Stop consonant
Encyclopedia
In phonetics
, a plosive, also known as an occlusive or an oral stop, is a stop consonant
in which the vocal tract is blocked so that all airflow
ceases. The occlusion may be done with the tongue (blade t, d, or body k, ɡ), lips (b, p), and f & v. Occlusives contrast with nasal stops, where the vocal tract is blocked but airflow continues through the nose, as in m and n, and with fricatives, where partial occlusion impedes but does not block airflow in the vocal tract.
stops, in contrast with nasal stops such as m, n. The ambiguity arises because the phrase nasal stop is frequently abbreviated to nasal, and oral stop to stop; in some ways nasal consonants behave more like sonorant
s than like oral stops, so the use of the term stop in reference to nasals may cause confusion.
The term stop refers to the stopping of the airflow, at least through the mouth. The term plosive derives from the plosive airflow which results when the occlusion of typical oral stops is released. The term occlusive refers to the occlusion of the vocal tract which stops the airflow. Plosive and occlusive are generally synonyms, though various authors may make idiosyncratic distinctions between them. In some cases, plosive refers exclusively to oral stops with outward airflow powered by the diaphragm, as in English. Occlusive may then be used as a cover term for plosives together with similar consonants with other airflow mechanisms, such as ejectives, implosives, and clicks
, or as a cover term for plosives and affricates. In other cases, it is occlusive which is restricted to oral stops with outward airflow, while plosive covers implosives and clicks. In yet other cases, plosive means specifically the glottal stop
, or the opposite, to oral stops excluding the glottal stop.
In Ancient Greek
, occlusives were called áphōna (stoicheîa), which was translated into Latin
as mūtae (cōnsōnantēs), and from there borrowed into English as mute. (Mute was sometimes used instead for voiceless consonants, whether occlusives or fricatives, a usage which was later replaced with surd, a term still occasionally seen in the literature.) Both the Latin and Greek terms sometimes referred to consonants in general, which ancient grammarians did not consider pronounceable on their own without vowels.
lacks the coronals
[t] and [n], and several North American languages, such as the northern Iroquoian languages, lack the labials
[p] and [m]. In fact, the labial plosive is the least stable of the voiceless stops in the languages of the world, as the unconditioned sound change [p] → [f] (→ [h] → Ø) is quite common in unrelated languages, having occurred in the history of Classical Japanese, Classical Arabic
and Proto-Celtic
, for instance. Some of the Chimakuan
, Salishan
, and Wakashan
languages near Puget Sound
lack nasal stops
[m] and [n], as does the Rotokas language
of Papua New Guinea
. In some African and South American languages, nasal stops occur, but only in the environment of nasal vowel
s, and so are not distinctive
. Formal Samoan
has nasals /n ŋ/ and /t/ but only one word with velar
[k]; colloquial Samoan conflates these to /ŋ k/. Ni‘ihau Hawaiian
has [t] for /k/ to a greater extent than Standard Hawaiian, but neither distinguish a /k/ from a /t/. It may be more accurate to say that Hawaiian and colloquial Samoan do not distinguish velar and coronal stops than to say they lack one or the other.
In many languages, such as Malay
and Vietnamese
, final plosives lack a release burst, or have a nasal release
. See Unreleased stop
.
Nasal stops are somewhat similar. In the catch and hold, airflow continues through the nose; in the release, there is no burst, and final nasals are typically unreleased across most languages.
In affricates
, the catch and hold are those of a plosive, but the release is that of a fricative
. That is, affricates are plosive–fricative articulation contours.
stops without. Plosives are commonly voiceless, whereas nasal stops are only rarely so.
plosives, the vocal cords (or vocal folds) are abducted at the time of release. In a prevocalic aspirated plosive (a plosive followed by a vowel or sonorant), the time when the vocal cords begin to vibrate will be delayed until the vocal folds come together enough for voicing to begin, and will usually start with breathy voicing. The duration between the release of the plosive and the voice onset is called the voice onset time
(VOT) or the aspiration interval. Highly aspirated plosives have a long period of aspiration, so that there is a long period of voiceless airflow (a phonetic [h]) before the onset of the vowel. In tenuis
plosives, the vocal cords come together for voicing immediately following the release, and there is little or no aspiration (a voice onset time close to zero). In English, there may be a brief segment of breathy voice that identifies the plosive as voiceless and not voiced. In voiced plosives, the vocal folds are set for voice before the release, and often vibrate during the entire hold, and in English, the voicing after release is not breathy. A plosive is called "fully voiced" if it is voiced during the entire occlusion. In English, however, initial voiced plosives like /#b/ or /#d/ may have no voicing during the period of occlusion, or the voicing may start shortly before the release and continue after release, though word-final plosives tend to be fully voiced: In most dialects of English, the final g in the bag is likely to be fully voiced, while the initial b will only be voiced during part of its occlusion. Initial voiceless plosives, like the p in pie, are aspirated, with a palpable puff of air upon release, while a plosive after an s, as in spy, is tenuous (unaspirated). When spoken near a candle flame, the flame will flicker more after the words par, tar, and car are articulated, compared with spar, star, and scar. In the common pronunciation of papa, the initial p is aspirated while the medial p is not.
is well known for its geminate plosives, as the double t in the name Vittoria takes just as long to say as the ct does in English Victoria. Japanese
also prominently features geminate consonants, such as in the minimal pair 来た kita 'came' and 切った kitta 'cut'.
Note that there are many languages where the features voice, aspiration, and length reinforce each other, and in such cases it may be hard to determine which of these features predominates. In such cases, the terms fortis
is sometimes used for aspiration or gemination, while lenis is used for single, tenuous, or voiced plosives. Be aware, however, that the terms fortis and lenis are poorly defined, and their meanings vary from source to source.
that allows the air to escape through the nose during the occlusion.
Nasal stops are acoustically sonorant
s, as they have a non-turbulent airflow and are nearly always voiced, but they are articulatorily obstruent
s, as there is complete blockage of the oral cavity.
A prenasalized stop starts out with a lowered velum that raises during the occlusion. The closest examples in English are consonant clusters such as the [nd] in candy, but many languages have prenasalized stops that function phonologically as single consonants. Swahili
is well known for having words whose spellings begin with mp or nd, like mtu, though truer prenasalized sounds like [mp] or [nd] do occur word-initially in other Bantu languages.
A postnasalized stop
begins with a raised velum that lowers during the occlusion. This causes an audible nasal release, as in English sudden. Russian
and other Slavic languages have words that begin with [dn], which can be seen in the name of the Dnieper River
.
Note that the terms prenasalization and postnasalization are normally used only in languages where these sounds are phonemic: that is, not analyzed into sequences of plosive plus nasal stop.
. The normal mechanism is pulmonic egressive, that is, with air flowing outward from the lungs. All languages have pulmonic stops. Some languages have stops made with other mechanisms as well: ejective stops
(glottalic egressive), implosive stops
(glottalic ingressive), or click consonant
s (velaric ingressive).
stop (in the narrow sense) is produced with more muscular tension than a lenis stop (in the narrow sense). However, this is difficult to measure, and there is usually debate over the actual mechanism of alleged fortis or lenis consonants.
There are a series of stops in Korean
, sometimes written with the IPA symbol for ejectives, which are produced using "stiff voice
", meaning there is increased contraction of the glottis than for normal production of voiceless stops. The indirect evidence for stiff voice is in the following vowels, which have a higher fundamental frequency than those following other stops. The higher frequency is explained as a result of the glottis being tense. Other such phonation
types include breathy voice
, or murmur; slack voice
; and creaky voice
.
.
voiceless bilabial plosive
voiceless alveolar plosive
voiceless retroflex plosive
voiceless palatal plosive
voiceless velar plosive
voiceless uvular plosive epiglottal plosive
glottal stop
voiced bilabial plosive
voiced alveolar plosive
voiced retroflex plosive
voiced palatal plosive
voiced velar plosive
voiced uvular plosive
[b], [d], [ɡ] (in most dialects: partially voiced word-initially, fully voiced intervocally)
[ʔ] (glottal stop, not as a phoneme
in most dialects)
Phonetics
Phonetics is a branch of linguistics that comprises the study of the sounds of human speech, or—in the case of sign languages—the equivalent aspects of sign. It is concerned with the physical properties of speech sounds or signs : their physiological production, acoustic properties, auditory...
, a plosive, also known as an occlusive or an oral stop, is a stop consonant
Stop consonant
In phonetics, a plosive, also known as an occlusive or an oral stop, is a stop consonant in which the vocal tract is blocked so that all airflow ceases. The occlusion may be done with the tongue , lips , and &...
in which the vocal tract is blocked so that all airflow
Airstream mechanism
In phonetics, the airstream mechanism is the method by which airflow is created in the vocal tract. Along with phonation, it is one of two mandatory aspects of sound production; without these, there can be no speech sound....
ceases. The occlusion may be done with the tongue (blade t, d, or body k, ɡ), lips (b, p), and f & v. Occlusives contrast with nasal stops, where the vocal tract is blocked but airflow continues through the nose, as in m and n, and with fricatives, where partial occlusion impedes but does not block airflow in the vocal tract.
Terminology
The terms occlusive, plosive, and stop are often used interchangeably, but they are not defined the same. Occlusives/plosives are oralOral consonant
An oral consonant is a consonant sound in speech that is made by allowing air to escape from the mouth, as opposed to the nose. To create an intended oral consonant sound, the entire mouth plays a role in modifying the air's passageway. This rapid modification of the air passageway using the tongue...
stops, in contrast with nasal stops such as m, n. The ambiguity arises because the phrase nasal stop is frequently abbreviated to nasal, and oral stop to stop; in some ways nasal consonants behave more like sonorant
Sonorant
In phonetics and phonology, a sonorant is a speech sound that is produced without turbulent airflow in the vocal tract; fricatives and plosives are not sonorants. Vowels are sonorants, as are consonants like and . Other consonants, like or , restrict the airflow enough to cause turbulence, and...
s than like oral stops, so the use of the term stop in reference to nasals may cause confusion.
The term stop refers to the stopping of the airflow, at least through the mouth. The term plosive derives from the plosive airflow which results when the occlusion of typical oral stops is released. The term occlusive refers to the occlusion of the vocal tract which stops the airflow. Plosive and occlusive are generally synonyms, though various authors may make idiosyncratic distinctions between them. In some cases, plosive refers exclusively to oral stops with outward airflow powered by the diaphragm, as in English. Occlusive may then be used as a cover term for plosives together with similar consonants with other airflow mechanisms, such as ejectives, implosives, and clicks
Click consonant
Clicks are speech sounds found as consonants in many languages of southern Africa, and in three languages of East Africa. Examples of these sounds familiar to English speakers are the tsk! tsk! or tut-tut used to express disapproval or pity, the tchick! used to spur on a horse, and the...
, or as a cover term for plosives and affricates. In other cases, it is occlusive which is restricted to oral stops with outward airflow, while plosive covers implosives and clicks. In yet other cases, plosive means specifically the glottal stop
Glottal stop
The glottal stop, or more fully, the voiceless glottal plosive, is a type of consonantal sound used in many spoken languages. In English, the feature is represented, for example, by the hyphen in uh-oh! and by the apostrophe or [[ʻokina]] in Hawaii among those using a preservative pronunciation of...
, or the opposite, to oral stops excluding the glottal stop.
In Ancient Greek
Ancient Greek
Ancient Greek is the stage of the Greek language in the periods spanning the times c. 9th–6th centuries BC, , c. 5th–4th centuries BC , and the c. 3rd century BC – 6th century AD of ancient Greece and the ancient world; being predated in the 2nd millennium BC by Mycenaean Greek...
, occlusives were called áphōna (stoicheîa), which was translated into Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
as mūtae (cōnsōnantēs), and from there borrowed into English as mute. (Mute was sometimes used instead for voiceless consonants, whether occlusives or fricatives, a usage which was later replaced with surd, a term still occasionally seen in the literature.) Both the Latin and Greek terms sometimes referred to consonants in general, which ancient grammarians did not consider pronounceable on their own without vowels.
Common stops
All languages in the world have stops and most have at least the voiceless plosives [p], [t], [k] and the nasals [n], and [m]. However, there are exceptions: Colloquial SamoanSamoan language
Samoan Samoan Samoan (Gagana Sāmoa, is the language of the Samoan Islands, comprising the independent country of Samoa and the United States territory of American Samoa. It is an official language—alongside English—in both jurisdictions. Samoan, a Polynesian language, is the first language for most...
lacks the coronals
Coronal consonant
Coronal consonants are consonants articulated with the flexible front part of the tongue. Only the coronal consonants can be divided into apical , laminal , domed , or subapical , as well as a few rarer orientations, because only the front of the tongue has such...
[t] and [n], and several North American languages, such as the northern Iroquoian languages, lack the labials
Labial consonant
Labial consonants are consonants in which one or both lips are the active articulator. This precludes linguolabials, in which the tip of the tongue reaches for the posterior side of the upper lip and which are considered coronals...
[p] and [m]. In fact, the labial plosive is the least stable of the voiceless stops in the languages of the world, as the unconditioned sound change [p] → [f] (→ [h] → Ø) is quite common in unrelated languages, having occurred in the history of Classical Japanese, Classical Arabic
Classical Arabic
Classical Arabic , also known as Qur'anic or Koranic Arabic, is the form of the Arabic language used in literary texts from Umayyad and Abbasid times . It is based on the Medieval dialects of Arab tribes...
and Proto-Celtic
Proto-Celtic language
The Proto-Celtic language, also called Common Celtic, is the reconstructed ancestor language of all the known Celtic languages. Its lexis can be confidently reconstructed on the basis of the comparative method of historical linguistics...
, for instance. Some of the Chimakuan
Chimakuan languages
The Chimakuan language family consists of two languages spoken in northwestern Washington, USA on the Olympic Peninsula. It is part of the Mosan sprachbund, and one of its languages is famous for having no nasal consonants...
, Salishan
Salishan languages
The Salishan languages are a group of languages of the Pacific Northwest...
, and Wakashan
Wakashan languages
Wakashan is a family of languages spoken in British Columbia around and on Vancouver Island, and in the northwestern corner of the Olympic Peninsula of Washington state, on the south side of the Strait of Juan de Fuca....
languages near Puget Sound
Puget Sound
Puget Sound is a sound in the U.S. state of Washington. It is a complex estuarine system of interconnected marine waterways and basins, with one major and one minor connection to the Strait of Juan de Fuca and the Pacific Ocean — Admiralty Inlet being the major connection and...
lack nasal stops
Nasal consonant
A nasal consonant is a type of consonant produced with a lowered velum in the mouth, allowing air to escape freely through the nose. Examples of nasal consonants in English are and , in words such as nose and mouth.- Definition :...
[m] and [n], as does the Rotokas language
Rotokas language
Rotokas is an East Papuan language spoken by some 4000 people in Bougainville, an island to the east of New Guinea, part of Papua New Guinea. There are at least three dialects of the language: Central Rotokas , Aita Rotokas, and Pipipaia...
of Papua New Guinea
Papua New Guinea
Papua New Guinea , officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea, is a country in Oceania, occupying the eastern half of the island of New Guinea and numerous offshore islands...
. In some African and South American languages, nasal stops occur, but only in the environment of nasal vowel
Nasal vowel
A nasal vowel is a vowel that is produced with a lowering of the velum so that air escapes both through nose as well as the mouth. By contrast, oral vowels are ordinary vowels without this nasalisation...
s, and so are not distinctive
Allophone
In phonology, an allophone is one of a set of multiple possible spoken sounds used to pronounce a single phoneme. For example, and are allophones for the phoneme in the English language...
. Formal Samoan
Samoan language
Samoan Samoan Samoan (Gagana Sāmoa, is the language of the Samoan Islands, comprising the independent country of Samoa and the United States territory of American Samoa. It is an official language—alongside English—in both jurisdictions. Samoan, a Polynesian language, is the first language for most...
has nasals /n ŋ/ and /t/ but only one word with velar
Velar consonant
Velars are consonants articulated with the back part of the tongue against the soft palate, the back part of the roof of the mouth, known also as the velum)....
[k]; colloquial Samoan conflates these to /ŋ k/. Ni‘ihau Hawaiian
Hawaiian language
The Hawaiian language is a Polynesian language that takes its name from Hawaii, the largest island in the tropical North Pacific archipelago where it developed. Hawaiian, along with English, is an official language of the state of Hawaii...
has [t] for /k/ to a greater extent than Standard Hawaiian, but neither distinguish a /k/ from a /t/. It may be more accurate to say that Hawaiian and colloquial Samoan do not distinguish velar and coronal stops than to say they lack one or the other.
Articulation
In the articulation of the plosive, three phases can be distinguished:- Catch: The airway closes so that no air can escape through the mouth (hence the name stop).
- Hold or occlusion: The airway stays closed, causing a pressure difference to build up (hence the name occlusive).
- Release or burst: The closure is opened. The released airflow produces a sudden impulse causing an audible sound, or burst (hence the name plosive).
In many languages, such as Malay
Malay language
Malay is a major language of the Austronesian family. It is the official language of Malaysia , Indonesia , Brunei and Singapore...
and Vietnamese
Vietnamese language
Vietnamese is the national and official language of Vietnam. It is the mother tongue of 86% of Vietnam's population, and of about three million overseas Vietnamese. It is also spoken as a second language by many ethnic minorities of Vietnam...
, final plosives lack a release burst, or have a nasal release
Nasal release
In phonetics, a nasal release is the release of a plosive consonant into a nasal stop. Such sounds are transcribed in the IPA with superscript nasal letters, for example as . In English words such as sudden in which historically the tongue made separate contacts with the alveolar ridge for the /d/...
. See Unreleased stop
Unreleased stop
An unreleased stop or unreleased plosive is a plosive consonant without an audible release burst. That is, the oral tract is blocked to pronounce the consonant, and there is no audible indication of when that occlusion ends...
.
Nasal stops are somewhat similar. In the catch and hold, airflow continues through the nose; in the release, there is no burst, and final nasals are typically unreleased across most languages.
In affricates
Affricate consonant
Affricates are consonants that begin as stops but release as a fricative rather than directly into the following vowel.- Samples :...
, the catch and hold are those of a plosive, but the release is that of a fricative
Fricative consonant
Fricatives are consonants produced by forcing air through a narrow channel made by placing two articulators close together. These may be the lower lip against the upper teeth, in the case of ; the back of the tongue against the soft palate, in the case of German , the final consonant of Bach; or...
. That is, affricates are plosive–fricative articulation contours.
Voice
Voiced stops are articulated with simultaneous vibration of the vocal cords, voicelessVoiceless
In linguistics, voicelessness is the property of sounds being pronounced without the larynx vibrating. Phonologically, this is a type of phonation, which contrasts with other states of the larynx, but some object that the word "phonation" implies voicing, and that voicelessness is the lack of...
stops without. Plosives are commonly voiceless, whereas nasal stops are only rarely so.
Aspiration
In aspiratedAspiration (phonetics)
In phonetics, aspiration is the strong burst of air that accompanies either the release or, in the case of preaspiration, the closure of some obstruents. To feel or see the difference between aspirated and unaspirated sounds, one can put a hand or a lit candle in front of one's mouth, and say pin ...
plosives, the vocal cords (or vocal folds) are abducted at the time of release. In a prevocalic aspirated plosive (a plosive followed by a vowel or sonorant), the time when the vocal cords begin to vibrate will be delayed until the vocal folds come together enough for voicing to begin, and will usually start with breathy voicing. The duration between the release of the plosive and the voice onset is called the voice onset time
Voice onset time
In phonetics, voice onset time, commonly abbreviated VOT, is a feature of the production of stop consonants. It is defined as the length of time that passes between when a stop consonant is released and when voicing, the vibration of the vocal folds, or, according to the authors, periodicity begins...
(VOT) or the aspiration interval. Highly aspirated plosives have a long period of aspiration, so that there is a long period of voiceless airflow (a phonetic [h]) before the onset of the vowel. In tenuis
Tenuis consonant
In linguistics, a tenuis consonant is a stop or affricate which is unvoiced, unaspirated, and unglottalized. That is, it has a "plain" phonation like , with a voice onset time close to zero, as in Spanish p, t, ch, k, or as in English p, t, k after s .In transcription, tenuis consonants are not...
plosives, the vocal cords come together for voicing immediately following the release, and there is little or no aspiration (a voice onset time close to zero). In English, there may be a brief segment of breathy voice that identifies the plosive as voiceless and not voiced. In voiced plosives, the vocal folds are set for voice before the release, and often vibrate during the entire hold, and in English, the voicing after release is not breathy. A plosive is called "fully voiced" if it is voiced during the entire occlusion. In English, however, initial voiced plosives like /#b/ or /#d/ may have no voicing during the period of occlusion, or the voicing may start shortly before the release and continue after release, though word-final plosives tend to be fully voiced: In most dialects of English, the final g in the bag is likely to be fully voiced, while the initial b will only be voiced during part of its occlusion. Initial voiceless plosives, like the p in pie, are aspirated, with a palpable puff of air upon release, while a plosive after an s, as in spy, is tenuous (unaspirated). When spoken near a candle flame, the flame will flicker more after the words par, tar, and car are articulated, compared with spar, star, and scar. In the common pronunciation of papa, the initial p is aspirated while the medial p is not.
Length
In a geminate or long consonant, the occlusion lasts longer than in simple consonants. In languages where plosives are only distinguished by length (e.g., Arabic, Ilwana, Icelandic), the long plosives may be held up to three times as long as the short plosives. ItalianItalian language
Italian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia...
is well known for its geminate plosives, as the double t in the name Vittoria takes just as long to say as the ct does in English Victoria. Japanese
Japanese language
is a language spoken by over 130 million people in Japan and in Japanese emigrant communities. It is a member of the Japonic language family, which has a number of proposed relationships with other languages, none of which has gained wide acceptance among historical linguists .Japanese is an...
also prominently features geminate consonants, such as in the minimal pair 来た kita 'came' and 切った kitta 'cut'.
Note that there are many languages where the features voice, aspiration, and length reinforce each other, and in such cases it may be hard to determine which of these features predominates. In such cases, the terms fortis
Fortis and lenis
In linguistics, fortis and lenis are terms generally used to refer to groups of consonants that are produced with greater and lesser energy, respectively, such as in energy applied, articulation, etc....
is sometimes used for aspiration or gemination, while lenis is used for single, tenuous, or voiced plosives. Be aware, however, that the terms fortis and lenis are poorly defined, and their meanings vary from source to source.
Nasalization
Nasal stops are differentiated from oral stops only by a lowered velumSoft palate
The soft palate is the soft tissue constituting the back of the roof of the mouth. The soft palate is distinguished from the hard palate at the front of the mouth in that it does not contain bone....
that allows the air to escape through the nose during the occlusion.
Nasal stops are acoustically sonorant
Sonorant
In phonetics and phonology, a sonorant is a speech sound that is produced without turbulent airflow in the vocal tract; fricatives and plosives are not sonorants. Vowels are sonorants, as are consonants like and . Other consonants, like or , restrict the airflow enough to cause turbulence, and...
s, as they have a non-turbulent airflow and are nearly always voiced, but they are articulatorily obstruent
Obstruent
An obstruent is a consonant sound formed by obstructing airflow, causing increased air pressure in the vocal tract, such as [k], [d͡ʒ] and [f]. In phonetics, articulation may be divided into two large classes: obstruents and sonorants....
s, as there is complete blockage of the oral cavity.
A prenasalized stop starts out with a lowered velum that raises during the occlusion. The closest examples in English are consonant clusters such as the [nd] in candy, but many languages have prenasalized stops that function phonologically as single consonants. Swahili
Swahili language
Swahili or Kiswahili is a Bantu language spoken by various ethnic groups that inhabit several large stretches of the Mozambique Channel coastline from northern Kenya to northern Mozambique, including the Comoro Islands. It is also spoken by ethnic minority groups in Somalia...
is well known for having words whose spellings begin with mp or nd, like mtu, though truer prenasalized sounds like [mp] or [nd] do occur word-initially in other Bantu languages.
A postnasalized stop
Nasal release
In phonetics, a nasal release is the release of a plosive consonant into a nasal stop. Such sounds are transcribed in the IPA with superscript nasal letters, for example as . In English words such as sudden in which historically the tongue made separate contacts with the alveolar ridge for the /d/...
begins with a raised velum that lowers during the occlusion. This causes an audible nasal release, as in English sudden. Russian
Russian language
Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...
and other Slavic languages have words that begin with [dn], which can be seen in the name of the Dnieper River
Dnieper River
The Dnieper River is one of the major rivers of Europe that flows from Russia, through Belarus and Ukraine, to the Black Sea.The total length is and has a drainage basin of .The river is noted for its dams and hydroelectric stations...
.
Note that the terms prenasalization and postnasalization are normally used only in languages where these sounds are phonemic: that is, not analyzed into sequences of plosive plus nasal stop.
Airstream mechanism
Stops may be made with more than one airstream mechanismAirstream mechanism
In phonetics, the airstream mechanism is the method by which airflow is created in the vocal tract. Along with phonation, it is one of two mandatory aspects of sound production; without these, there can be no speech sound....
. The normal mechanism is pulmonic egressive, that is, with air flowing outward from the lungs. All languages have pulmonic stops. Some languages have stops made with other mechanisms as well: ejective stops
Ejective consonant
In phonetics, ejective consonants are voiceless consonants that are pronounced with simultaneous closure of the glottis. In the phonology of a particular language, ejectives may contrast with aspirated or tenuis consonants...
(glottalic egressive), implosive stops
Implosive consonant
Implosive consonants are stops with a mixed glottalic ingressive and pulmonic egressive airstream mechanism. That is, the airstream is controlled by moving the glottis downward in addition to expelling air from the lungs. Therefore, unlike the purely glottalic ejective consonants, implosives can...
(glottalic ingressive), or click consonant
Click consonant
Clicks are speech sounds found as consonants in many languages of southern Africa, and in three languages of East Africa. Examples of these sounds familiar to English speakers are the tsk! tsk! or tut-tut used to express disapproval or pity, the tchick! used to spur on a horse, and the...
s (velaric ingressive).
Tenseness
A fortisFortis and lenis
In linguistics, fortis and lenis are terms generally used to refer to groups of consonants that are produced with greater and lesser energy, respectively, such as in energy applied, articulation, etc....
stop (in the narrow sense) is produced with more muscular tension than a lenis stop (in the narrow sense). However, this is difficult to measure, and there is usually debate over the actual mechanism of alleged fortis or lenis consonants.
There are a series of stops in Korean
Korean language
Korean is the official language of the country Korea, in both South and North. It is also one of the two official languages in the Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture in People's Republic of China. There are about 78 million Korean speakers worldwide. In the 15th century, a national writing...
, sometimes written with the IPA symbol for ejectives, which are produced using "stiff voice
Stiff voice
The term stiff voice describes the pronunciation of consonants or vowels with a glottal opening narrower, and the vocal cords stiffer, than what occurs in modal voice. Although there is no specific IPA diacritic for stiff voice, the voicing diacritic may be used in conjunction with the symbol for...
", meaning there is increased contraction of the glottis than for normal production of voiceless stops. The indirect evidence for stiff voice is in the following vowels, which have a higher fundamental frequency than those following other stops. The higher frequency is explained as a result of the glottis being tense. Other such phonation
Phonation
Phonation has slightly different meanings depending on the subfield of phonetics. Among some phoneticians, phonation is the process by which the vocal folds produce certain sounds through quasi-periodic vibration. This is the definition used among those who study laryngeal anatomy and physiology...
types include breathy voice
Breathy voice
Breathy voice is a phonation in which the vocal cords vibrate, as they do in normal voicing, but are held further apart, so that a larger volume of air escapes between them. This produces an audible noise...
, or murmur; slack voice
Slack voice
The term slack voice describes the pronunciation of consonant or vowels with a glottal opening slightly wider than that occurring in modal voice. Such sounds are often referred to informally as lenis or half-voiced in the case of consonants...
; and creaky voice
Creaky voice
In linguistics, creaky voice , is a special kind of phonation in which the arytenoid cartilages in the larynx are drawn together; as a result, the vocal folds are compressed rather tightly, becoming relatively slack and compact...
.
Examples
The following plosives have been given dedicated symbols in the IPAInternational Phonetic Alphabet
The International Phonetic Alphabet "The acronym 'IPA' strictly refers [...] to the 'International Phonetic Association'. But it is now such a common practice to use the acronym also to refer to the alphabet itself that resistance seems pedantic...
.
voiceless bilabial plosive
Voiceless bilabial plosive
The voiceless bilabial plosive is a type of consonantal sound used in many spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is , and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is p...
voiceless alveolar plosive
Voiceless alveolar plosive
The voiceless alveolar plosive is a type of consonantal sound used in many spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents voiceless dental, alveolar, and postalveolar plosives is , and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is t...
voiceless retroflex plosive
Voiceless retroflex plosive
-External links:*...
voiceless palatal plosive
Voiceless palatal plosive
The voiceless palatal plosive is a type of consonantal sound used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is , and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is c....
voiceless velar plosive
Voiceless velar plosive
The voiceless velar stop or voiceless velar plosive is a type of consonantal sound used in many spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is , and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is k....
voiceless uvular plosive epiglottal plosive
Epiglottal plosive
The epiglottal plosive is a type of consonantal sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is .-Features:Features of the epiglottal plosive:...
glottal stop
Glottal stop
The glottal stop, or more fully, the voiceless glottal plosive, is a type of consonantal sound used in many spoken languages. In English, the feature is represented, for example, by the hyphen in uh-oh! and by the apostrophe or [[ʻokina]] in Hawaii among those using a preservative pronunciation of...
voiced bilabial plosive
Voiced bilabial plosive
The voiced bilabial plosive is a type of consonantal sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is , and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is b. The voiced bilabial plosive occurs in English, and it is the sound denoted by the...
voiced alveolar plosive
Voiced alveolar plosive
The voiced alveolar plosive is a type of consonantal sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents voiced dental, alveolar, and postalveolar plosives is , and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is d.-Features:Features of the voiced...
voiced retroflex plosive
Voiced retroflex plosive
The voiced retroflex plosive is a type of consonantal sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is , and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is d`. The IPA symbol is a lowercase letter d with a rightward-pointing tail protruding...
voiced palatal plosive
Voiced palatal plosive
The voiced palatal plosive is a type of consonantal sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ⟨⟩, a barred dotless ⟨j⟩ , and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is J\.The sound does not exist as a phoneme in English, but is...
voiced velar plosive
Voiced velar plosive
The voiced velar plosive is a type of consonantal sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is , and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is g. Strictly, the IPA symbol is the so-called "opentail G" , though the "looptail G" is...
voiced uvular plosive
English
[p], [t], [k] (aspirated word-initially, tenuis in clusters with s)[b], [d], [ɡ] (in most dialects: partially voiced word-initially, fully voiced intervocally)
[ʔ] (glottal stop, not as a phoneme
Phoneme
In a language or dialect, a phoneme is the smallest segmental unit of sound employed to form meaningful contrasts between utterances....
in most dialects)
See also
- ContinuantContinuantA continuant is a sound produced with an incomplete closure of the vocal tract. That is, any sound except a stop or nasal. An affricate is considered to be a complex segment, composed of both a stop and a continuant.-See also:...
(the opposite of a stop) - List of phonetics topics
- Pop filterPop filterA pop filter or pop shield is an anti-pop noise protection filter for microphones, typically used in a recording studio. It serves to reduce or eliminate 'popping' sounds caused by the mechanical impact of fast moving air on the microphone during recorded speech and singing. It can also protect...
- Nonexplosive stopNonexplosive stopIn phonetics and phonology, nonexplosive stops are stop consonants that lack the pressure build-up and burst release normally associated with stops...