The prosodic features of spoken Spanish in the city of Temuco, IX region of Chile

Abstract

This article presents the results of a study that aims to characterise the prosodic features that make up the dialect variety of Spanish spoken in the city of Temuco, IX region of Chile. To do so, the methods of melodic analysis of speech, dynamic analysis and rhythmic analysis were used.

Using a corpus composed of one hundred declarative or neutral statements, corresponding to twenty informants from the city of Temuco, the main results are the presence of a rather flat melodic line, with the absence of the first peak without declination and a slight final inflection. There was also a sustained dynamic curve with an increase in intensity before the end is added, followed by an abrupt decrease even when it coincides with a stressed vowel. In addition to this, there is an increase in intensity regardless of whether it coincides with a stressed or unstressed vowel. Finally, we found a rhythmic profile with equitable distribution in the intervals of stressed and unstressed vowels, a final syllable of the phonic group shorter than its predecessors, rhythmic feet that combine the long-short and short-long schemes without an established pattern or trend to equalize the values of the rhythmic feet and then to increase or decrease the speed.