a. Recurrent patterns
It was noted at the outset that the main regional standards are associated with
the cities of Berlin, Hamburg, Hanover, Cologne, Frankfurt, Stuttgart,
Munich and Leipzig, as well as Vienna for Austrian German, and Zurich for
Swiss German, and that fundamentally these varieties share the same
prosodic properties. However, they have characteristic differences in detail.
A characteristic shared by all these German dialects is the regular foot-based
rhythm, with syllable reduction on weak syllables.
In many dialects, however, where the influence of normative grammar is less
than in the standard languages, inflectional affixes are much weaker than in
standard superstrate, or have disappeared.
Most inflectional affixes being word-final weak syllables such as
,
this has led to differences in rhythmic pattern between dialects and
the standard language.
The reductions are particularly characteristic of Southern varieties, but are
also found in many other dialects.
Rhythm is based on the regular recurrence of prominent syllables, either with or without enhancement by pitch modulation. Dialects (as well as styles of speaking) vary in the details of this modulation. In general, Southern dialects are associated with a right-displaced prominence peak; that is, the syllable perceived as being accented has low pitch, and a pitch rise, often followed by a peak, occurs on one of the following syllables (ToBI L*+H, similar to Bolinger's Accent C in English). In the standard pronunciation, the peak tends to occur on the accented syllable itself, though in some speech styles, such as telling stories to children, the right-displaced peak rhythm occurs.
The North German coastal dialects in general display features which are quite close to those of dialects of North-Eastern England. There have been no comparative studies of the intonation patterns of these areas, however.
b. Nuclear patterns
Conspicuous prosodic differences between German dialects are found
in the pitch contours of falling nuclei associated with plain statements.
Three main varieties are to be found: fall from the nuclear syllable,
a high fall from the nuclear syllable followed by a low rise,
and a delayed rise to high following the nuclear syllable, with a
fall to mid or low.
The fall from the nuclear syllable is characteristic of standard pronunciation in formal situations, and of many dialects. The other two varieties are distinctively regional, however. The high fall from the nuclear syllable followed by a low rise (ToBI H*+L L-H%) is characteristic of the intonation of Hamburg and of neighbouring coastal dialects. The delayed rise to high following the nuclear syllable, with fall to mid or low (ToBI L*+H H-H%), is common to a chain of dialects along the Rhine valley, from Switzerland (`Schwyzer Dütsch') to Cologne (`Kölsch'). Phonetically, the delayed rise is similar to displaced pitch accents and tones in other languages. Kohler has demonstrated that nuclear accent displacement of this kind is an option associated with different attitudinal meanings in Standard German pronunciation.