Metathesis is a sound change that alters the order of phonemes in a word. The most common instance of metathesis is the reversal of the order of two adjacent phonemes. Many languages have words that show this phenomenon, and some use it as a regular part of their grammar (e.g. Fur). The process of metathesis has altered the shape of many familiar words in the English language, too. Metathesis is one of the most common types of speech errors. In chemistry, metathesis refers to a reaction where parts of two reactants "switch places".

Metathesis in English

The use of ax for ask goes back to Old English days, when ascian and axian/acsian were both in use. Some other frequently heard pronunciations in English that display metathesis are:

• ax for ask
• asterix for asterisk
• comfterble for comfortable
• foilage for foliage
• interduce for introduce
• intregal for integral
• nucular for nuclear
• purty for pretty
• realator for realtor
• revelant for relevant

The process has shaped many English words historically. Bird in English was once bryd, run was once irnan, horse was hros, wasp is also recorded as wæps and hasp, hæps. The discrepancy between the spelling of iron and the usual pronunciation is the result of metathesis.

Examples in Popular Culture

• In the Hollow Pursuits episode of The Next Generation, Lt. Commander Data explains the meaning of metathesis after Captain Picard mistakenly calls Lt. Barclay "Mr. Broccoli". After Barclay leaves, Data says to the captian, "metathesis is one of the most common of pronunciation errors, sir; a reversal of vowel and consonant; 'barc' to broc'..."

Metathesis in Spanish

Old Spanish showed occasional metathesis when phonemes not conforming to the usual euphonic constraints were joined. This happened, for example, when a clitic pronoun was attached to a verb ending: it is attested that forms like dejadle "leave him" were often metathesized to dejalde (the phoneme cluster /dl/ is not allowed anywhere else in Spanish). Milagro "miracle" is a metathesized derivation from Latin miraculum, which also shows typical intervocalic voicing and syncope.

Lunfardo, an argot of Spanish from Buenos Aires, is fond of vesre, a form of intentional metathesis that involves changes in the order of whole syllables as well as individual phonemes (vesre is the inverted form of revés "back, backwards"). Gacería, an argot of Castile, also incorporates words formed through metathesis (brica for "criba", for example).

Some frequently heard pronunciations in Spanish that display metathesis are:

• calcamonía for calcomanía
• dentrífico for dentífrico
• murciégalo for murciélago

Metathesis in Navajo

In Navajo, verbs have (often multiple) morphemes prefixes onto the verb stem. These prefixes are added to the verb stem in a set order in a prefix positional template. Although prefixes are generally found in a specific position, some prefixes change order by the process of metathesis.

For example, prefix a- (3i object pronoun) usually occurs before di-', as in

adisbąąs 'I'm starting to drive some kind of wheeled vehicle along' < 'a- + di- + sh- + ł + -bąąs.

However, when a- occurs with the prefixes di- and ni-, the a- metathesizes with di-, leading to an order of di- + a- + ni-', as in

di'nisbąąs 'I'm in the act of driving some vehicle (into something) & getting stuck' < di-'a-ni-sh-ł-bąąs < 'a- + di- + ni- + sh- + ł + -bąąs

instead of the expected *adinisbąąs (a-di-ni-sh-ł-bąąs) (note also that a- is reduced to -').

Metathesis in Straits Saanich

In Straits Saanich metathesis is used as a grammatical device to indicate "actual" aspect. The actual aspect is most often translated into English as a be ... -ing progressive. The actual aspect is derived from the "nonactual" verb form by a CV → VC metathesis process (i.e. consonant metathesizes with vowel).

See Montler (1986), Thompson & Thompson (1969) for more information.

Metathesis in Hebrew

In Hebrew the verb conjugation (binyan) ' (התפעל) undergoes metathesis if the first consonant of the root is an alveolar or postalveolar fricative. Namely, the pattern ' (where the numbers signify the root consonants) becomes hi1ta22ē3. Examples:

• No metathesis: root lbš לבש = הִתְלַבֵּש ("he got dressed").
• Voiceless alveolar fricative: root skl סכל = histakkēl הִסְתַּכֵּל ("he looked something").
• Voiceless postalveolar fricative: root šdl שדל = hištaddēl הִשְתַּדֵּל ("he made an effort").
• Voiced alveolar fricative: root zqn זקן = hizdaqqēn הִזְדַּקֵּן ("he grew old"); with assimilation of the T of the conjugation.
• Voiceless velarized alveolar fricative: root ' צלם = ' הִצְטַלֵּם ("he had a photograph of him taken"); with assimilation of the T of the conjugation.

See also

• Spoonerism
• Quantitative metathesis

External links

• Ohio State University Dept. of Linguistics Metathesis Page

Bibliography

• Montler, Timothy. (1986). An outline of the morphology and phonology of Saanich, North Straits Salish. Occasional Papers in Linguistics (No. 4). Missoula, MT: University of Montana Linguistics Laboratory. (Revised version of the author's PhD dissertation, University of Hawaii).
• Thompson, Laurence C.; & Thompson, M. Terry. (1969). Metathesis as a grammatical device. International Journal of American Linguistics, 35, 213-219.
• Young, Robert W., & Morgan, William, Sr. (1987). The Navajo language: A grammar and colloquial dictionary, (rev. ed.). Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press. ISBN 0-8263-1014-1

Phonology

Metàtesi | Metathese (Phonetik) | Métathèse (linguistique) | שיכול עיצורים | Metathesis | Metatese | Metateza