Gourt Home::Gourt :: Allomorph
This article is about a lingustic term. See Pseudomorph for another meaning of the word.
In linguistics an allomorph is a variant form of a morpheme. The meaning remains the same, while the sound can vary.
For example, in the English language the past tense morpheme is -ed. It occurs in several allomorphs depending on its phonological environment, assimilating voicing of the previous segment or inserting a schwa when following an alveolar stop:
- as in 'hunted' or 'banded',
- as in 'buzzed',
- as in 'fished'
Allomorphy can also exist in case distinctions, as in Classic Sanskrit:
| Singular | Plural | |
|---|---|---|
| Nominative | ||
| Genitive | ||
| Instrumental | ||
| Locative |
The nominative is the basic form of the morpheme and, because of Pre-Indic palatalazation of velars and the merging of and into (making the alternation unpredictable on phonetic grounds), morphophonemic variation has occurred that isn’t directly related to phonological processes.
See also
Reference
"Allomorph"