Final-obstruent Devoicing - German

German

In the southern varieties of German, the contrast between homorganic obstruents is rather an opposition of fortis and lenis than an opposition of voiceless and voiced sounds. Therefore, the term devoicing may be misleading, since voice is only an optional feature of German lenis obstruents. Likewise, the German term for the phenomenon, Auslautverhärtung, does not refer to a loss of voice and is better translated as 'final hardening'. However, the German phenomenon is similar to the final devoicing in other languages in that the opposition between two different kinds of obstruents disappears at the ends of words. The German varieties of the north, and many pronunciations of Standard German, do distinguish voiced and voiceless obstruents however.

Some examples from German include:

Nouns Verbs
Singular Translation Plural Imperative Translation Infinitive
Bad bath Bäder red! talk! reden
Maus mouse Mäuse lies! read! lesen
Raub robbery Raube reib! rub! reiben
Zug train Züge sag! say! sagen
Fünf five Fünfen

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