scansion

American  

[skan-shuhn] / ˈskæn ʃən /

noun

Prosody.

1. the metrical analysis of verse. The usual marks for scansion are ˘ for a short or unaccented syllable, ¯ or ′ for a long or accented syllable, ^ for a rest, | for a foot division, and ‖ for a caesura or pause.

---

scansion British  

/ ˈskænʃən /

noun

1. the analysis of the metrical structure of verse See quantity stress

---

Etymology

Origin of scansion

1645–55; < Late Latin scānsiōn- (stem of scānsiō ), Latin: a climbing, equivalent to scāns ( us ) (past participle of scandere to climb) + -iōn- -ion

Explanation

Scansion is the process of figuring out which syllables should be stressed when you read a poem. If you practice scansion in English class, you'll learn to determine a poem's meter based on the patterns of these syllables. Scansion is a fancy literary term that simply means discovering the meter (or underlying structure) of a poem by marking where the stresses naturally fall. If you're using scansion to analyze verse, you can say you're scanning the poem. Formally, scansion involves making special marks used above both stressed and unstressed syllables, allowing you to easily see repeated patterns. Since the 1670s, scansion has meant "marking verse in metric feet," from a Latin root meaning "to climb."

Example Sentences

Clarity for lyricists has to refer not just to scansion and word choice, but also how their songs are communicated.

From Washington Post • Jul. 29, 2022

There’s something about Shakespeare and the language that, as a Black performer, I naturally get: the rhythms, the scansion, the iambic pentameter.

From Los Angeles Times • Jan. 12, 2022

The effort is evident in Purple Mountains’ dense internal rhymes and honed, precise scansion.

From Slate • Jul. 11, 2019

The poems in the collection, displaying fairly conventional scansion and suffused with mythic references from Classical tradition, ancient sagas and oral verse, typify Mr. Merwin’s early style.

From New York Times • Mar. 15, 2019

It was a slip of yellow note paper, checked along the margin with groups of rhyming words and scansion marks, and in the middle this single verse.

From Hidden Water by Dixon, Maynard