In
phonology
Phonology is the branch of linguistics that studies how languages or dialects systematically organize their sounds or, for sign languages, their constituent parts of signs. The term can also refer specifically to the sound or sign system of a ...
, particularly within
historical linguistics
Historical linguistics, also termed diachronic linguistics, is the scientific study of language change over time. Principal concerns of historical linguistics include:
# to describe and account for observed changes in particular languages
# ...
, dissimilation is a phenomenon whereby similar
consonant
In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract. Examples are and pronounced with the lips; and pronounced with the front of the tongue; and pronounced wi ...
s or
vowel
A vowel is a syllabic speech sound pronounced without any stricture in the vocal tract. Vowels are one of the two principal classes of speech sounds, the other being the consonant. Vowels vary in quality, in loudness and also in quantity (leng ...
s in a
word
A word is a basic element of language that carries an objective or practical meaning, can be used on its own, and is uninterruptible. Despite the fact that language speakers often have an intuitive grasp of what a word is, there is no conse ...
become less similar. In
English, dissimilation is particularly common with
liquid consonants such as /r/ and /l/ when they occur in a sequence.
Examples
Dropped initial /r/ in /r..r/ sequence (r-Deletion)
When a sound occurs before another in the middle of a word in
rhotic dialects of
English, the first tends to drop out, as in "" for ''berserk,'' "" for ''surprise,'' "" for ''particular'', and "" for ''governor'' – this does not affect the pronunciation of ''government,'' which has only one , but English ''government'' tends to be pronounced "", dropping out the first n.
In English, ''r''-deletion occurs when a syllable is unstressed and may drop out altogether, as in "" for ''deteriorate'' and "" for ''temperature,'' a process called
haplology. When the is found in , it may change to . (, ' → ''February,'' which has been explained by
phonotactic
Phonotactics (from Ancient Greek "voice, sound" and "having to do with arranging") is a branch of phonology that deals with restrictions in a language on the permissible combinations of phonemes. Phonotactics defines permissible syllable struc ...
factors or alternatively by
morphological analogy with more common sequences such as ''January''. ''
nucular'', which may have arisen through an analogous process)
Dissimilation of /l..l/ to /r..l/
An example where a relatively old case of phonetic dissimilation has been artificially undone in the spelling is English ''
colonel
Colonel (abbreviated as Col., Col or COL) is a senior military officer rank used in many countries. It is also used in some police forces and paramilitary organizations.
In the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries, a colonel was typically in charge o ...
'', whose standard pronunciation is (with the r sound) in North-American English, or in
RP. It was formerly spelt ''coronel'' and is a borrowing from French ''coronnel'', which arose as a result of dissimilation from Italian ''colonnello''.
["Pronunciation Note" a]
Colonel @ Dictionary.Reference.com
Dissimilation of /r..r/ to /l..r/
* Latin
peregrinus > Old French
pelegrin (and the Italian
pellegrino and Sicilian
piḍḍigrinu) which gave rise to the English .
Causes
There are several hypotheses on the cause of dissimilation. According to
John Ohala, listeners are confused by sounds with long-distance acoustic effects. In the case of English ,
rhoticization spreads across much of the word: in rapid speech, many of the vowels may sound as if they had an ''r''. It may be difficult to tell whether a word has one source of rhoticity or two. When there are two, a listener might wrongly interpret one as an acoustic effect of the other, and so mentally filter it out.
This factoring out of
coarticulatory effects has been experimentally replicated. For example, Greek ''pakhu-'' (παχυ-) "thick" derives from an earlier ''*phakhu-.'' When test subjects are asked to say the ''*phakhu-'' form in casual speech, the aspiration from both consonants pervades both syllables, making the vowels
breathy. Listeners hear a single effect, breathy voiced vowels, and attribute it to one rather than both of the consonants, as they assume the breathiness on the other syllable to be a long-distance coarticulatory effect, thus replicating the historical change in the Greek word.
If Ohala is correct, one might expect to find dissimilation in other languages with other sounds that frequently cause long-distance effects, such as
nasalization
In phonetics, nasalization (or nasalisation) 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 the mouth. An archetypal nasal sound is .
In the Internation ...
and
pharyngealization.
Types
Dissimilation, like
assimilation, may involve a change in pronunciation relative to a segment that is adjacent to the affected segment or at a distance, and may involve a change relative to a preceding or a following segment. As with assimilation, anticipatory dissimilation is much more common than lag dissimilation, but unlike assimilation, most dissimilation is triggered by ''non''-contiguous segments. Also, while many kinds of assimilation have the character of a
sound law, few dissimilations do; most are in the nature of accidents that befall a particular lexical item.
Anticipatory dissimilation
Anticipatory dissimilation at a distance (by far the most common):
*
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
*''medio-diēs'' ("mid-day", i.e. "noon"; also "south") became ''merīdiēs''. Latin ''venēnum'' "poison" >
Italian
Italian(s) may refer to:
* Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries
** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom
** Italian language, a Romance language
*** Regional Ita ...
''veleno''. This category includes a rare example of a systematic sound law, the dissimilation of aspirates in
Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
and
Sanskrit
Sanskrit (; attributively , ; nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had diffused there from the northwest in the late ...
known as
Grassmann's Law: *''thi-thē-mi'' "I put" (with a reduplicated prefix) > Greek ''tí-thē-mi'' (τίθημι), *''phakhu'' "thick" > Greek ''pakhus'' (παχύς), *''sekhō'' "I have" > *''hekhō'' > Greek ''ékhō'' (ἔχω; cf. future *''hekh-s-ō'' > ''héksō'' ἕξω). Some apparent cases are problematic, as in English "eksetera" for ''
etcetera'', which may rather be contamination from the numerous forms in ''eks-'' (or a combination of influences), though the common misspelling ''ect''. implies dissimilation.
Anticipatory dissimilation from a contiguous segment (very rare):
* The change from fricative to stop articulation in a sequence of fricatives may belong here: German ''sechs'' (as evidenced by the spelling, the was previously a
fricative
A fricative is a consonant produced by forcing air through a narrow channel made by placing two articulators close together. These may be the lower lip against the upper teeth, in the case of ; the back of the tongue against the soft palate in t ...
). In Sanskrit in any original sequence of two
sibilants
Sibilants are fricative consonants of higher amplitude and pitch, made by directing a stream of air with the tongue towards the teeth. Examples of sibilants are the consonants at the beginning of the English words ''sip'', ''zip'', ''ship'', and ...
the first became a stop (often with further developments): root ''vas''- "dress", fut. ''vas-sya''- > ''vatsya''-; *''wiś-s'' "clan" (nom.sg.) > *''viťś > *viṭṣ > viṭ'' (final clusters are simplified); *''wiś-su'' locative pl. > *''viṭṣu > vikṣu''. English ''amphitheater'' is very commonly pronounced ''ampitheater'' (though
spelling pronunciation
A spelling pronunciation is the pronunciation of a word according to its spelling when this differs from a longstanding standard or traditional pronunciation. Words that are spelled with letters that were never pronounced or that were not pronounc ...
may be either some or all of the story here). Russian конфорка 'stove burner' is from Dutch ''komfoor'' 'brazier'.
Lag dissimilation
Lag dissimilation at a distance (fairly common):
* English "purple" is in medieval English as ''purpul'' and ''purpure'' (in medieval French ''porpre'') and comes from classical Latin ''purpura'' = "purple" with dissimilation of to . Latin ''rārus'' "rare" > Italian ''rado''. ''Cardamom'' is commonly pronounced ''cardamon''. In Middle English, in some words ending in -''n'' preceded by a coronal consonant the ''-n'' changed to -''m'': ''seldom, random, venom''. English ''marble'' is ultimately from Latin ''marmor''. Russian февраль 'February' is from Latin ''Februārius''.
* In Spanish, interchanges between and are common; for a list, see
History of the Spanish language#Interchange of the liquids /l/ and /r/. In Basque, dissimilation is frequent as well.
Lag dissimilation from a contiguous segment (very rare):
* Latin ''hominem'' ("man", acc.) >
Old Spanish ''omne'' > ''omre'' >
Spanish
Spanish might refer to:
* Items from or related to Spain:
**Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain
**Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many Latin American countries
**Spanish cuisine
Other places
* Spanish, Ontario, Can ...
''hombre''
* Latin ''nomine'' ("name", abl.) > ''nomre'' > Spanish ''nombre''
*
English ''chimney'' (standard) > ''chim(b)ley'' (dialectal)
*
Proto-Slavic
Proto-Slavic (abbreviated PSl., PS.; also called Common Slavic or Common Slavonic) is the unattested, reconstructed proto-language of all Slavic languages. It represents Slavic speech approximately from the 2nd millennium B.C. through the 6th ...
*''svobodà'' "freedom" >
Slovak ''sloboda'' (vs.
Czech
Czech may refer to:
* Anything from or related to the Czech Republic, a country in Europe
** Czech language
** Czechs, the people of the area
** Czech culture
** Czech cuisine
* One of three mythical brothers, Lech, Czech, and Rus'
Places
* Czech, ...
''svoboda'')
* In
Irish
Irish may refer to:
Common meanings
* Someone or something of, from, or related to:
** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe
***Éire, Irish language name for the isle
** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...
, many dialects regularly change the sequence to
Paradigmatic dissimilation
When, through
sound change, elements of a grammatical paradigm start to conflate in a way that is not easily remedied through
re-wording, the forms may dissimilate. For example, in modern
Korean
Korean may refer to:
People and culture
* Koreans, ethnic group originating in the Korean Peninsula
* Korean cuisine
* Korean culture
* Korean language
**Korean alphabet, known as Hangul or Chosŏn'gŭl
**Korean dialects and the Jeju language
** ...
the vowels and are merging for many people in the capital Seoul, and concurrently the second-person pronoun 네 'you' is shifting to 니 to avoid confusion with the first-person pronoun 내 'me'.
Similarly, it appears that English ''
she,'' historically ''heo'', may have acquired its modern ''sh'' form through dissimilation from ''he'', though it is not clear whether the mechanism was idiosyncratic sound change (
palatalization) of ''heo'', or substitution of ''heo'' with the feminine
demonstrative pronoun
Demonstratives ( abbreviated ) are words, such as ''this'' and ''that'', used to indicate which entities are being referred to and to distinguish those entities from others. They are typically deictic; their meaning depending on a particular fram ...
''seo''.
See also
*
Assimilation (linguistics)
References
{{reflist
Sources
* Crowley, Terry. (1997) ''An Introduction to Historical Linguistics.'' 3rd edition. Oxford University Press.
Vasmer's dictionaryDissimilation(''International Encyclopedia of Linguistics'', 2nd ed.)
Phonology
Sound changes