ElisionPreviously in one of the posts, we discussed such a linguistic phenomenon as epenthesis and how it affects pronunciation. Let’s continue discovering the word of linguistics and learn a new opposite to the epenthesis phenomenon called
elision.
I bet you have been using it before without even knowing.
Elision is a normal speech phenomenon and comes naturally to native speakers of the language in which they occur.
In phonetics,
elision is the omission of sounds, syllables or words in speech. This is done to make the language easier to say, and faster, whereas epenthesis illustrates that it does not necessarily occur to ease pronunciation.
History /histry/,
mathematics /mathmatics/,
I don't know /duno/, /kamra/ for
camera, and
fish 'n' chips are all examples of elision.
Most elisions in English are not mandatory, but they are used in common practice and even sometimes in more formal speech.
#cedric_phonetics
