consonantslends

Consonantslends is a proposed phonological concept that describes the coalescence of two consonants occurring at a morpheme boundary into a single blended consonant. The term captures the idea that one consonant “lends” articulatory properties to the other, producing a segment that carries features from both inputs rather than a plain sequence or a simple elision.

Mechanism and typology

Consonantslends is envisioned as a type of coalescent assimilation or boundary merger. At a boundary between morphemes, the adjacent consonants may merge into a single segment whose place and manner of articulation reflect a compromise between the two inputs. Commonly proposed outcomes include the creation of an affricate or a fricative that bears features from both consonants, or the emergence of a single consonant with blended characteristics. Realizations can be gradual, with intermediate articulations, or discrete, yielding a clear single segment.

Distribution and interpretation

The phenomenon is discussed as more likely in languages with rich morpheme boundaries, agglutinative morphology, or substantial language contact. Because direct cross-linguistic evidence is limited and analyses vary, consonantslends remains a theoretical construct rather than a firmly established category. Some researchers prefer analyses in terms of standard sandhi or coalescent assimilation, viewing consonantslends as a descriptive label for outcomes that could be accounted for by existing mechanisms.

Illustrative pattern

In a hypothetical language, a stem-final /t/ followed by an affix-initial /s/ at a boundary might realize as an affricate [t͡s], interpreted as the boundary consonants lending to a single blended segment.

Relation to related processes

Consonantslends intersects with coalescent assimilation, consonant cluster reduction, and sandhi, but is distinguished by modeling the boundary result as a single, blended consonant rather than a straightforward deletion or straightforward accumulation of segments.

See also: consonant cluster, sandhi, coalescent assimilation, affrication.