Word: Prosody

You Pronounce It: [pros-uh-dee]

Meaning: noun
1. the science or study of poetic meters and versification.
2. a particular or distinctive system of metrics and versification:
Milton’s prosody.
3. Linguistics. the stress and intonation patterns of an utterance.

Origin:

1400-50; late Middle English < Latin prosōdia < Greek prosōidía tone or accent, modulation of voice, song sung to music, equivalent to prós toward + ōid

I heard it:

In class as we were discussing “Contextualization Cues”by Gumperz.

Works Cited:

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/prosody