Vowel coalescence is a phonological process in which adjacent vowels cause each other to change. Processes of vowel coalescence that are widespread in other Bantu languages occur in Shona at the boundaries between words and monosyllabic affixes. This article argues for two main coalescence triggers in Shona: 1) epenthetic i-, used to eliminate monosyllabic words, and 2) a nominal initial vowel attested, in other Bantu languages, which is hypothesized to have once existed in Shona. Coalescence only takes place across a syntactic boundary that occurs within a phonological word.
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