Tue-1-10-7 Lexical Stress in Urdu

Abstract: This study looks at the role of lexical stress in Urdu/Hindi prosody. The literature on lexical stress is divided, with some authors developing algorithms for stress assignment, while others deny its relevance for prosody. We performed three experiments to investigate this issue and find evidence that a strong increase in the duration of a syllable indicates stress and that lexical stress and phrasal intonation interact in a non-trivial manner. We also find that stress perception varies according to syllable weight with weight clash being a determining factor.