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Language poetry tradition

Tradition
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

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The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

The experimental American movement emphasizing linguistic materiality

Detailed Definition
Language poetry tradition is a late 20th-century avant-garde movement (Bernstein, Hejinian) that foregrounds language as material rather than transparent medium, emphasizing disjunction, polysemy, and reader participation; rejecting expressive subjectivity, it uses fragmentation, parataxis, and textual play to expose ideology in syntax, making the poem a site of linguistic investigation rather than personal confession.
Example
Example in poetry:
Language poetry: Charles Bernstein’s fragmented syntax; “Words resist meaning, embrace noise”; Focus on materiality of language; Rejects narrative for linguistic play; Influenced by Dada and post-structuralism; Challenges reader’s expectations.
Additional Notes
Poetic practice treating language as opaque, exploring signification itself. Related to Language poetry movement and poststructuralism. Often experimental and non-narrative. Study how sound/visual patterns create meaning independent of reference.
Also Known As
experimental American poetry avant-garde linguistics
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