Assonance is the repetition of identical or similar phonemes in words or syllables that occur close together, either in terms of their vowel phonemes (e.g., lean green meat) or their consonant phonemes (e.g., Kip keeps capes ). However, in American usage, assonance exclusively refers to this phenomenon when affecting vowels, whereas, when affecting consonants, it is generally called consonance.
Huh, TIL that the US uses a different definition than the rest of the world. I’d been wondering if you and I just had vastly different vowel pronunciations.
Whoa. I’m American and I just discovered that I had been using that word…uh…wrong for my region but right for the rest of the world? I thought it was phonemes in general, and that the vowel thing was an archaic usage. Interesting.
I knew it wasn’t alliteration, since it isn’t all the first syllable sound. But it’s always fun to learn new stuff about the language I’ve been speaking for nearly forty years.
Not the point of the post, but–dang, that headline assonance is amazing.
shocking Australia?
Huh, TIL that the US uses a different definition than the rest of the world. I’d been wondering if you and I just had vastly different vowel pronunciations.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assonance
Whoa. I’m American and I just discovered that I had been using that word…uh…wrong for my region but right for the rest of the world? I thought it was phonemes in general, and that the vowel thing was an archaic usage. Interesting.
I knew it wasn’t alliteration, since it isn’t all the first syllable sound. But it’s always fun to learn new stuff about the language I’ve been speaking for nearly forty years.