Talk:Lenition

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[edit] Lenition vs. soft mutation

In my limited experience of discussion of Gaelic, I've seen "lenition" used much more often than in English-language discussion of Welsh. When people are talking about Welsh, they seem to tend to call the same phenomenon "soft mutation". I don't know why this should be. Has anyone else noticed this? and is it something we should mention? Marnanel 16:49, 23 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I can only assume it's a calque from the term traditionally used in Welsh grammar "treigliad meddal". A similar term is used in Breton to refer to the same phenomenon "kemmadur dre vlotaat". A bit similar I suppose to the way people often talk about "hard" and "soft" "g".. Neal (on Breton language Wiki)
It's a practical issue. The initial changes in the Celtic languages are generally referred to as 'mutations'. Irish has 2 (lenition (eg ceann > mo cheann) and nasalisation (ceann > ar gceann)), Scots Gaelic only one (lenition (ceann > mo cheann), Manx two (can't think of good examples off the top of my head). Lenition is by far the more common phenomenon (in terms of occurrence) so it's more talked about. Brythonic languages on the other hand have to cope with up to 4 initial mutations (soft mutation (voicing), aspiration (equivalant of lenition in Goidelic), hard mutation and mixed mutation. Soft Mutation here affects the most sounds so presumably it is the most 'talked' about one. Akerbeltz 22:20 30 June 2007 (GMT)

[edit] Miscellaneous comments

I've just removed a whole passage that is rather irrelevant to the discussion of lenition, even though it may be of some value in other articles. I'm quoting it after this. It reads a bit confusingly but the problem is that it mixes phonology with orthographical conventions (a big no-no), and the phonology part is rather sui generis. --Pablo D. Flores 11:00, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Although probably not true to the dictionary definition, or the true meaning of the word, this term is also used, (just as is aspiration) to describe the effect of what sometimes happens when one adds an 'h' after a consonant to form a new consonant sound. The resulting sounds are marked by the passage of air during the consonant sound (producing a new sound), rather than directly afterward (producing the same sound with a hiss/buzz on the end). Irish Gaelic, for instance, uses these principles often. The 'b', in Irish, is very similar to the English 'b'; however, the 'bh' is like a 'b', only the lips don't quite touch, and thus it is like a 'v' sound, without using the teeth (lips only). Similarly, the Irish 'c' is like an English 'k'; the Irish 'ch' is like a 'k' that is not connected (air can still travel through during the sound), producing a sound somewhat like the 'h' in the word 'huge'. Sometimes, English consonants follow these rules, as with the 'th' in 'thing', the 'sh' in 'shell', and so forth.
Just for the record, one doesn't add 'h' after a consonant to form a new sound -- one may add 'h' to a consonant letter to produce a new digraph that may be read as another sound. But 'th' is not to 't' what 'sh' is to 's', and neither is what 'ch' is to 'k' in Irish... Orthography is arbitrary and absolutely irrelevant to the discussion of a phonological process (it's as relevant to phonology as discussing whether you write down the sounds using a pen, a pencil or a brush). --PDF
All instances of this do not completely follow these rules, as the tongue and mouth positions sometimes shift slightly to accomodate a better sound, and thus we get some interesting sound like the 'ch' in chalk, which seems to have its roots in the 'ts' in cats much more than the c in cats or the c in certify (note how the 'c' in some slavic languages makes this sound); with this same train of thought, the English 'j' sound, as in 'jam' has already been altered by these rules, and is the vocal version of the 'ch' as in 'chalk'; the unaltered version would make a sound like the 'ts' in 'cats', only vocalized, thus producing the 'ds' (like a 'dz') sound as in 'odds'.
This is rather confused (and confusing, if you don't know better). The sound represented by English 'ch' is a fricative; 'ts' is two consonants ('t' and 's'), and neither derives from the other in any sense (in English at least).
The 'ch' as used in some languages, does not follow these rules, as it still sounds like a 'k'. It seems probable that such forms follow the true definition of this word.

[edit] another sense

This word is also used more generally to refer to any assimilatory-type or loss-type phonological process. Lenition is the opposite of fortition. Then, 3 types of processes: (1) lenition, (2) fortition, (3) metrical. Maybe the idea of lenition comes from Roman Jakobson (?). — ishwar  (SPEAK) 15:18, 2005 Mar 31 (UTC)

[edit] the scale goes like what?

The section "the scale goes like this: unvoiced -> voiced -> fricative" is ambiguous: it is not immediately clear to a reader whether the progression is weak-to-strong or strong-to-weak. Perhaps someone who is more certain than I am would be kind enough to add some kind of indication?

[edit] Irish orthography

The discussion of matters of Irish orthography seems out of place in an otherwise linguistic article. And this area should be dealt with properly. Welsh and Breton orthographical choices deserve a mention as the contrast between the strategies that have been adopted by modern Gaelic languages is interesting. However, these matters deserve to be dealt with somewhere, and in fact the subject of language communities' orthographical strategic choices are insightful to linguists in showing native speakers' intuitions.

I don't think that anyone would disagree that the orthographies] deserve a separate article. The present text was parked here pending such an article, to be written by someone who knows rather more than I do about the subject (and maybe to provoke that person into doing so!). If you feel you could make at least a first cut, then please do so and others will improve. --Red King 23:14, 12 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Fortition needs a separate article

I have changed the redirect page at Fortition into a stub; I believe it needs its own article regardless of its rarity. Raifʻhār Doremítzwr 13:00, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Hm, now that we've sorted out the Scots Gaelic lenition, I could add some on fortition in Gaelic. Due to the omnipresence of lenition the language disallows word initial friatives in most cases (unless caused by lenition) so fricative initial loanwords frequently undergo fortition, for example Norse hallur > talla, Scots yawl > geòla, Scots vervain > bearbhain etc. Akerbeltz 14:45, 23 February 2008 (GMT)

[edit] More examples needed

It would be nice to have some examples of diachronic lenition in the Celtic languages, as well, in the article. FilipeS 12:43, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

I think some examples of words that undergo this process would be nice, and would make this article more accessible to people with casual interest in linguistics rather than just people who already have a Ph.D.RSido 02:45, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

Hm I've added examples - in case the person who keeps editing the labials in IPA reads this page: Scots Gaelic does not have palatalised labials anymore, it only has a glide preceding a back vowel so my IPA is correct :) Akerbeltz 01:54, 30 June 2007 (GMT)

[edit] Merger?

Consonant mutation, Consonant gradation, Spirantization, Lenition, Fortition and Fortis and lenis all seem to be about the same kind of phenomenon. Perhaps they should be merged. FilipeS 21:28, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

I don't know about merging them, that would end up being a rather mixed up page. But perhaps a main page with a rough outline of consonant change outlining the general prinicple with links to mutation/gradation/lenition etc? Akerbeltz 13:51, 28 January 2008 (GMT)

[edit] Labials

Ok some suggestions please... someone keeps marking the Gaelic labials as palatalised but Gaelic doesn't have palatalised labials anymore, only a remnant glide before a back vowel. Any suggestions on how to keep that from happening? Akerbeltz 13:48, 28 January 2008 (GMT)

Maybe a historical note to that effect in the text? And commented-out notes for editors in the chart. kwami (talk) 20:58, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Kwami, I'm getting a little annoyed with this. What exactly is your rationale behing suddenly claiming that Gaelic cannot lenite /ɲ/ to /n/??? Akerbeltz 10:41, 20 February 2008 (GMT)

As I explained on your Talk page, I'm not saying that the change doesn't occur, only that AFAIK it is not lenition. It would be lenition if it involved loss of secondary articulation, but since you say that is not the case, you've removed its only element of 'weakening'. If you can show that change from a more marked to less marked place of articulation is considered 'lenition', for example /θ/ → /s/, then not only should we restore this, but we should add an new type of lenition to the lead, and we would need to put this in a different category from /n̪ˠ/ → /n/. kwami (talk) 11:11, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Lenition does not ONLY involve the loss of secondary articulation as any good book on phonology (and the wiki article itself) will tell you but any movement towars higher sonorisation or opening (try Roger Lass Phonology - An Introduction to Basic Concepts (Cambridge Textbooks in Linguistics) for example). Lass, and all other serious linguistic author that I've ever come across are all quite happy to accept the full set of celtic lenition phenomena as lenition. In Goidelic phonology /l/ /n/ and /ɾ/ are without any doubt less marked places of articulation as they are considered to involve less tongue movement than their strong counterparts /ɲ/ /lˠ/ and /rˠ/ (including /ɲ/ as it involves moving the body of the tongue which is 'bigger' than the tip). There is also no reason to remove the labials. If you're being very pedantic, you could mark them as dual articulation but that's excessive. Akerbeltz 13:10, 20 February 2008 (GMT)

It's fine as you have it now (though I reworded it somewhat). I won't bother tracking down your ref, since from your summary it would appear that it doesn't support your point. My problem was that /ɲ/ → /n/ is neither loss of secondary articulation nor increase in sonorisation. What we now have sounds good, and it may be what such authors had in mind, but it is OR on our part and we won't be able to defend it if anyone challenges it—unless we can find a ref that actually says that reduction of place markedness is considered lenition. kwami (talk) 00:57, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

Agreed. It's probably just a bit understudied. Not lenition as a whole but the fine detail especially since it's not desperately common synchronically and reliable diachronic phonlogical data older than 100 years is hard-ish to come by. I'll keep looking for a specific reference though for loss of place. Akerbeltz 14:14, 23 February 2008 (GMT)

Sounds good, and I doubt we'll be challenged in any case. kwami (talk) 18:34, 23 February 2008 (UTC)