sonority

English

AI In plain words

Writing a short explanation…

Written by a house AI from the entry below, in your language. The entry itself is the source.

sonority

/səˈnɑɹɪti/
/səˈnɔːɹɪti/
/səˈnɑɹəti/
/səˈnɔːɹəti/

Where it comes from

From sonor(ous) + -ity, from French sonorité, from Latin sonōritās.

noun sonorities

countable, uncountable The property of being sonorous. Another quality that bothers me is Brendel's inconsistent sonority. The treble is hard and pingy; the midrange is weighed down with a booming bass.
countable, uncountable Relative loudness (of a speech sound); degree of being sonorous. It can be seen that vowels have the highest sonority of all phonemes in English, with low vowels being even more sonorous than high vowels.

Talk about this word

Cite this

MLA

"sonority." Wiktionary, via Micwyn, micwyn.com/word/sonority. Accessed 6 Nov. 2026.

APA

sonority. (n.d.). In Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Retrieved November 6, 2026, from https://micwyn.com/word/sonority

Chicago

"sonority." Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Accessed November 6, 2026. https://micwyn.com/word/sonority.

BibTeX

@misc{sonority_2026,
  title = {sonority},
  howpublished = {Wiktionary, via Micwyn},
  year = {2026},
  url = {https://micwyn.com/word/sonority},
  urldate = {2026-11-06}
}