Talk:Consonant mutation

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article is part of WikiProject Theoretical Linguistics, an attempt to build a comprehensive and detailed guide to theoretical linguistics and theories of language on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, you can edit the article attached to this page, or visit the project page, where you can join the project and see a list of open tasks.

[edit] Scottish Gaelic

Jwst a note, I'm fairly certian Scottish Gaelic has no eclipses, only lenition.

---

If you're sure, add it. I don't know enough about the goidelic languages to be certain myself.

[edit] New title

I changed this article so it covers all sorts consonant mutations in all sorts of languages, not just Celtic initial consonant mutations. I moved the information on specific Celtic languages to the relevant articles. --Angr 11:59, 15 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Nice article! — ishwar  (SPEAK) 15:31, 2005 Mar 31 (UTC)

[edit] Merger?

Consonant mutation, Consonant gradation, Lenition, Fortition and Fortis and lenis all seem to be about the same kind of phenomenon. Perhaps they should be merged. FilipeS 21:26, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

I don't think so. They are different types of consonant mutation, so they aren't exactly the same thing. The first two are pretty long articles and so combining them all seems unnecessary when we cand just interwiki between them. Fortis and lenis isn't consonant mutation, it's a way of describing consonant pairs that differ in ways similar to voiced/voiceless but are, nonetheless, not a voiced/voiceless pair. Ƶ§œš¹ _{[aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]} 22:06, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

I understand that fortis and lenis are not the names of consonant mutations. However, those two terms only seem to be applied when talking about fortition and lenition, which are types of consonant mutation, so having separate articles for them seems redundant. By the way, I've just noticed another one: spirantization.

I am not opposed to the idea of having a separate article for each (although, doesn't it make more sense to categorize by language?), but in that case I think that the examples at Consonant mutation, Consonant gradation and Lenition should be better categorized by type of mutation, and taken to a specific article. FilipeS 00:07, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

P.S. See also the discussion here. FilipeS 00:17, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

The only reference to Lenition and Fortitian in fortis and lenis is in the see also section. I've heard fortis and lenis applied to English consonants so that English /t/ is fortis and English /d/ is lenis. The idea behind it was so that you could have one term for, say, both English and Spanish /t/.

On a second look at Lenition I see that it may need a little bit of cutting because it oversteps its scope. I see why you wanted to do a merger. If you think that an example in one article would be better in another, go ahead and move it. I've been under the impression, also, that Consonant Mutation isn't isolated to Celtic languages, it's just common in them.

These articles are in the phonology catagory, and consonant mutation is a phonological process. I think putting it in the consonant mutation category would be great. Ƶ§œš¹ _{[aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]} 00:57, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

Hmm... actually I've just published an article in Lingua arguing that Celtic consonant mutation is a purely morphological process, not phonological at all. —Angr 05:22, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

With respect to the use of the terms "fortis" and "lenis" concerning English, perhaps it should be mentioned in the article.

It seems clear enough that spirantization is a type of lenition (or is it a type of consonant mutation?...) If "consonant mutation", "consonant gradation", "lenition", "fortis and lenis", "fortition" and "lenition" each refer to different things, then their respective articles should explain better what is the difference between them, and the examples currently given definitely need to be redistributed by the articles.

While Wikipedia multiplies the number of articles about phenomena which are, as far as I can tell, very analogous, another thing is still sorely laking in each of them: a more in-depth discussion of diachronic sound change. The vast majority of the examples in these articles concern only synchronic (grammatical) sound changes. FilipeS 10:47, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

Spirantization is a type of lenition, and in some cases can also be a consonant mutation. But by definition, consonant mutations have morphosyntactic triggers, not phonological ones, while spirantization can have a purely phonological trigger. Spirantization in Modern Hebrew is morphosyntactically triggered and so is a mutation. Spirantization in Biblical Hebrew was probably purely phonologically triggered, and in modern Spanish certainly is, so in those cases it isn't a mutation. I don't think Spirantization needs a separate article though; it can be beneficially merged with Lenition. Fortition can also be either phonologically or morphosyntactically triggered and so isn't necessarily a mutation; it should have its own article (and the current article can be greatly expanded). Fortis and lenis should also be a separate article so that these terms can be defined independently of the fortition and lenition processes. (For example, it's linked to from the discussion of "fortis and lenis sonorants" at Irish phonology.) Both Fortition and Lenition should discuss both synchronic and diachronic examples, and both phonologically and morphosyntactically triggered examples. —Angr 11:09, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

I appeal to Angr's expertise. Although, even if Celtic consonant mutation is a purely morphological process, it must have arisen from an at least partially phonological one. But then, maybe it would've been called something else, like assimilation. Ƶ§œš¹ _{[aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]} 22:29, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

As a cross-word phenomenon it would have been a form of external sandhi. See the discussion at the bottom of the article. —Angr 22:54, 3 November 2006 (UTC)