Talk:Palatalization (phonetics)

message: I think there's some big confusion here, with "palatalization" meaning at least two completely different things that should be differentiated very clearly. In Russian, for example, ш is palatal (IPA: ʂ), while сь is palatalized (IPA: sʲ).
Some letters with a háček are palatal (š, ž, č: ʂ, ʐ, tʂ-ligature), while others are palatalized (ď, ť, ň, ľ: dʲ, tʲ, nʲ, lʲ).
David Marjanović (... that's tʃʲ-ligature for you!) 23:52 CET-summertime 2005/8/2
:This usage of 'palatal' is specific to Slavic and some other linguistics tradition, perhaps due to historical development through palatalization. They are not synchronically palatal consonants by the IPA standards for the use of that term. Part of the difference between them and the English postalveolars is that they aren't palatalized in Russian, while they are (at least somewhat) in English! (The also aren't labialized as in English, I believe.) kwami 01:22, 2005 August 3 (UTC)
::Sorry. I wrote the above before I had reasonably understood the IPA and the associated terminology. Retroflexes could be called palatal (being "corono-palatal"), but they almost never are, instead "palatal" normally refers to dorso-palatal consonants only. – The confusion has long ago been cleared up, thanks, everyone! – I agree the Russian retroflexes aren't labialized, at least not as much as the palato-alveolars of English, French, or German. David Marjanović 23:08, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Palatal? Palatalized? 

message: I'm cleaning up the article, and removed the following: 
*The digraphs with j are problematic, because /j/ is a separate phoneme: The Savo Finnish word ärjäsj /ärjäś/ uses both meanings.
I removed this because it does not show the digraph <sj> being used for contrastive [sj] vs [sʲ]. Does the person who wrote this have an example of a true contrast, so we can put the illustration back in? kwami 02:46, 2005 August 20 (UTC)
:Now, it is hard to find such minimal pairs from Savo, because typically palatalization is final. Maybe parjaa mua [parjaammua] vs. parj aamua [parʲ aammua]. (But, here prosody comes to help.) But, we have inconsistencies such as karja [karja] vs. kaarj [kaarʲ]. This is indeed less problematic than the other method, which prefixing 'j' instead. ([vesʲ] as vejs.) For example, standard vesissä "in the waters" would be [veisʲ] in Karelian dialect (example from ), while [vesʲ] would be the singular of the same. Now, write the latter (singular) as vejs, the standard pronounciation becomes [veis], which is a plural as it contains the plural marker -i-. --Vuo 14:12, 20 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  problem with diacritic 

message: I speak Russian and i don't understand what /akʲa/ is. There's now such word as "акя" and i can't even think of a word which includes that sounds in that order. There should be an example from the actual language. I would think of an example myself, but i don't know jack about phonology.--Amir E. Aharoni 19:04, 4 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Russian /akʲa/ 

message: The article says: "Sometimes palatalization is part of a synchronic grammatical process, such as palatalizing the first consonant of a verb root to signal the past tense".
Is there an example for this?--Amir E. Aharoni 19:49, 4 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Palatalization to mark past tense 

message: I don't know what happened to the template and I don't know what was in there, but the article needs to be fixed now it was deleted. --Mkill 10:48, 13 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Template:Ll]] 

message: #There's no кя (/kʲa/) in any Russian words and from what i learned about linguistics (i'm doing my fourth year) examples from real life are much better. Why do English, Estonian and Votic deserve a real word as an example and Russian does not?
#If k is supposed to represent a generic konsonant, then why use IPA at all?
#I focused much more on syntax than on phonetics in my studies, but /anja/ would be анья or even анъя and i'm quite sure that аня is anʲa.--Amir E. Aharoni 11:26, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: OK, after this grand rewrite i've got no more complaints about Russian. Thanks.--Amir E. Aharoni 13:15, 22 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  What's so bad about /anʲa/? 

message: Are there any consonants which cannot be palatalized? --84.61.41.214 08:45, 7 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Some languages palatalize all consonants they "can", such as Nenets language and Võro language, but the glottal stop and the velar nasal are not palatalized. The obvious is also /j/ itself. --Vuo 20:45, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

text: I would say that palatalizing a consonant with a palatal point of articulation would be tricky. In a contrastive system it might be feasible if, say, the effect of "palatalization" as a contrastive feature were redundantly signaled by adjacent syllabics, say, /a/ has allophones [æ] preceding palatalized consonants but [a] elsewhere, one might think of a contast between [æɲ] (with phonemically palatalized /ɲj/ vs [aɲ] (with plain /ɲ/). But I would imagine that such a setup would be extremely unstable. I would think that it would be a dicey matter to palatalize a uvular r, [ʀ], but according to rumor in 18th and 19th century Russia, some high-hat types transplanted uvular pronunciation of r from French into Russian. Presumably they managed the contrast somehow. I'd have to hear it to believe it, though. Alsihler 15:45, 15 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Irish has . A dialect of Hausa has . There are IIRC languages in the Caucasus with aspirated and/or ejective versions of , and at least one manages . As a native speaker of two of the many variants of German with , I find  much more difficult than the Russian , which in turn I find much easier than ordinary [r], but that's another story… I agree that palatalized dorso-palatals are probably impossible. David Marjanović 23:01, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Phonetically, it would be more accurate to say that it's not possible to unpalatalize palatal consonants. If you want something which cannot be palatalized primarily nor secondarily, retroflexes - proper subapicals, at least - are commonly considered that; everything else should be possible. (Well, theoretically dorsal linguolabials are also unpalatizable, as well as unvelarizable, but those aren't used in speech anywhere. :b) I've redd a dissertation on this which might be suitable for quoting... --Tropylium 09:25, 23 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: According to Jerzy Rubach, who wrote a whole dissertation on retroflex consonants, retroflexes typically resist palatalization (in the phonetic sense).  — Æµ§œš¹ [aɪm ˈfɹ̠ˤʷɛ̃ɾ̃ˡi] 15:06, 16 February 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Unpalatalizable Consonants 

message: When a sound is formed on the palate it is palatal. When the sound migrates to be formed on the palate it is palatised. 
This is the same as: digit - digital - digitised. It is NOT 'digitalised' is it? Then why is it 'palatalised'? Bill, 2009 April.
:The reasoning for "palatalization" is that "palatization" is confusing: are we talking about changing something into a palate? No, we mean "change into consonant produced by tongue touching hard palate" (or one roughly similar).
:"Digitization" isn't confusing if understood correctly. "Digit" means both "finger" and "number counted on a finger" (= digital). Therefore, the word-formation sequence is digit → digitization: "change into digits". — Erutuon (talk) 21:46, 25 December 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Palatised or palatalised?

message: What is the difference between palatalization and yod-coalescence? Are [ʃ] and [ʒ] palatal consonants?  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.22.207.252 (talk) 01:02, 13 April 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Yod-coalescence is an example of palatalization. Palatalization doesn't always result in palatal consonants, and [ʃ] and [ʒ] are not palatal. Sometimes it just makes consonants that are closer to palatal, as here. [ʃ] and [ʒ] are closer to the palatal place of articulation than the alveolar consonants [s] and [z]: more back, or postalveolar, or alveolopalatal. — Eru·tuon 02:54, 13 April 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Well said, Erutuon.  — Æµ§œš¹ [aɪm ˈfɹ̠ˤʷɛ̃ɾ̃ˡi] 03:00, 13 April 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Erutuon, [z] and [s] have their panlatal variants. They do not need to convert to [ʃ] and [ʒ] to become palatal.--Anuclanus (talk) 22:17, 28 April 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Difference between palatalization and yod-coalescence? 

message: Hi! I wonder what does it mean. In Russian there are many examples when sounds are followed with [j] and are not palatalized.
For example, подъём[подйом], въезд[вйэзд], съезд[cйэзд], вражья[вражйа].--Anuclanus (talk) 22:12, 28 April 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  This means that the consonant is pronounced as if followed very closely by the sound [j]  

message: The articla says Russian тема is pronounced [ˈtˢʲɛmə] but this pronounciation is definitely non-Russian. There is no [s] or [ts] there.--Anuclanus (talk) 22:31, 28 April 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Russian palatized T and D sound like fricatives ts and dz by many speakers.--2.245.120.223 (talk) 22:46, 27 February 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  тема  

message: There is a stub article called Mouillé that contains (currently unsourced) information about the development of palatal laterals and nasals in Romance. I propose that any usable information be sourced and merged into the "Diachronic palatalization" section of this article, and for Mouillé to be redirected to Palatal consonant (since mouillé is just French for "palatal(ized)", and I don't think it means anything more than that when used in English, if it is actually used in English with any significant frequency). CapnPrep (talk) 01:44, 2 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: I think Mouillé can have a separate section here.  It might need to have a fuller treatment to indicate why it's something separate, though. — Æµ§œš¹ [ãːɱ ˈfɹ̠ˤʷɪ̃ə̃nlɪ] 01:35, 26 June 2012 (UTC)

text: I do not object to merging "mouillé" (to an appropriate destination) itself, but the "palatalization" article already devotes too little attention to palatalized consonants, and too many to various ditch–dike, shirt–skirt and other phonological processes resulted in sounds which are not itself palatalized. The phonetic palatalization should not be eclipsed by numerous examples of historical assimilation of [ʲ] to palatalized consonants themselves and succeeding sounds. Incnis Mrsi (talk) 09:51, 1 September 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Merger proposal 

message: The article currently uses -ize in the title, but the body of the article uses -ise. This is strange; shouldn't the two be consistent? Would I be breaking MOS:RETAIN or following it if I changed -ise forms throughout the article to -ize? — Eru·tuon 08:54, 3 January 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: I think, technically, MOS:RETAIN was violated in this edit by an anon user. So we can pretty easily justify restoring it to its earlier form. — Æµ§œš¹ [lɛts b̥iː pʰəˈlaɪˀt] 09:32, 3 January 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  -ize or -ise 

message: I moved the section on mouillé (palatal consonants) to , because technically it's about palatal , not palatalized, although these palatal consonants arose by palatalization. It should originally have been moved there, rather than here. — Eru·tuon 04:38, 11 February 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: I think it might be appropriate to put it in the sound change article that you'll be creating soon. — Æµ§œš¹ [lɛts b̥iː pʰəˈlaɪˀt] 04:45, 11 February 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, I think so, although some cases are a little puzzling, like annus > año and caballum > caballo , and would be harder to integrate into the overall picture of palatalization as assimilation. — Eru·tuon 05:16, 11 February 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: It would be inaccurate to characterize palatalization as assimilation, even if that is the most common form. We already have a number of examples that go against that generalization. — Æµ§œš¹ [lɛts b̥iː pʰəˈlaɪˀt] 06:15, 11 February 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: Hmm, quite right, now that I think of it. I see why my change to the intro was wrong. However, noting that palatalization is frequently assimilatory would be helpful. I think palatalization is either triggered by a palatal or front vowel, or results in a palatal or palatalized consonant or front vowel. Sometimes the sound change is triggered by a palatal but doesn't result in a palatal or palatalized consonant, and can be considered theoretically assimilatory or at least conditioned. In other cases, as above, the result is palatal, but there's no palatal conditioning environment. Noting this fact would help explain to readers why the sound change is called palatalization in both cases: in some cases it refers to the result, in others to the environment. You may be able to verify whether this generalization regarding the name is right; I'm just working from memory here. — Eru·tuon 07:46, 11 February 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Mouillé 

message: See vertical vowel system for some discussion and sources on suprasegmental palatalization in Central Chadic. I've yet to add coverage of this into the main article of the language group. --Trɔpʏliʊm • blah 15:28, 16 February 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for the additional examples. Good question; also curious how suprasegmental palatalization relates to advanced and retracted tongue root. Both involve changes in vowel height or frontness, but perhaps the difference is the part of the tongue that is moved. — Eru·tuon 19:48, 16 February 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Note on suprasegmental palatalization 

message: The below message was originally posted underneath #What's so bad about /anʲa/?.
Well, I have to disagree on sibilant offglide in Russian palatalized t. Indeed, such a phenomenon is possible and quite frequent, but nevertheless it's a typical feature of some dialects that should be avoided in standard normative speech. --95.26.43.198 (talk) 17:43, 19 May 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: This seems strange to me, too: Superscript  stands for palatalization, so it doesn't make sense to use it as an example for not being phonetically palatalized. Maybe what was meant was it changes to  ? This originates from this edit by User:Vuo. — Sebastian 04:04, 13 April 2015 (UTC)
replies: text:  Following our conversation at Talk:Semivowel#Does_offglide_belong_here.3F, Aeusoes1 just  changed it, which removed what was unclear from the text, but there's one thing remaining that's confusing me: I don't see any affrication in the text anymore, while the edit summary still talk about it. — Sebastian 04:23, 13 April 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: That's the point. Affrication is kind of a side issue and irrelevant to the point being made. — Æµ§œš¹ [lɛts b̥iː pʰəˈlaɪˀt] 15:52, 13 April 2015 (UTC)
replies: text:  OK, I get that. (I was confused because I thought your summary was about what you added, but it was about what you removed.) You write "when Russian "soft" consonants appear before front vowels (particularly [i]), they are unpalatalized", which was news to me, and which may be only a recent suggestion of one linguistRussian_phonology#cite_note-38. Is that indeed the commonly held view nowadays? — Sebastian 19:21, 13 April 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: Google scholar finds 126 sources citing Padgett 2003a, 66 citing Padgett 2003b, and 110 citing the 2001 article in which they first examined and laid out these phonetic particularities of Russian. I'm not sure how many of these are critical (and therefore don't know how representative this view is among modern scholars), but I don't think it's particularly recent or even a mere suggestion.  It is, according to this scholar, consistent with cross-linguistic tendencies when phonemic contrasts of palatalized and non-palatalized consonants are maintained before  (Irish phonology may mention a similar dynamic with "broad" and "slender" consonants). In other words, it would be kind of weird if Russian weren't this way. — Æµ§œš¹ [lɛts b̥iː pʰəˈlaɪˀt] 07:04, 14 April 2015 (UTC)
replies: text:   Thank you for your thorough research! Funny you should mention Irish; that's actually why I got here: I wanted to compare that with something that was a little more familiar to me. — Sebastian 06:42, 15 April 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Sibilant offglide 

message: I think this article can be dramatically improved if we write the examples a bit differently: (I still not exactly sure what Palatization is, I'll probably get it soon after reading the article a few times...)
1. IMHO the examples should have the palatalized and unpalatalized consonants side by side so that we see and hear the difference. 
2. Examples should be given first and formost in the English language which is spoken by the readers of this WP article, even though palatalization in English does not distinguish the sound as a different consonant. 
3. Several quick examples from SEVERAL languages, first of all European ones but not just, should be shown in sub sections.
4. Each consonant that can be palatalized should be under a section of its own.  L - palatalized sounds so. unplalatalized so.  T palatelized sounds so  unpalatalized sounds so. These consonants are the ones that can be palatalized, all the other's cannot be palatalized. 
I'm willing to assist if someone puts up sets of words in their language. I know how to articulate foreign accents, in many languages which I speak. I'll put it up for your native testing and then publish it in this article.פשוט pashute ♫ (talk) 08:29, 9 April 2021 (UTC)
replies: text: And from reading here and in other places I'm still not convinced I fully understand what palatalization is in the case of English and Hebrew (or Russian).פשוט pashute ♫ (talk) 11:46, 12 April 2021 (UTC)

text: I'm confused by your request for examples because there are several audio examples in the phonology section (for instance Russian , ). Did you not notice them, or are they not enough? — Eru·tuon 21:38, 12 April 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Better presentation of examples 

message: The article provides a very technical description of palatization, with examples from languages that many English-speaking readers are not familiar with. After going through this article, I have no idea what palatization sounds like.
It would be very helpful if examples of (allophonic) palatization in English were provided.
I found some examples:
* pleaSe - pleaSure
* resiDue - resiDual
* analoG - analoGy
Source: https://englishphonetics.net/blog/vowel-length-palatalization.html
I'm not familiar enough with the matter to judge whether these are good examples.
I'm not familiar enough with the matter to judge whether these are good examples.
A picture of the tongue position would also help to clarify "the body of the tongue is raised toward the hard palate and the alveolar ridge during the articulation of the consonant." Han-Kwang (t) 08:10, 27 March 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: Those are examples of Palatalization (sound change), but not of Palatalization (phonetics). Nardog (talk) 09:13, 27 March 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Examples in English