Languages & Linguistics
Phonetic Assimilation
Phonetic assimilation refers to the process in which a sound becomes more like a neighboring sound in a word. This can occur when a sound is influenced by the characteristics of a nearby sound, such as becoming voiced or voiceless. Phonetic assimilation is a common phenomenon in many languages and can affect the pronunciation of words.
Written by Perlego with AI-assistance
4 Key excerpts on "Phonetic Assimilation"
eBook - PDFOn Germanic Linguistics
Issues and Methods
- Irmengard Rauch, Gerald F. Carr, Robert L. Kyes, Irmengard Rauch, Gerald F. Carr, Robert L. Kyes(Authors)
- 2011(Publication Date)
- De Gruyter Mouton(Publisher)
Assimilation in Germanic Robert L. Kyes 1. Introduction Conditioned sound changes are commonly grouped under four major types: insertion or deletion of segments, reordering of segments, dissim-ilation, and assimilation (Jeffers — Lehiste 1982: 3). Of these, assimilation is perhaps the most common (Arlotto 1972: 81). There is widespread agreement, furthermore, on what assimilation is, on the articulatory adjustments involved, and on its various possible manifestations. According to Arlotto (1972: 81), assimilation can be considered a simplification of the muscular movements needed to pro-nounce a given word and may involve the point of articulation, manner of articulation, or voice, or any combination of these. Jeffers — Lehiste (1982: 3) see assimilation as any situation in which two sounds having a syntagmatic, or linear, relationship become more like one another or, in terms of features, as a change in marking for a feature of one segment to agree with the marking for another segment in the vicinity. Assimilation is not so infrequent or exceptional a process as might be inferred from its rather cursory treatment in the handbooks. Lass (1984: 199) asserts that most natural articulatory processes are assimilative, in that they prolong an articulatory gesture over longer stretches of speech and thereby reduce the number of discrete gestures in a sequence. By pronouncing embar 'pail' as emmar, for example, the speaker of Old Saxon prolonged the nasality of the first segment through the second segment by eliminating the gesture that would have resulted in velic closure and directed the air-flow into the oral cavity. The articulatory adjustment can be a continuation of a gesture through a following segment (progressive assimilation), or it can be in anticipation of a following gesture (regressive assimilation). Both are richly docu-mented in the Germanic corpora. It seems clear, however, that there is little correlation between type of assimilation, i.
eBook - PDFLinguistics for Everyone
An Introduction
- Kristin Denham, Anne Lobeck(Authors)
- 2012(Publication Date)
- Cengage Learning EMEA(Publisher)
In children’s acquisition of language, assimilation is a very common process. One example of this process is assimilation of voiced sounds, so a word like paper with two voiceless /p/s may Figure 4.1 Children spell things as they hear them. This young student has written ‘Room 12 is a good class. We do lots of art. In art we do pictures. Lots of reading too. We read from our book box and from our. . . .’ (Used by permission of Brian Pahl.) Some recent product names use , including Bratz, Myntz, Squirtz, Catz, and Dogz. Of these examples, however, only Dogz mimics pronunciation, the others being nearly impossible to pronounce with a /z/ rather than an /s/ since assimilation is hard at work! (Used by permission of Brian Pahl.) Copyright 2012 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part. Due to electronic rights, some third party content may be suppressed from the eBook and/or eChapter(s). Editorial review has deemed that any suppressed content does not materially affect the overall learning experience. Cengage Learning reserves the right to remove additional content at any time if subsequent rights restrictions require it. 112 • CHAPTER 4 Phonology: The Sound Patterns of Language assimilate to the voicing of the neighboring vowels, resulting in a pronun-ciation like the following: paper /bebə/ The child changes the voiceless /p/s to voiced sounds to assimilate to the voiced vowels, resulting in voicing across the board. This also happens in adult variations. So for some speakers (including adults), an /s/ between two vowels becomes voiced, resulting in /z/: casserole /kæsərol/ → /kæzərol/ Leslie /lɛsli/ → /lɛzli/ In fact, much dialectal variation is a result of assimilation.
eBook - PDF- Hans Henrich Hock(Author)
- 2020(Publication Date)
- De Gruyter Mouton(Publisher)
5. Sound change: Assimilation, weakening, loss Most of the processes covered in this chapter belong to the category of regular sound change. In fact, among conditioned sound changes, these processes make up the bulk of regular change. (Changes which are not normally regular will be specially noted.) 5.1. Assimilatory changes 5.1.1. General; Greek-letter variables The process of assimilation can be illustrated by the history of the word assimilation. It is derived from Lat. assimilare 'to assimilate', which in turn is composed of a prefix ad-, a root or stem similsimul-'similar, like', and a verbal suffix -are. In the word assimilare, then, the final -d of the prefix has assimilated, i. e. become similar in pronunciation, to the initial s-of simil- cf. (1). (1) d > s I s In assimilare, the process of assimilation has gone all the way, making the 'assimilated' segment identical in pronunciation to the following /. Such a development is referred to as complete assimilation. Note that the outcome of this process is a double or geminate [ss], with roughly twice the length of a single [s]. (If in languages like English, assimilation is pronounced with a single [s], that results from a separate process of degemination, for which cf. 5.2 and 5.3.2.) Assimilation can also be partial, affecting only a subset of a given segment's features. Compare the Sanskrit data in (2) and the Latin examples in (4). The respective sound changes are formulated in (3) and (5). As can be seen, the assimilation of stops to following stops affects only their voicing, and the assimilation of nasals to following stops is limited to their place of articulation. Otherwise, these segments 62 5. Assimilation, weakening, loss retain their original identity. (The data given here are synchronic, but the changes did take place at some point in history.) (2) Skt.
eBook - PDF- Ralph W. Fasold, Jeff Connor-Linton(Authors)
- 2014(Publication Date)
- Cambridge University Press(Publisher)
Assimilation may be either local , when the two sounds are next to each other, or long-distance , where two sounds seem to affect each other even through other intervening segments. Voicing assimilation is one very common alternation across languages. In English, the plural suf fi x agrees in voicing with a previous stop: two cats [kæts] and two dogs [dagz]. Another example is seen in Russian. The Russian word for ‘ from ’ is either [ot] or [od]: [od vzbút ʃ ki] ‘ from a scolding, ’ [ot fspléska] ‘ from a splash. ’ Local assimilation may also affect place of articulation. The English negative pre fi x in -is an example of a nasal assimilating in place of articulation to a following stop ( indecent vs. impossible ). Another example comes from Twi, a language of West Africa. [barselona] ‘ Barcelona ’ [a β arselona] ‘ to Barcelona ’ [bola] ‘ ball ’ [la β ola] ‘ the ball ’ [data] ‘ date ’ [la ð ata] ‘ the date ’ [gata] ‘ female cat ’ [la ɣ ata] ‘ the female cat ’ me-p ɛ ‘ I like ’ me-m-p ɛ ‘ I do not like ’ me-t ɔ ‘ I buy ’ me-n-t ɔ ‘ I do not buy ’ me-ka ‘ I say ’ me-ŋ -ka ‘ I do not say ’ 51 The sounds of language The morpheme that means ‘ not ’ in Twi has three different allomorphs. It is always produced as a nasal consonant, but the nasal takes on the place of articulation of whatever consonant it ’ s next to – bilabial next to bilabial, velar next to velar, etc. The most extreme type of local assimilation is complete assimilation: two sounds that are next to each other become identical. Complete assimilation of adjacent vowels is found in many West African languages. In Yoruba, for example [ow o ] ‘ money ’ plus [ e po] ‘ oil ’ becomes [ow ee po] ‘ oil money. ’ In Igbo, [nwok e ] ‘ man ’ plus [ a ] ‘ determiner ’ becomes [nwo kaa ] ‘ that man. ’ The English pre fi x / ɪ n/ can also undergo complete assimilation in certain words. Before most consonants, the nasal assimilates just to the place of articula-tion, as in impartial .
Index pages curate the most relevant extracts from our library of academic textbooks. They’ve been created using an in-house natural language model (NLM), each adding context and meaning to key research topics.
