zakaris. 2012. Faroese: An Overview and Reference Grammar. Reykjavík and Tórshavn: University of Iceland and University of the Faroe Islands.Google Scholar
Thuren, Hjalmar. 1901. Dans og kvaddigtning på Færøerne. København: Føroyingafelag.Google Scholar
Thuren, Hjalmar. 1908. Folkesangen på Færøerne. København: Carlsbergfondet.Google Scholar
Weyhe, Eivind. 1979. Færøsk skæmtevisedigtning (táttayrking). Unpublished ms.: Speciale til magisterkonferens i nordisk filologi.Google Scholar