venge of the Mutant Ninja Consonants (Re: mutation?

Hey Dirk,
what would you call the Ephraimite sound shift
from "sh" to "s" in Shibboleth?

In Andalusian Spanish there is a mutation of sorts
concerning the "r" and "l" somwhat opposite the
Caribean fashion... In Seville one can hear sometimes
the change of an "l" to an "r" at the end of syllables.
In the Caribean speech of Puerto Ricans, Dominicans,
and Cubans, one can hear the "r" becoming an "l"
sort of like "Puelto Rico".

By mutation do you mean the "P" vs. "C" fashion in
Celtic tongues? Believe it or not there is a case for
this change in rural Spanish speech. And there is
a lot of Celtic roots in Galicia and Asturias. But any
such deviations from the standard speech are strongly
discouraged. And there is enough modern communication
that these differences are minimized.

Another sad show of this mutating consonantal change
in Spanish is the "th" sound in Andalusia. There are
such pressures to talk "Castillian" that you hear the
"th" sound used all the time instead of the appropriate
"s" sound in words which should have the "s" and not
the "z" or "ce, ci". I find this very annoying ;-) And pick
on my cousins a lot about it.

Thintherely,
Jay B.

>Mutation is an alternation among consonants which is primarily
>morphological, and for which little or no phonological conditioning can
>be found (although it may be historically recoverable). Celtic abounds
>with mutations. Hebrew doesn't have any. The term I've most frequently
>encountered for the Hebrew alternations is spirantization, which is a
>fine way to describe these changes.
>Dirk