Systematic changes in pronunciation associated with languages and dialects. Includes segmental and prosodic changes. Sound-change is usually used in a diachronic sense and does not refer to the transient or adaptive changes of an individual.
Questions tagged [sound-change]
160 questions
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Do sound changes have a preferred direction?
Considering a pair of sounds (e.g. [b] and [v], although any related pair will do), are they more likely to change in one direction, or are they equally likely to change in either direction? If sound change is measurably directional, which qualities…
CJ Dennis
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How does "-age" come from L "-aticum", with a change from "t" to "g"?
-age (wiktionary)
From Old French -age, from Latin -aticum.
Cognates include Spanish -aje and Italian -aggio.
-age (etymonline)
word-forming element in nouns of act, process, function, condition, from Old French and French -age, from L.L. -aticum…
archenoo
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Is there a sound change from [ɡ] to [i] or [j]?
Is there a sound change from [ɡ] to [i] or [j]?
Also, is it possible for [i] to become [ɡ] or only vice versa (as what I'm looking for).
I looked for information about it on Google and it was difficult to me to find it.
Ubiquitous Student
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What does it mean for consonant/ vowel sound to shift?
In this site,
With weak verbs, consonant sounds shift, often in the form of suffixes (endings) added onto the stem.
In the case of strong verbs, the vowel sound shifts, often within the stem.
What exactly does it mean for the sound to shift?
tryst with freedom
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When did the sound change from t in PIE to th in Proto-Germanic?
From Proto-Indo-European, the t sound sometimes changed to th in Proto-Germanic, which in turn gave English the same th sound. However, I'm not sure when this change happened. I watched a video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ky7SjFRsFs and it…
Number File
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Similarities and differences
Why is it that Spanish and Italian are freakishly similar (for the most part) whilst French* and German are in some sense alien tongue when compared to the former two, even though geographically the countries are pretty close by?
*Alright, perhaps…
Artemisia
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How fast does sound change occur?
Just what it says on the tin, really ─ how fast do sound changes happen? Since sound changes are generally individual rules, how many of them would occur in, say, a 100-year range? How much variation is there?
nearsighted
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Why do flag and Latin flagrare have similar sound?
When I was reading the definition of conflagration, I found that it was from the latin word, flagare. This word has the word flag in it, and it is cognate with the word flagrant. However, I saw the word flag in it and I don’t know why. Latin and…
Fly Black
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