Word.ws English Dictionary

rhoticism

rhoticism is the alternative form of rhotacism.

Meaning of rhotacism

Noun

rhotacism (countable and uncountable, plural rhotacisms)

  1. An exaggerated use of the sound of the letter R.
  2. (countable) A linguistic phenomenon in which a consonant changes into an R; rhotacization.
  3. The inability to pronounce the letter R; derhotacization.
    • For example: r’s may become burrs or guttural grunts or w’s or l’s (rhotacism); […]1970, Leland E. Hinsie, Robert Jean Campbell, Psychiatric Dictionary, Oxford University Press, page 711

Forms of rhoticism

pluralrhoticisms

Origin of rhoticism

From rhotic + -ism.

Questions about rhoticism

What is rhoticism the alternative form of?
Rhoticism is the alternative form of rhotacism.

Words near rhoticism in the dictionary

  1. Rhoten
  2. Rhotens
  3. rhotic
  4. rhotic hook
  5. rhotically
  6. rhoticism
  7. rhoticisms
  8. rhoticity
  9. rhoticize
  10. rhoticized
  11. rhoticizes

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: rhoticism (page history and authors); rhotacism (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “rhoticism.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/rhoticism. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.