In phonology, the ts–ch merger is the merger of the voiceless alveolar affricate /ts/ and the voiceless postalveolar affricate /tʃ/.

In Russian, it is the merger of the consonants rendered by letters Che and Tse. If the shift is towards Tse, it is called tsokanye (Russian: цоканье); the shift towards Che is called chokanye (Russian: чоканье).[1][2]

It is a regular sound change of Lower Sorbian, but not Upper Sorbian, as seen in the difference between Lower Sorbian cas and Upper Sorbian čas, both meaning "time".[3]

In Polish the /t͡ʃ/ /t͡s/ merger is part of a more general dialectal feature called mazurzenie (mazuration), present in many Polish dialects but named after the Masovian dialect.[4]

It also occurs in a few areas of the Chakavian dialect of Serbo-Croatian, known as tsakavism.

The sabesdiker losn feature of Northeastern Yiddish includes the /tʃ/ /ts/ merger.

Greek-speaking people may merge /t͡ʃ/ (and /d͡ʒ/) into /t͡s/ (and /d͡z/) when speaking foreign languages that contain those sounds.

References

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  1. ^ "Карта. Различение или совпадение согласных на месте ч и ц" (in Russian). Archived from the original on 2014-03-23.
  2. ^ "Легенда карты. Различение или совпадение согласных на месте ч и ц" (in Russian). Archived from the original on 2014-03-23.
  3. ^ Stieber, Zdzisław (1965). Zarys dialektologii języków zachodnio-słowiańskich (in Polish). Warszawa: Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe. pp. 16–17.
  4. ^ Stanislaw Gogolewski, "Dialectology in Poland, 1873-1997", In: Towards a History of Linguistics in Poland, by E. F. K. Koerner, A. J. Szwedek (eds.) (2001) ISBN 90-272-4591-6, p. 128