Prosody - the  study of suprasegmental features 

(phonetic  features involving more than a single segment)

Syllable  division of sound flow according to relative openness of sounds

English has a rich variety of syllable types.

SYLLABLE TYPES in ENGLISH

v cv vc cvc ccvc cccvc cccvccc svcccc
a ma it hit spin strip strengths sixths [sIksTs]

ONSET (the beginning of the syllable)

PEAK (the open part of the syllable, usually a vowel)

CODA (any consonant sound that ends a syllable)

RHYME (everything but the onset; the peak and coda together)

OPEN SYLLABLE - has no coda         CLOSED SYLLABLE - has a coda

cv is the most common syllable type, found in every language.

Other Prosodic Features

stress (accent)  relative loudness and tenseness of syllable peak

pitch (tone)  relative frequency of syllable peak

Prosodic domain - syllable, word, intonation phrase, utterance

intonation - domain of pitch and stress is the phrase -every language

word stress languages - stress is non tonal, one each word

fixed stress -

word-initial - Czech, Hungarian

word-final - Turkish, French

penultimate, next to last, syllable - in Polish

no word stress -Cambodian

dynamic stress - Russian, English

pitch-accent languages -domain of pitch and stress is the word (Ancient Greek)

tone languages  domain of pitch is the syllable (East Asia, West Africa)

            CONTOUR TONE - syllabic pitch rises or falls on a single syllable

            REGISTER TONE - syllabic pitch distinguished only by height