Is lenition more common than Fortition?

Is lenition more common than Fortition?

It is generally agreed that lenition is much more common than fortition in sound changes as well as phonological processes across the languages of the world.

What does ː mean?

In the International Phonetic Alphabet the sign ː (not a colon, but two triangles facing each other in an hourglass shape; Unicode U+02D0 ) is used for both vowel and consonant length. This may be doubled for an extra-long sound, or the top half (ˑ) may be used to indicate that a sound is “half long”.

What languages use lenition?

6.1 The most important consonant change in Welsh is “lenition”. It is often called the”soft mutation”. Lenition is a pronunciation phenomenon which is widespread in Western European languages, but in Welsh (and in Celtic generally) it has a special importance because it is not merely a change of pronunciation.

What kind of sound change is a fortition?

fortition (countable and uncountable, plural fortitions) (phonetics, phonology) A sound change in which a consonant becomes more fortis.

How are fortition and lenition used in phonology?

In Stampean Natural Phonology, which mostly agrees with the traditional use of these terms in phonology, a lenitionis a phonetic change functioning to make speech easier to articulate, and a fortitionis a phonetic change functioning to make speech easier to perceive.

What is the meaning of the word fortition?

fortition (countable and uncountable, plural fortitions) (phonetics, phonology) A sound change in which a consonant becomes more fortis. (obsolete) Casual choice; fortuitous selection; hazard.

Which is the opposite of a lenition or a fortition?

Fortition, also known as strengthening, is a consonantal change that increases the degree of stricture. It’s the opposite of the more common lenition. For example, a fricative or an approximant may become a stop (i.e. [v] becomes [b] or [r] becomes [d] ). Although not as typical of sound change as lenition,…