[r]→[∅]Certainty: 5/5Commonality: 5/5

Alveolar trill to Empty sound / Zero

The elision of the rhotic [r] is the final stage of rhotic weakening. In many non-rhotic dialects, the historical rhotic has first vocalized into a schwa or caused compensatory lengthening of the preceding vowel, before disappearing entirely from the phonetic realization.

Phonetic Effects

Elision, R-dropping, Compensatory Lengthening

Language Examples

Cockney / AAVE Germanic

car [ɹ]→[kʰɑː] / [kɑ]— Total loss of the rhotic gesture, leaving only the vowel.

hard→[hɑːd]

Southern Min (Hokkien) Sino-Tibetan

historical *-r→[∅]— Historical rhotic codas in several Chinese dialects have been elided entirely.

Related Transformations

Reverse

More Germanic Shifts

[a] → [ã] — Assimilatory Nasalization [a] → [∅] — Elision [a] → [ʔ] — Glottalization [a] → [ə] — Vowel Reduction [æ] → [ɛ] — Vowel Raising

Sources & References

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