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Rhotacism (/ ˈ r oʊ t ə s ɪ z əm / ROH-tə-siz-əm) [1] or rhotacization is a sound change that converts one consonant (usually a voiced alveolar consonant: /z/, /d/, /l/, or /n/) to a rhotic consonant in a certain environment.
Most commonly, the change is a result of sound assimilation with an adjacent sound of opposite voicing, but it can also occur word-finally or in contact with a specific vowel. For example, the English suffix -s is pronounced [s] when it follows a voiceless phoneme (cats), and [z] when it follows a voiced phoneme (dogs). [1]
When a consonant ends a word, or when more than a single consonant follows a vowel within a word, the syllable is closed and therefore heavy. (A consonant is not the same thing as a letter. The letters x [ks] and z [dz] each count as two consonants, but th [θ], ch [k], and ph [f] count as one, as the pronunciations in brackets indicate.)
The voiced allophones [v ð z] were used when one of these phonemes was surrounded on both sides by voiced sounds (between vowels, between a vowel and a voiced consonant, or between voiced consonants) and immediately preceded by a syllable with some degree of stress.
The voiceless alveolar sibilant [s] has a strong hissing sound, as the s in English sink. It is one of the most common sounds in the world. It is one of the most common sounds in the world. The voiceless denti-alveolar sibilant [s̄] (an ad hoc notation), also called apico-dental, has a weaker lisping sound like English th in thin .
Burmese exhibits consonant mutation, involving voicing in many compound words. The primary type of consonant mutation is that if two syllables are joined to form a compound word, the initial consonant of the second syllable becomes voiced. The shift occurs in these phones: /kʰ, k/ → /ɡ/ /tɕʰ, tɕ/ → /dʑ/ /sʰ, s/ → /z/ /tʰ, t/ → ...
Ezh (Ʒ ʒ) / ˈ ɛ ʒ / ⓘ EZH, also called the "tailed z", is a letter, notable for its use in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) to represent the voiced postalveolar fricative consonant. For example, the pronunciation of "si" in vision / ˈ v ɪ ʒ ən / and precision / p r ɪ ˈ s ɪ ʒ ən / , or the s in treasure / ˈ t r ɛ ʒ ...
Verner's law describes a historical sound change in the Proto-Germanic language whereby consonants that would usually have been the voiceless fricatives *f, *þ, *s, *h, *hʷ, following an unstressed syllable, became the voiced fricatives * β, *ð, *z, *ɣ, *ɣʷ. [1] The law was formulated by Karl Verner, and first published in 1877.