Re: partial letter replacement in languages?

On Thursday, December 9, 2004, at 09:25 , Philip Newton wrote:

> On Thu, 9 Dec 2004 02:48:04 +0200, Rodlox <Rodlox@...> wrote:
>>
>>  is there a term for when a language is evolving/being changed, &
>> replaces
>> one letter with another (ie, /d/ becomes /t/) in nearly all
>> instances...yet
>> there are still words in the resultant language  which retain (to
>> continue
>> the example) /d/ ?
>
> I don't know a term for it,
Nor I - I do not think there is. Sound changes follow regular patterns, so
the most appropriate tem is "exception".

> but just wanted to note that some
> instances of this come when there are two (nearly) concurrent sound
> changes such that, say, /d/ becomes /t/ while, say, /D/ becomes /d/ --
> so all or most original /d/'s disappeared but there are still /d/'s in
> the resulting language that used to be a different sound.
Yes, but that is not what I understand Rodlox to mean. Where, to use his
example, /d/ generally becomes /t/, but there are a few cases where the
original sound is kept, there will IMO be only two reasons:
- in certain environments the change is not made. For example in French
-tion is normally pronounced /sjO`/, but after a preceding /s/, the /t/ is
not changed to /s/, so _question_ /kEstjO`/.
- a word is taken into the standard language from a dialect where the
change did not happen.

One would state the sound change, giving examples, and the note the
exceptions.

> (Perhaps Greek is an example, where /b/ -> /v/, but modern Greek has a
> /b/ phoneme which comes from,
Does it? Thee is actually controversy over the phonemic status of [b]], [d]
  and [g] in modern Greek.

> I assume, earlier /mp/ -- it's certainly written |mp|.)
..and some analyze [b] as /mp/.

I gather there is in fact dialect variation in the pronunciation of things
like _ton patera_ (the father [acc.]) between {tOmba'tEra] and [tOba'tEra]
. AFAIK a word like _briki_ (a very useful implement for us coffee lovers)
  is always AFAIK pronounced ['briki] but some phonematize it as /'mpriki/.

I want to stress that I *not* saying this analysis is correct, just that
it exists. Pesonally, I am agnostic about the phonemic status of the
voiced plosives in modern Greek.

Ray
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