Allomorph

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This article is about a lingustic term. See Pseudomorph for another meaning of the word.

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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 Template:IPA in 'hunted' or 'banded',
• as Template:IPA in 'buzzed',
• as Template:IPA in 'fished'

Allomorphy can also exist in case distinctions, as in Classic Sanskrit:

Vāk (voice)

	Singular	Plural
Nominative	Template:IPA	Template:IPA
Genitive	Template:IPA	Template:IPA
Instrumental	Template:IPA	Template:IPA
Locative	Template:IPA	Template:IPA

The nominative Template:IPA is the basic form of the morpheme and, because of Pre-Indic palatalazation of velars and the merging of Template:IPA and Template:IPA into Template:IPA (making the alternation unpredictable on phonetic grounds), morphophonemic variation has occurred that isn’t directly related to phonological processes.

See also

• Consonant mutation
• Grassman's Law

Reference

• Template:Cite book

Template:Ling-stubde:Allomorph nl:Allomorf pl:Allomorf sv:Allomorf