"fission" with -zh-?

[Douglas G. Wilson]

On 3/15/2011 3:11 PM, geoffrey nunberg wrote:
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> Poster:       geoffrey nunberg<nunberg at ISCHOOL.BERKELEY.EDU>
> Subject:      "fission" with -zh-?
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> Listening to some nuclear energy experts talking about Japan on the radio this morning, I was led to wonder whether  "fission" is the only English word in which orthographic [Vssion] can be pronounced with a voiced fricative.
--

It's not.

MW3 shows "fission", "scission", "abscission", "rescission" with both
"-sh" and "-zh-" pronunciations. I guess some of these are in line with
the usual pronunciation of "scissors".

Going back to the good old days, the on-line Century dictionary shows
_only_ "-sh-" pronunciations for "fission" and "scission", but _only_
"-zh-" pronunciations for "abscission", "rescission" (!).

In between, MW2 shows both for "scission", only "-zh-" for "abscission",
"rescission", only "-sh-" for "fission".

These data would be compatible with "abscission" and "rescission"
leading "scission" astray with "fission" following later (I'm not
asserting this must have happened). These are not all everyday words and
I suppose a century ago "fission" may have been as esoteric as
"scission"or nearly so.

Why the "-z-" sound in "scissor", BTW?

-- Doug Wilson

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