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I was surprised to see that the primary stress in the phrase "Little Red Riding Hood" falls into the first syllable in "Riding". I expected the primary stress would fall into the word "Hood" since "Riding" is the action that is clearly NOT supported by the "Hood".

This pattern is quite popular for many English words for example "Running Water", "Talking Head", "Falling Star". There are exceptions as always but there're reasons behind those things historically or linguistically. However, I can't find any resources that explain why "Little Red Riding Hood" is stressed that way.

Could someone help to give me some hints?

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    Tradition? It's effectively a personal name, not an item of clothing. Also, it's "riding".
    – Stuart F
    May 9 at 13:15
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    @EdwinAshworth, I'm aware of what's in the question's answer. It's indeed mentioned in a book by Beverly Collins and Inger M. Mess.
    – Tran Khanh
    May 9 at 14:28
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    No, 'Riding' isn't her real name, but (according to the story) she is known by the nickname 'Little Red Riding Hood' because she is a little girl who usually wears a red hood.
    – Kate Bunting
    May 9 at 16:26
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    You have accepted a somewhat incorrect answer! It's probably best to wait a couple of days before accepting an answer. Many other people may have interesting (or more accurate) things to say. But they may not bother to write you an answer if you have already accepted one. It's perhaps worth looking at my comment to Tchrist and Rosie under the currently selected answer. [By the way, Inger's surname is Mees, not Mess!!! ;-) ]
    – Araucaria - Him
    May 10 at 14:10
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    compounds and phrases: compound nouns vs free combinations & collocations has the answer (Greg Lee): 'Telling the difference between a compound noun and a modified noun is not straightforward, but one way that often works is to consider the stress. A modified noun has primary stress at the end, while a compound noun has stress at the beginning. There are exceptions....'
    – Edwin Ashworth
    May 10 at 16:08

4 Answers 4

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In "running water" and your other examples, the first word is an adjective. By contrast, in "riding hood", "riding" is an adjunct specifying the kind of hood. Such adjuncts are usually stressed more than the nouns they modify. Examples: swimming cap, riding jacket.

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    This is the correct answer. Nouns get stressed, but adjectives do not: RUNNING shoes vs running WATER. The hood is for riding. It is not a hood that is riding.
    – tchrist ♦
    May 9 at 13:47
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    @Rosie F Thanks for the answer, it's something I didn't know of. Are there any books, articles mentioning this specific case (I guess yes)?
    – Tran Khanh
    May 9 at 14:33
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    Likewise, voting machine, sewing machine, answering machine, adding machine, washing machine, calling card (where the stress position is the same as in credit card, and for the same reason), ironing board, running shoes. Ok, ok, I‘love stop here.
    – PaulTanenbaum
    May 9 at 14:58
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    @tchrist Not quite! Attributive adjectives are adjuncts. Those words, "running" etc, are also adjuncts, but they are verbs, not adjectives. The difference in stress is due to the fact that riding hood is a compound noun. Compound nouns (as a rough generalisation - there are lots of subrules) are stressed on the first word. Note that the water runs, the heads talk, the star falls, but that the hood does not ride!!! Note as well that a ['smoking 'jacket] is on fire whilst a ['smoking jacket] isn't!
    – Araucaria - Him
    May 9 at 22:20
  • @Araucaria Good point. "Bright falling star": "bright" modifies "star". "Brightly shining star": "brightly" modifies "shining" and is an adverb because "shining" is a verb.
    – Rosie F
    May 10 at 5:06
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The basic rule for compound nouns is that the first element takes stress and the second doesn't (and it doesn't matter whether the compound noun is written as one word or two). Consider:

  • 'stepping stone
  • 'handbag
  • 'aeroplane
  • 'body builder
  • 'writing paper
  • com'puter screen
  • 'walking stick

Notice that the first word in the compound noun is itself usually a noun, but may be an adjective or occasionally a verb. It makes no difference.

The compound noun "riding hood" like the compound noun "smoking jacket" or the compound "swimming costume" is regular and only takes stress on the first element.

Here, the words "little" and "red" are both attributive adjectives functioning as adjuncts within the larger noun phrase. And, for this reason, both of these words are stressed. In a run of three stressed words, the middle one is always less prominent, and so the word "red" will not be as prominent as the words "little" or "riding".

The Original Poster compares the noun phrase "'Little 'Red 'Riding Hood", which involves a compound noun, with the following noun phrases, which don't:

  • 'running 'water
  • 'falling 'star
  • 'talking 'heads

The noun phrases above all involve a noun modified by an attributive present participle verb functioning as an adjunct. Notice that adjectives are always stative in meaning whereas verbs are often dynamic. In the noun phrases above the water runs, the star is falling the heads talk. Because verbs are content words and usually stressed and the same goes for nouns, the noun phrases above have stress on both elements.

Notice, then, that we have a clear contrast here with the Original Poster's "Little Red Riding Hood". In that noun phrase, the hood is not riding! And because "riding hood" is a compound noun it only has a single lexical stress, which is exactly what we should expect.

Ain't English fun!

That's all, folks!

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    I think you mean "That's all, folks!" But I suppose you could mean your entire answer was folksy in the extreme, in which case never mind. ^_^
    – Robusto
    May 10 at 14:02
  • @Robusto Roger!
    – Araucaria - Him
    May 10 at 14:03
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    Also +1 for your answer, so you know I'm not just a cheapskate critic.
    – Robusto
    May 10 at 14:04
  • An interesting albeit very contrived example: compare "The hunters went down to the pond to shoot the drinking game" vs. "The college students were playing a drinking game."
    – alphabet
    May 10 at 15:28
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    @EdwinAshworth I meant to Greg Lee.
    – Araucaria - Him
    May 10 at 23:13
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Running water is water that runs; talking heads are heads that talk; a falling star is a star that falls. But a riding hood is not a hood that rides; it is a hood for riding.

Suppose you are a runner, and you take water on your runs to keep you hydrated. Somebody asks you for a sip; you might say "No, that's my running water!" with the stress on running.

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  • +1 Nice example.
    – Araucaria - Him
    May 10 at 22:38
  • +! This does provide me another perspective!
    – Tran Khanh
    May 11 at 4:42
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The fact is that "riding" is the initial spelling that is found in "riding hood".

(The Free Dictionary) riding hood
A hood formerly worn by women when riding
A kind of cloak with a hood.

"little red ridding hood" is extremely rare, and most probably a spelling error.

enter image description here

From A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language this compound should be stressed on "riding".

(CoGEL § I.63)

[A] 'SWIMMING ˌPOOL : verbal noun in -ing + adverbial (consisting of a prepositional phrase; cf  'X swims in the pool'). This is a very productive type. Several adverbial relations are involved […]. For example:

PLACE

                    diving board ['dive from a board']
                    drinking cup ['drink from a cup']
[…]

INSTRUMENTAL

                    ad'ding machine ['add with a machine']
                    baking powder ['bake with powder']

                    walking stick ['walk with a stick']

                    riding hood ['ride with a hood']
[…]

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    The question isn't about spelling at all; OP made a spelling mistake incidental to the question.
    – Karl Knechtel
    May 9 at 22:32
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    "Little red ridding hood" is not only rare, it's non-existent. It says so in the ngram plot itself "Ngrams not found: little red ridding hood"
    – Mari-Lou A
    May 9 at 23:19
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    Are you sure the book says "ride with a hood" wouldn't it be "a hood for riding"? An exposed head while riding a horse, especially when the English weather is quite intemperate, could lead to colds, sniffles and the like.
    – Mari-Lou A
    May 9 at 23:23
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    The analysis: ride with a hood [ride with a hood] is in block quotes as if you were quoting from the CGEL when in actual fact you've added that interpretation yourself. The hood does not make riding a horse any easier whereas a stick can make it easier to walk for someone who is slightly or severely impaired. As for red ridding hood if there are four or even three examples within Google books that's quite an easy thing to find..Can you find and post the link to one example of usage?
    – Mari-Lou A
    May 10 at 5:15
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    You mean the casual non-native speaker's head when they don't know the difference between the verbs rid and ride. Why are you insisting that this misspelling has relevance. It does not. (EDIT You've admitted it is probably a misspelling.) yay
    – Mari-Lou A
    May 10 at 9:46

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