Hostname: page-component-74656f9884-c52kr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-11-08T22:40:17.871Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Sound Change and Linguistic Structure

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 April 2026

H. M. Hoenigswald
H. M. Hoenigswald*
Affiliation:
Yale University and Hartford Seminary Foundation
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The interplay of sound change and analogy may create patterns so typical as to make it possible to recover from them the process to which they owe their existence. Such internal reconstruction serves to supplement the comparative method. In this paper sound changes are classified with regard to their effect on structure: 1. non-phonemic change; 2. phonemic change without loss of contrast; 3. unconditioned merger with loss of contrast; 4. conditioned merger with loss of contrast; 5. secondary rearrangement induced by a primary loss of contrast; 6. borrowed contrast.

Information

Type
Research Article
Information
Language , Volume 22 , Issue 2: April-June , June 1946 , pp. 138 - 143
Copyright
Copyright © 1946 by the Linguistic Society of America

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

1 Treating the disappearance of phonemes as merger with zero simplifies our statements concerning loss of contrast. Zero behaves like a phoneme of extremely wide distribution; it may be said to occur (if its alternation with a real phoneme recommends this formula) between the members of any permitted sequence of phonemes, including pauses. Two zeros occur in Gr. /ána/ ‘lord!', i.e. /ána00/ vs. /ánakt-os/ ‘of the lord'.

2 For examples of sound alternation in paradigms, see the following paragraph.

3 Loss of final t in Greek, of initial k before n in Modern English.

4 See three paragraphs below.

5 See G. L. Trager, American Speech, 15.255-8 (1940).

6 Belated loss or merger of the conditioning factor may also occur in the cases treated under §3c and §4. It will not create new phonemes, but make both the free (§3c) and the compulsory alternations (§4) irregular. Paradigms like E sing sang sung have developed in that way.

7 J. H. Bonfante in Word 1.132 refers to them briefly as a ‘simple play of logical deduction’. Among those who have helped to clear up the details we mention E. Hermann, KZ 41.1-69; N. van Wijk, Phonologie passim (The Hague, 1939); A. A. Hill, Lang. 12.15-22; L. Bloomfield, Language 369-91; R. Jakobson, TCLP 4.247-67. Some of the facts presented in this paper were dealt with by the author in SIL 2.4.78-87. The author wishes to acknowledge the suggestions and encouragement which he has had in discussing the matter with Bernard Bloch, Zellig S. Harris, George L. Trager, Rulon S. Wells, and many others.