Avokadosar och kepsar – ett epentetiskt s med olika funktioner

Abstract

Two groups of words containing an s in the ending are discussed: firstly, non-standard plural forms ending in -sar, such as avokadosar ‘avocados’, frequently found in spoken Swedish, but deviating from the forms avokador or avokadoer, recommended by normative authorities, and secondly, so-called keps-words, traditionally analysed as English loan words, retaining the plural s, which, in some cases has been incorporated into the stem: cap + s → keps ‘hat’. The focus of interest is the role of the s. I argue that s in both groups is an epenthetic consonant. In sar-plurals, the s blocks hiatus, which is undesirable in Swedish. It also provides the syllable that follows with an onset and allows for the use of the default plural marker -ar. For keps-words I argue that s is epenthetic too, but in a different way. Prokosch’s law is important in Swedish phonology; basically, stressed syllables have to be long. When English short-syllable words, such as cap, are imported, they have to be adjusted accordingly. To supply the coda with an s – a reanalysis of the English plural marker –, is one way to achieve this. Not all keps-words can be explained this way, but the explanation holds for the majority of the examples.