Lenition in the context of "Intervocalic consonant"

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⭐ Core Definition: Lenition

In linguistics, lenition is a sound change that alters consonants, making them "weaker" in some way. The word lenition means 'softening' or 'weakening' (from Latin lēnis 'weak'). Lenition can happen both synchronically (within a language at a particular point in time) and diachronically (as a language changes over time). Lenition can involve such changes as voicing a voiceless consonant, causing a consonant to relax occlusion, to lose its place of articulation (a phenomenon called debuccalization, which turns a consonant into a glottal consonant like [h] or [ʔ]), or even causing a consonant to disappear entirely.

An example of synchronic lenition is found in most varieties of American English, in the form of tapping: the /t/ of a word like wait [weɪt] is pronounced as the more sonorous [ɾ] in the related form waiting [ˈweɪɾɪŋ]. Some varieties of Spanish show debuccalization of /s/ to [h] at the end of a syllable, so that a word like estamos "we are" is pronounced [ehˈtamoh]. An example of diachronic lenition can be found in the Romance languages, where the /t/ of Latin patrem ("father", accusative) has become /d/ in Italian (an irregular change; compare saeta "silk" > seta) and Spanish padre (the latter weakened synchronically /d/ → [ð̞]), while in Catalan pare, French père and Portuguese pai historical /t/ has disappeared completely.

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👉 Lenition in the context of Intervocalic consonant

In phonetics and phonology, an intervocalic consonant is a consonant that occurs between two vowels. Intervocalic consonants are often associated with lenition, a phonetic process that causes consonants to weaken and eventually disappear entirely. An example of such a change in English is intervocalic alveolar flapping, a process (especially in North American and Australian English) that, impressionistically speaking, replaces /t/ with /d/. For example, "metal" is pronounced [mɛɾl]; "batter" sounds like ['bæ.ɾɚ]. (More precisely, both /t/ and /d/ are pronounced as the alveolar tap [ɾ].) In North American English, the weakening is variable across word boundaries, such that the /t/ of "see you tomorrow" might be pronounced as either [ɾ] or [tʰ]. Some languages have intervocalic-weakening processes fully active word-internally and in connected discourse. For example, in Spanish, /d/ is regularly pronounced like [ð] in the words "todo" [ˈtoðo] (meaning "all") and "la duna [laˈðuna]", meaning "the dune" (but [ˈduna] if the word is pronounced alone).

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Lenition in the context of Irish initial mutations

Irish, like all modern Celtic languages, is characterised by its initial consonant mutations. These mutations affect the initial consonant of a word under specific morphological and syntactic conditions. The mutations are an important tool in understanding the relationship between two words and can differentiate various meanings.

Irish, like Scottish Gaelic and Manx, features two initial consonant mutations: lenition (Irish: séimhiú [ˈʃeːvʲuː]) and eclipsis (urú [ˈʊɾˠuː]) (the alternative names, aspiration for lenition and nasalisation for eclipsis, are also used, but those terms are misleading).

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LINKED FROM (PARENTS)
← Irish initial mutations ← Intervocalic consonant
LINKS TO (CHILDREN)
Linguistics → Sound change → Consonant → Latin → Synchronic analysis → Historical linguistics → Voice (phonetics) → Occlusive → Place of articulation → Debuccalization → Glottal consonant → Voiceless glottal fricative → Glottal stop → American English → Flapping → Voiceless alveolar plosive → Voiced alveolar tap or flap → Spanish language → Voiceless alveolar fricative → Syllable → Romance languages → Accusative → Voiced alveolar plosive → Italian language → Voiced dental approximant →