prominence of a syllable in terms of differential loudness, or of pitch, or length, or of a combination of these.
degree of prominence of a syllable within a word and sometimes of a word within a phrase: primary accent; secondary accent.
a mark indicating stress (as (·, ·), or (ˈ, ˌ), or (′, ″)), vowel quality (as French grave `, acute ´, circumflex ^), form (as French la “the” versus là “there”), or pitch.
any similar mark.
Prosody.
- regularly recurring stress.
- a mark indicating stress or some other distinction in pronunciation or value.
a musical tone or pattern of pitch inherent in a particular language either as a feature essential to the identification of a vowel or a syllable or to the general acoustic character of the language.
Compare tone(def 7).
Often accents.
- the unique speech patterns, inflections, choice of words, etc., that identify a particular individual: We recognized his accents immediately. She corrected me in her usual mild accents.
- the distinctive style or tone characteristic of an author, composer, etc.: the unmistakably Brahmsian accents of the sonata; She recognized the familiar accents of Robert Frost in the poem.
a mode of pronunciation, as pitch or tone, emphasis pattern, or intonation, characteristic of or peculiar to the speech of a particular person, group, or locality: French accent; Southern accent.
Compare tone(def 5).
such a mode of pronunciation recognized as being of foreign origin: He still speaks with an accent.
Music.
- a stress or emphasis given to certain notes.
- a mark noting this.
- stress or emphasis regularly recurring as a feature of rhythm.
Mathematics.
- a symbol used to distinguish similar quantities that differ in value, as in b′, b″, b‴ (called b prime, b second or b double prime, b third or b triple prime, respectively).
- a symbol used to indicate a particular unit of measure, as feet (′) or inches (″), minutes (′) or seconds (″).
- a symbol used to indicate the order of a derivative of a function in calculus, as f′ (called f prime) is the first derivative of a function f.
words or tones expressive of some emotion.
accents,
words; language; speech: He spoke in accents bold.
distinctive character or tone: an accent of whining complaint.
special attention, stress, or emphasis: an accent on accuracy.
a detail that is emphasized by contrasting with its surroundings: a room decorated in navy blue with two red vases as accents.
a distinctive but subordinate pattern, motif, color, flavor, or the like: The salad dressing had an accent of garlic.
