Hiatus (linguistics)

Historical sound change

General

Metathesis
Dissimilation
Fortition

Lenition (weakening)

Sonorization (voicing)
Spirantization (assibilation)
Rhotacism
Debuccalization (loss of place)

Elision (loss)

Apheresis (initial)
Syncope (medial)
Apocope (final)
Haplology (similar syllables)
Fusion
Cluster reduction
Compensatory lengthening

Epenthesis (addition)

Anaptyxis (vowel)
Excrescence (consonant)
Prosthesis (initial)
Paragoge (final)
Unpacking
Vowel breaking

Assimilation

Coarticulation
Palatalization (before front vowels)
Labialization (before rounded vowels)
Final devoicing (before silence)
Vowel harmony
Consonant harmony

Cheshirisation (trace remains)

Nasalization
Tonogenesis
Floating tone

Sandhi (boundary change)

Crasis (contraction)
Liaison, linking R
Consonant mutation
Tone sandhi
Hiatus

Hiatus (Latin "yawning") (IPA: /haɪˈeɪtəs/) in linguistics is the separate pronunciation of two adjacent vowels, sometimes with an intervening glottal stop. Metathesis (məˈtæθəsɨs is a Sound change that alters the order of Phonemes in a Word. For the chemical term see Catabolism In Phonology, particularly within Historical linguistics, dissimilation is a phenomenon Fortition is a consonantal change from a 'weak' sound to a 'strong' one the opposite of the more common Lenition. Lenition is a kind of Consonant mutation that appears in many Languages Along with assimilation, it is one of the primary sources of historical change Lenition is a kind of Consonant mutation that appears in many Languages Along with assimilation, it is one of the primary sources of historical change Lenition is a kind of Consonant mutation that appears in many Languages Along with assimilation, it is one of the primary sources of historical change In Linguistics, assibilation is the term for a Sound change resulting in a Sibilant consonant Rhotacism may refer to several phenomena related to the usage of the Consonant R (whether as an Alveolar tap, Alveolar trill, or Lenition is a kind of Consonant mutation that appears in many Languages Along with assimilation, it is one of the primary sources of historical change Elision is the omission of one or more sounds (such as a Vowel, a Consonant, or a whole Syllable) in a word or phrase producing a result that is easier For other uses of the word syncope, see Syncope (disambiguation In Phonology, syncope ( Greek syn- + kopein Haplology is defined as the elimination of a Syllable when two consecutive identical or similar syllables occur In Phonetics and Historical linguistics, fusion is the merger of the features of two segment into one In Phonology and Historical linguistics, cluster reduction is the simplification of Consonant clusters in certain environments or over time Compensatory lengthening in Phonology and Historical linguistics is the lengthening of a Vowel sound that happens upon the loss of a following Consonant In Phonology, epenthesis (/əˈpɛnθəsɪs/ Ancient Greek ἐπένθεσις - epenthesis from epi "on" + en "in" In Phonology, epenthesis (/əˈpɛnθəsɪs/ Ancient Greek ἐπένθεσις - epenthesis from epi "on" + en "in" In Phonology, epenthesis (/əˈpɛnθəsɪs/ Ancient Greek ἐπένθεσις - epenthesis from epi "on" + en "in" Prothesis in Linguistics (from Greek pro "before" + tithenai "to put" is the prepending of Phonemes at the beginning of a Paragoge is the addition of a sound to the end of a word Often this is due to Nativization, and a logical counterpart of Epenthesis, particularly vocalic epenthesis In Historical linguistics and Language contact, unpacking is the separation of the features of a segment into distinct segments In Historical linguistics, vowel breaking is the change of a Monophthong into a Diphthong or Triphthong. Assimilation is a common Phonological process by which the phonetics of a speech segment becomes more like that of another segment in a word (or at a word boundary Palatalization or palatalisation (ˌpælətəlɨˈzeɪʃən generally refers to two phenomena As a process or the result of a process "Lip rounding" redirects here See Roundedness for the lip rounding of vowels Final obstruent devoicing or terminal devoicing is a systematic phonological process occurring in languages such as German, Dutch, Polish Vowel harmony is a type of long-distance ( see below) assimilatory phonological process involving Vowels in some languages Consonant harmony is a type of "long-distance" phonological assimilation akin to the similar assimilatory process involving Vowels i James A Matisoff (born July 14, 1937) is a professor Emeritus of Linguistics at the University of California Berkeley and noted In Phonetics, nasalization is the production of a sound while the velum is lowered so that some air escapes through the nose during the production of the sound by Tone is the use of pitch in Language to distinguish lexical or grammatical meaning—that is to distinguish or inflect words A floating tone is a Morpheme or element of a morpheme that contains no Consonants no Vowels but only tone. Sandhi ( Sanskrit saṃdhi sa संधि "joining" is a cover term for a wide variety of phonological processes that occur at Morpheme Crasis (κρᾶσις is the contraction of a vowel or diphthong at the end of a word with a vowel or diphthong at the start of the following word In French, most written word-final Consonants are silent in most contexts Linking R and intrusive R are phonological phenomena that occur in many non- rhotic dialects of English. Consonant mutation is the phenomenon in which a Consonant in a word is changed according to its morphological and/or syntactic environment Tone sandhi is the change of tone that occurs in some languages when different tones come together in a word or phrase Linguistics is the scientific study of Language, encompassing a number of sub-fields In Phonetics, a vowel is a Sound in spoken Language, such as English ah! or oh!, pronounced with an open Vocal tract This article is about the sound in spoken language For the letter see Glottal stop (letter. In poetic metre (or "poetic meter"), hiatus can also refer to the failure of two vowels straddling a word boundary to coalesce, for example by elision of the first vowel. In Poetry, the meter or metre is the basic rhythmic structure of a verse. Elision is the omission of one or more sounds (such as a Vowel, a Consonant, or a whole Syllable) in a word or phrase producing a result that is easier

In written English it was formerly common to use a diaeresis mark (or "trema") to indicate a hiatus (for example: coöperate, daïs, reëlect), but this is increasingly rare in modern English. Diaeresis or trema See also Diaeresis History Historically the diaeresis mark or trema is far older than the umlaut mark Nowadays the diaeresis is normally left out (cooperate), or a hyphen is used (co-operate). It is, however, still common in loanwords such as naïve and noël.

Many languages disallow hiatus, avoiding it either by deleting or assimilating the vowel, or by adding an extra consonant. In particular, some (but not all) non-rhotic dialects of English insert an /r/ to avoid hiatus after many vowels. English pronunciation is divided into two main accent groups the rhotic (ˈroʊtɪk and non-rhotic, depending on when the sound typically represented

In Greek and Latin poetry, hiatus is generally avoided, though it does occur in many authours under certain rules with varying degrees of poetic licence. Strategies of avoidance of hiatus include elisio (elision of final vowel), prodelisio (elision of initial vowel, rare) and synaloiphe/krasis (synalepha and crasis, merging final and initial vowels). Elision is the omission of one or more sounds (such as a Vowel, a Consonant, or a whole Syllable) in a word or phrase producing a result that is easier A synalepha (/ˌsɪnəˈlifə/ from Greek synaleifein “to smear together” also synaloepha) is the Elision of two syllables into one Crasis (κρᾶσις is the contraction of a vowel or diphthong at the end of a word with a vowel or diphthong at the start of the following word Other strategies include shortening of final long vowels, maybe in connection with a process of synalepha or crasis, or the transformation of vowels (or final diphthong components) into semivowels (e. g. /ai/ → /aj/, /au/ → /aw/). This latter process is sometimes also at work in the English pronunciation of the Latin word "hiatus" (sometimes pronounced with a distinct y sound between the first two syllables). The Classical Latin word hiātus was pronounced /hi. aː. tus/ and originally meant "gaping. "