afvoeging

Afvoeging is a Dutch term used in several disciplines to denote the action of removing, omitting, or stripping away a part from a system. The word is formed from af- meaning away and voeging meaning joining or adding, signaling a focus on removal rather than addition.

In linguistics, afvoeging describes deletion processes, where a sound, morpheme, or affix is omitted under certain phonological, morphological, or syntactic conditions. It is considered the opposite of toevoeging (affixation or addition). Typical domains include phonology (deletion of a segment), morphology (loss of an affix in inflection or word formation), and syntax (ellipsis of optional elements).

In other disciplines, afvoeging can refer to removal in a broader sense. In chemistry and materials science, some texts use afvoeging to denote removal of atoms or substituents, though more common terms are deletie or eliminatie; usage can vary by subfield or author.

Etymologically, the term reflects a general idea of withdrawal or subtraction, and its precise meaning is context-dependent. In scholarly writing, authors often clarify the specific type of removal involved—phonetic, morphological, syntactic, or chemical—to avoid ambiguity.

See also: toevoeging (addition/affixation) and deletie (deletion).