Monophthongise

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. To turn a diphthong, a glide between two vowel sounds, into one steady pure vowel sound in pronunciation
2. Making a gliding vowel such as the one in 'price' into a single unchanging vowel quality during speech
3. Reducing a two-part vowel sound to one simple vowel, as happens in many dialects of English pronunciation

Etymology: Monophthongise is a plain technical formation: it combines "monophthong," a single vowel sound that does not glide from one quality to another, with the verb ending "-ise," which turns a noun into a verb meaning to make or to become something. To monophthongise a vowel is to turn a diphthong, a sound that slides between two vowel positions, into one steady sound. The English word "monophthong" itself is built from Greek elements, "monos" meaning "single" and "phthongos" meaning "sound" or "voice," so the whole word simply means "make into a single sound." The verb is most often used by phonologists describing change over time. Many English speakers, for instance, have monophthongised the diphthong in words like "price" in some dialects, so that it sounds closer to a single vowel. The term is applied to any language, and is used in both British and American spellings, with the "-ize" form being the American variant.

Synonyms: monophthongize

Antonyms: diphthongise