9 Perception , Variation, and Sound Change

Sound change

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Sound change includes any processes of language change that affect pronunciation (phonetic change) or word structures (phonemic change). Sound change can consist of the replacement of one speech sound (or, more generally, one phonetic feature) by another, the complete loss of the affected sound, and (rarely) even the introduction of a new sound in a place where there previously was none. Sound changes can be environmentally conditioned, meaning that the change in question only occurs in a defined sound environment, whereas in other environments the same speech sound is not affected by the change.
Sound change is assumed to be usually regular, which means that it is expected to apply mechanically whenever its structural condition is met, irrespective of any non-phonological factors (such as the meaning of the words affected). On the other hand, sound changes can sometimes be sporadic, affecting only one particular word or a few words, without any seeming regularity.
Of regular sound changes, the somewhat hyperbolic term sound law is also sometimes used. This term was introduced by the Neogrammarian school in the 19th century and is still commonly applied to some historically important sound changes, such as Grimm's law. While real-world sound changes often admit of exceptions (for a variety of known reasons, and sometimes without a known reason), the expectation of their regularity or "exceptionlessness" is of great heuristic value, since it allows historical linguists to define the notion of regular correspondence (see: comparative method).
Each sound change is limited in space and time. It means it functions within a specified area (only in some dialects) and within a specified period of time. These limitations are some of the reasons for which some scholars refuse using the term "sound law" (asserting that laws should not have such spatial and temporal limitations) and replace it with phonetic rule.

Contents
1 The formal notation of sound change
2 Principles of sound change
3 Terms for changes in pronunciation
4 Examples of specific historical sound changes
5 External links

˙LNG 201/ENGL 202Prof. G. Steinberg Sound Changes

˙Contextual Variations in Implicit Evaluation /PDF



Reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sound_change