Prosodist

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A scholar or specialist who studies the rhythm, meter, and sound patterns of verse
2. Someone skilled in the study of poetic meter, stress, and the musical structure of language
3. A person who analyzes or teaches the principles of versification and the patterns of poetic sound

Etymology: Prosody began as a Greek word for something sung along with the music. Ancient Greek "prosōidia" was built from "pros", meaning "to" or "towards", and "ōidē", a song, so the original sense was an accompaniment added to a melody. Latin borrowed it as "prosodia", and it reached English through Middle French, where it came to mean the rules governing the sound and stress of verse. The term was a technical one from the start, used for the patterns of syllable length and stress in poetry. "Prosodist" is a simple formation: the noun "prosody" with the suffix "-ist", which in English marks a person who studies or practises a field. A prosodist, then, is a specialist in the metrical and rhythmic rules of verse. The suffix came into English from Old French, and its Greek ancestor "-istēs" named a person connected with a particular practice, so the word is a plain agent noun with nothing hidden in it.

Synonyms: prosodian