Marc van Oostendorp, born in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, in 1967. Ph.D. from Tilburg University. Researcher of Variational Linguistics at Meertens Institute.
KB Fellow (1 September 2013 – 31 January 2014)
RHYME AND REASON IN DIGITAL HUMANITIES
Research Question
How did iambic rhythm get introduced into Dutch fourteenth/fifteenth-century poetry, and to what extent can this be found out by electronic means?
Project Description
In the course of the 14/15th Century, the traditional ‘Germanic’ rhythm in poetry (a fixed number of beats in a line, but no fixed number of intermediary unstressed syllables) was replaced by a more regular (iambic/trochaic) rhythm, borrowed from Italian humanists, with every beat preceded or followed by exactly one unstressed syllable. How did this happen? And: how can we find out by computational means?
Selected Publications
1) Coloured Containment. A Theory of Faithfulness in Phonology. Berlin: Mouton-De Gruyter, to appear.
2) Phonology between Theory and Data. Langues et cultures 45:210-238. 2013.
3) Taalverloedering. Series of 6 cd’s for the general public. The Hague: Home Academy. 2013.