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56-471: In the alveolar hissing sibilants [s] and [z] , the back of the tongue forms a narrow channel (is grooved ) to focus the stream of air more intensely, resulting in a high pitch. With the hushing sibilants (occasionally termed shibilants ), such as English [ʃ] , [tʃ] , [ʒ] , and [dʒ] , the tongue is flatter, and the resulting pitch lower. A broader category is stridents , which include more fricatives than sibilants such as uvulars . Sibilants are

112-521: A lateral alveolar approximant /l/ . (Samoan words written with t and n are pronounced with [k] and [ŋ] in colloquial speech.) In Standard Hawaiian , [t] is an allophone of /k/ , but /l/ and /n/ exist. In labioalveolars, the lower lip contacts the alveolar ridge. Such sounds are typically the result of a severe overbite. In the Extensions to the IPA for disordered speech, they are transcribed with

168-428: A flat or concave shape, with no associated palatalization, and no groove running down the tongue. The term "retroflex", in fact, literally means "bent back" (concave), although consonants with a flat tongue shape are commonly considered retroflex as well. The velar bunched approximant found in northern varieties of Dutch and some varieties of American English is acoustically similar to the retroflex approximant. It

224-426: A four-way distinction among sibilant affricates /ts/ /tʂ/ /tʃ/ /tɕ/ , with one for each of the four tongue shapes. Toda also has a four-way sibilant distinction, with one alveolar, one palato-alveolar, and two retroflex (apical postalveolar and subapical palatal). The now-extinct Ubykh language was particularly complex, with a total of 27 sibilant consonants. Not only all four tongue shapes were represented (with

280-520: A generic "retracted sibilant" as [s̠] , a transcription frequently used for the sharper-quality types of retroflex consonants (e.g. the laminal "flat" type and the " apico-alveolar " type). There is no diacritic to denote the laminal "closed" articulation of palato-alveolars in the Northwest Caucasian languages , but they are sometimes provisionally transcribed as [ŝ ẑ] . The attested possibilities, with exemplar languages, are as follows. Note that

336-499: A grouping of sibilants and [f, v] , the term strident is more common. Some researchers judge [f] to be non-strident in English, based on measurements of its comparative amplitude, but to be strident in other languages (for example, in the African language Ewe , where it contrasts with non-strident [ɸ] ). The nature of sibilants as so-called 'obstacle fricatives' is complicated – there

392-410: A higher pitched subset of the stridents. The English sibilants are: while the English stridents are: as /f/ and /v/ are stridents but not sibilants because they are lower in pitch. Be aware, some linguistics use the terms stridents and sibilants interchangeably to refer to the greater amplitude and pitch compared to other fricatives. "Stridency" refers to the perceptual intensity of

448-478: A language. However, other possibilities exist. Serbo-Croatian has alveolar, flat postalveolar and alveolo-palatal affricates whereas Basque has palato-alveolar and laminal and apical alveolar ( apico-alveolar ) fricatives and affricates (late Medieval peninsular Spanish and Portuguese had the same distinctions among fricatives). Many languages, such as English or Arabic , have two sibilant types, one hissing and one hushing. A wide variety of languages across

504-421: A sequence of r and a coronal consonant may be replaced by the coronal's retroflex equivalent: the name Martin is pronounced [ˈmǎʈːɪn] (Swedish) or [ˈmɑ̀ʈːɪn] (Norwegian), and nord ("north") is pronounced [ˈnuːɖ] in (Standard) Swedish and [ˈnuːɽ] in many varieties of Norwegian. That is sometimes done for several consonants in a row after an r : Hornstull

560-548: A subapical palatal retroflex sibilant occurs in Toda . The main distinction is the shape of the tongue. Most sibilants have a groove running down the centerline of the tongue that helps focus the airstream, but it is not known how widespread this is. In addition, the following tongue shapes are described, from sharpest and highest-pitched to dullest and lowest-pitched: The latter three post-alveolar types of sounds are often known as "hushing" sounds because of their quality, as opposed to

616-450: Is a coronal consonant where the tongue has a flat, concave, or even curled shape, and is articulated between the alveolar ridge and the hard palate . They are sometimes referred to as cerebral consonants —especially in Indology . The Latin -derived word retroflex means "bent back"; some retroflex consonants are pronounced with the tongue fully curled back so that articulation involves

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672-412: Is a sibilant and the latter is not. [s̠] differs from postalveolar [ʃ] in being unpalatalized. The bare letters [s, t, n, l] , etc. cannot be assumed to specifically represent alveolars. The language may not make such distinctions, such that two or more coronal places of articulation are found allophonically , or the transcription may simply be too broad to distinguish dental from alveolar. If it

728-471: Is a continuum of possibilities relating to the angle at which the jet of air may strike an obstacle. The grooving often considered necessary for classification as a sibilant has been observed in ultrasound studies of the tongue for the supposedly non-sibilant voiceless alveolar fricative [θ̠] of English. Alveolar consonant Alveolar ( / æ l ˈ v iː ə l ər / ; UK also / æ l v i ˈ oʊ l ər / ) consonants are articulated with

784-547: Is articulated with the body of the tongue bunched up at the velum. In the International Phonetic Alphabet , the symbols for retroflex consonants are typically the same as for the alveolar consonants , but with the addition of a right-facing hook to the bottom of the symbol. Retroflex consonants are transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as follows: Some linguists restrict these symbols for consonants with subapical palatal articulation, in which

840-942: Is in the indigenous languages of Australia and the Western Pacific (notably New Caledonia ). Here, most languages have retroflex plosives, nasals and approximants . Retroflex consonants are relatively rare in the European languages but occur in such languages as Swedish and Norwegian in Northern Europe , some Romance languages of Southern Europe ( Sardinian , Sicilian , including Calabrian and Salentino , some Italian dialects such as Lunigianese in Italy , and some Asturian dialects in Spain ), and (sibilants only) Faroese and several Slavic languages ( Polish , Russian , Serbo-Croatian , Slovak and Sorbian ). In Swedish and Norwegian,

896-475: Is necessary to specify a consonant as alveolar, a diacritic from the Extended IPA may be used: [s͇, t͇, n͇, l͇] , etc. , though that could also mean extra-retracted. The letters ⟨s, t, n, l⟩ are frequently called 'alveolar', and the language examples below are all alveolar sounds. (The Extended IPA diacritic was devised for speech pathology and is frequently used to mean "alveolarized", as in

952-430: Is not an IPA notation. See the article on postalveolar consonants for more information. The following table shows the types of sibilant fricatives defined in the International Phonetic Alphabet : Diacritics can be used for finer detail. For example, apical and laminal alveolars can be specified as [s̺] vs [s̻] ; a dental (or more likely denti-alveolar ) sibilant as [s̪] ; a palatalized alveolar as [sʲ] ; and

1008-432: Is particularly important for retroflex sibilants, because all three varieties can occur, with noticeably different sound qualities. For more information on these variants and their relation to sibilants, see the article on postalveolar consonants . For tongue-down laminal articulations, an additional distinction can be made depending on where exactly behind the lower teeth the tongue tip is placed. A little ways back from

1064-471: Is pronounced [huːɳʂˈʈɵlː] ). The retroflex approximant [ɻ] is in free variation with the postalveolar approximant /ɹ/ in many dialects of American English , particularly in the Midwestern United States . Polish and Russian possess retroflex sibilants , but no stops or liquids at this place of articulation. Retroflex consonants are largely absent from indigenous languages of

1120-725: The International Phonetic Association . In their Handbook , they give the example of [ᶑ] , a retroflex implosive, but when they requested an expansion of coverage of the International Phonetic Alphabet by Unicode in 2020, they supported the addition superscript variants of not just [ᶑ] but of the retroflex lateral fricatives [ꞎ] and [𝼅] , of the retroflex lateral flap [𝼈] , and of the retroflex click release [𝼊] . (See Latin Extended-F .) The lateral fricatives are explicitly provided for by extIPA . Most of these sounds are not common, but they all occur. For example,

1176-748: The Iwaidja language of northern Australia has a retroflex lateral flap [𝼈] ( [ɺ̢] ) as well as a retroflex tap [ɽ] and retroflex lateral approximant [ɭ] ; and the Dravidian language Toda has a subapical retroflex lateral fricative [ꞎ] ( [ɭ̊˔] ) and a retroflexed trill [ɽr] . The Ngad'a language of Flores has been reported to have a retroflex implosive [ᶑ] . Subapical retroflex clicks occur in Central !Kung , and possibly in Damin . Most languages with retroflex sounds typically have only one retroflex sound with

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1232-500: The grooved alveolar sibilants. The farther back the point of contact with the roof of the mouth, the more concave is the shape of the tongue, and the duller (lower pitched) is the sound, with subapical consonants being the most extreme. The main combinations normally observed are: Subapical sounds are sometimes called "true retroflex" because of the curled-back shape of the tongue, and the other sounds sometimes go by other names. For example, Ladefoged and Maddieson prefer to call

1288-480: The hard palate ( palatal ). Finally, both sibilant ( fricative or affricate ) and nonsibilant ( stop , nasal , lateral , rhotic ) consonants can have a retroflex articulation. The greatest variety of combinations occurs with sibilants, because for them, small changes in tongue shape and position cause significant changes in the resulting sound. Retroflex sounds generally have a duller, lower-pitched sound than other alveolar or postalveolar consonants, especially

1344-480: The " ceceo " type, which have replaced the former hissing fricative with [θ] , leaving only [tʃ] . Languages with no sibilants are fairly rare. Most have no fricatives at all or only the fricative /h/ . Examples include most Australian languages , and Rotokas , and what is generally reconstructed for Proto-Bantu . Languages with fricatives but no sibilants, however, do occur, such as Ukue in Nigeria , which has only

1400-412: The "hissing" alveolar sounds. The alveolar sounds in fact occur in several varieties, in addition to the normal sound of English s : Speaking non-technically, the retroflex consonant [ʂ] sounds somewhat like a mixture between the regular English [ʃ] of "ship" and a strong American "r"; while the alveolo-palatal consonant [ɕ] sounds somewhat like a mixture of English [ʃ] of "ship" and the [sj] in

1456-1064: The Americas with the exception of the extreme south of South America, an area in the Southwestern United States as in Hopi and O'odham , and in Alaska and the Yukon Territory as in the Athabaskan languages Gwich’in and Hän . In African languages retroflex consonants are also rare but reportedly occur in a few Nilo-Saharan languages , as well as in the Bantu language Makhuwa and some other varieties. In southwest Ethiopia, phonemically distinctive retroflex consonants are found in Bench and Sheko , two contiguous, but not closely related, Omotic languages. There are several retroflex consonants that are implied by

1512-419: The IPA diacritics are simplified; some articulations would require two diacritics to be fully specified, but only one is used in order to keep the results legible without the need for OpenType IPA fonts. Also, Ladefoged has resurrected an obsolete IPA symbol, the under dot, to indicate apical postalveolar (normally included in the category of retroflex consonants ), and that notation is used here. (Note that

1568-409: The alveolar consonants. Rather, the same symbol is used for all coronal places of articulation that are not palatalized like English palato-alveolar sh , or retroflex . To disambiguate, the bridge ( [s̪, t̪, n̪, l̪] , etc. ) may be used for a dental consonant, or the under-bar ( [s̠, t̠, n̠, l̠] , etc. ) may be used for the postalveolars . [s̪] differs from dental [θ] in that the former

1624-431: The alveolar diacritic on labial letters: ⟨ m͇ p͇ b͇ f͇ v͇ ⟩. Symbols to the right in a cell are voiced , to the left are voiceless . Shaded areas denote articulations judged impossible. Legend: unrounded  •  rounded Retroflex A retroflex ( / ˈ r ɛ t r ə f l ɛ k s , - r oʊ -/ ), apico-domal , or cacuminal ( / k ə ˈ k juː m ɪ n əl / ) consonant

1680-432: The fricative [h] as an allophone of /k/ . Authors including Chomsky and Halle group [ f ] and [ v ] as sibilants. However, they do not have the grooved articulation and high frequencies of other sibilants, and most phoneticians continue to group them together with bilabial [ ɸ ] , [ β ] and (inter)dental [ θ ] , [ ð ] as non-sibilant anterior fricatives. For

1736-432: The fricatives /f, v, h/ . Also, almost all Eastern Polynesian languages have no sibilants but do have the fricatives /v/ and/or /f/ : Māori , Hawaiian , Tahitian , Rapa Nui , most Cook Islands Māori dialects, Marquesan , and Tuamotuan . Tamil only has the sibilant /ʂ/ and fricative /f/ in loanwords, and they are frequently replaced by native sounds. The sibilants [s, ɕ] exist as allophones of /t͡ɕ/ and

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1792-485: The grooved vs. hushing tongue shape so as to maximize the differences. However, the palato-alveolar sibilants in the Northwest Caucasian languages such as Ubykh are an exception. These sounds have the tongue tip resting directly against the lower teeth, which gives the sounds a quality that Catford describes as "hissing-hushing". Ladefoged and Maddieson term this a " closed laminal postalveolar" articulation, and transcribe them (following Catford) as [ŝ, ẑ] , although this

1848-588: The labioalveolar sounds [p͇, b͇, m͇, f͇, v͇] , where the lower lip contacts the alveolar ridge.) Alveolar consonants are transcribed in the IPA as follows: There are no languages that have no alveolars at all. The alveolar or dental consonants [t] and [n] are, along with [k] , the most common consonants in human languages. Nonetheless, there are a few languages that lack them. A few languages on Bougainville Island and around Puget Sound , such as Makah , lack nasals and therefore [n] but have [t] . Colloquial Samoan , however, lacks both [t] and [n] but has

1904-449: The laminal post-alveolar sounds "flat post-alveolar". Retroflex sounds must be distinguished from other consonants made in the same parts of the mouth: The first three types of sounds above have a convex tongue shape, which gives them an additional secondary articulation of palatalization . The last type has a groove running down the center line of the tongue, which gives it a strong hissing quality. The retroflex sounds, however, have

1960-484: The latter probably through Amerindian influence, and alveolar and dorsal i.e. [ɕ ʑ cɕ ɟʑ] proper in Japanese ). Only a few languages with sibilants lack the hissing type. Middle Vietnamese is normally reconstructed with two sibilant fricatives, both hushing (one retroflex, one alveolo-palatal). Some languages have only a single hushing sibilant and no hissing sibilant. That occurs in southern Peninsular Spanish dialects of

2016-697: The lips are compressed throughout, and the sibilant may be followed by normal labialization upon release. (That is, there is a contrast among s, sw, ȿ, ȿw .) In Tsonga, the whistling effect is weak; the lips are narrowed but also the tongue is retroflex . Tswa may be similar. In Changana, the lips are rounded (protruded), but so is /s/ in the sequence /usu/, so there is evidently some distinct phonetic phenomenon occurring here that has yet to be formally identified and described. Not including differences in manner of articulation or secondary articulation , some languages have as many as four different types of sibilants. For example, Northern Qiang and Southern Qiang have

2072-415: The lower teeth is a hollow area (or pit) in the lower surface of the mouth. When the tongue tip rests in this hollow area, there is an empty space below the tongue (a sublingual cavity ), which results in a relatively duller sound. When the tip of the tongue rests against the lower teeth, there is no sublingual cavity, resulting in a sharper sound. Usually, the position of the tip of the tongue correlates with

2128-433: The middle of "miss you". Sibilants can be made at any coronal articulation, i.e. the tongue can contact the upper side of the mouth anywhere from the upper teeth ( dental ) to the hard palate ( palatal ), with the in-between articulations being denti-alveolar , alveolar and postalveolar . The tongue can contact the upper side of the mouth with the very tip of the tongue (an apical articulation, e.g. [ʃ̺] ); with

2184-560: The notation s̠, ṣ is sometimes reversed; either may also be called 'retroflex' and written ʂ .) ^1 ⟨ ŝ ẑ ⟩ is an ad-hoc transcription. The old IPA letters ⟨ ʆ ʓ ⟩ are also available. ^2 These sounds are usually just transcribed ⟨ ʂ ʐ ⟩ . Apical postalveolar and subapical palatal sibilants do not contrast in any language, but if necessary, apical postalveolars can be transcribed with an apical diacritic, as ⟨ s̠̺ z̠̺ ⟩ or ⟨ ʂ̺ ʐ̺ ⟩ . Ladefoged resurrects

2240-598: The old retroflex sub-dot for apical retroflexes, ⟨ ṣ ẓ ⟩ Also seen in the literature on e.g. Hindi and Norwegian is ⟨ ᶘ ᶚ ⟩ – the domed articulation of [ʃ ʒ] precludes a subapical realization. Whistled sibilants occur phonemically in several southern Bantu languages, the best known being Shona . However, they also occur in speech pathology and may be caused by dental prostheses or orthodontics. The whistled sibilants of Shona have been variously described—as labialized but not velarized, as retroflex, etc., but none of these features are required for

2296-525: The otherwise IPA transcription of Shona in Doke (1967), the whistled sibilants are transcribed with the non-IPA letters ⟨ ȿ ɀ ⟩ and ⟨ tȿ dɀ ⟩ . Besides Shona, whistled sibilants have been reported as phonemes in Kalanga , Tsonga , Changana , Tswa —all of which are Southern African languages—and Tabasaran . The articulation of whistled sibilants may differ between languages. In Shona,

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2352-432: The palato-alveolar appearing in the laminal "closed" variation) but also both the palato-alveolars and alveolo-palatals could additionally appear labialized . Besides, there was a five-way manner distinction among voiceless and voiced fricatives, voiceless and voiced affricates, and ejective affricates. (The three labialized palato-alveolar affricates were missing, which is why the total was 27, not 30.) The Bzyp dialect of

2408-448: The related Abkhaz language also has a similar inventory. Some languages have four types when palatalization is considered. Polish is one example, with both palatalized and non-palatalized laminal denti-alveolars, laminal postalveolar (or "flat retroflex"), and alveolo-palatal ( [s̪ z̪] [s̪ʲ z̪ʲ] [s̠ z̠] [ɕ ʑ] ). Russian has the same surface contrasts, but the alveolo-palatals are arguably not phonemic. They occur only geminate, and

2464-863: The rest having both stops and continuants. Retroflex consonants are concentrated in the Indian subcontinent , particularly in the Indo-Aryan and Dravidian languages , but are found in other languages of the region as well, such as the Munda languages and Burushaski . The Nuristani languages of eastern Afghanistan also have retroflex consonants. Among Eastern Iranian languages , they are common in Pashto , Wakhi , Sanglechi- Ishkashimi , and Munji - Yidgha . They also occur in some other Asian languages such as Mandarin Chinese , Javanese and Vietnamese . The other major concentration

2520-452: The result that there are many sibilant types that contrast in various languages. Sibilants are louder than their non-sibilant counterparts, and most of their acoustic energy occurs at higher frequencies than non-sibilant fricatives—usually around 8,000 Hz. All sibilants are coronal consonants (made with the tip or front part of the tongue). However, there is a great deal of variety among sibilants as to tongue shape, point of contact on

2576-402: The retroflex consonants never occur geminate, which suggests that both are allophones of the same phoneme. Somewhat more common are languages with three sibilant types, including one hissing and two hushing. As with Polish and Russian, the two hushing types are usually postalveolar and alveolo-palatal since these are the two most distinct from each other. Mandarin Chinese is an example of such

2632-400: The shape of the tongue. The tongue may be either flat or concave, or even with the tip curled back. The point of contact on the tongue may be with the tip ( apical ), with the blade ( laminal ), or with the underside of the tongue ( subapical ). The point of contact on the roof of the mouth may be with the alveolar ridge ( alveolar ), the area behind the alveolar ridge ( postalveolar ), or

2688-497: The sound of a sibilant consonant, or obstacle fricatives or affricates , which refers to the critical role of the teeth in producing the sound as an obstacle to the airstream. Non-sibilant fricatives and affricates produce their characteristic sound directly with the tongue or lips etc. and the place of contact in the mouth, without secondary involvement of the teeth. The characteristic intensity of sibilants means that small variations in tongue shape and position are perceivable, with

2744-399: The sounds. Using the Extended IPA , Shona sv and zv may be transcribed ⟨ s͎ ⟩ and ⟨ z͎ ⟩ . Other transcriptions seen include purely labialized ⟨ s̫ ⟩ and ⟨ z̫ ⟩ (Ladefoged and Maddieson 1996) and labially co-articulated ⟨ sᶲ ⟩ and ⟨ zᵝ ⟩ (or ⟨ s͡ɸ ⟩ and ⟨ z͜β ⟩ ). In

2800-416: The surface just behind the tip, called the blade of the tongue (a laminal articulation, e.g. [ʃ̻] ); or with the underside of the tip (a subapical articulation). Apical and subapical articulations are always tongue-up , with the tip of the tongue above the teeth, while laminal articulations can be either tongue-up or tongue-down , with the tip of the tongue behind the lower teeth. This distinction

2856-576: The tongue against or close to the superior alveolar ridge , which is called that because it contains the alveoli (the sockets) of the upper teeth. Alveolar consonants may be articulated with the tip of the tongue (the apical consonants ), as in English , or with the flat of the tongue just above the tip (the "blade" of the tongue; called laminal consonants ), as in French and Spanish . The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) does not have separate symbols for

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2912-601: The tongue is curled back and contacts the hard palate, and use the alveolar symbols with the obsolete IPA underdot symbol for an apical post-alveolar articulation: ⟨ ṭ, ḍ, ṇ, ṣ, ẓ, ḷ, ɾ̣, ɹ̣ ⟩, and use ⟨ ᶘ, ᶚ ⟩ for laminal retroflex, as in Polish and Russian. The latter are also often transcribed with a retraction diacritic, as ⟨ s̠ ⟩. Otherwise they are typically but inaccurately transcribed as if they were palato-alveolar, as ⟨ ʃ ⟩. Consonants with more forward articulation, in which

2968-529: The tongue touches the alveolar or postalveolar region rather than the hard palate, can be indicated with the retracted diacritic ( minus sign below ). This occurs especially for [s̠ ẕ] ; other sounds indicated this way, such as ⟨ ṉ ḻ ḏ ⟩, tend to refer to alveolo-palatal rather than retroflex consonants. Although data are not precise, about 20 percent of the world's languages contain retroflex consonants of one sort or another. About half of these possess only retroflex continuants , with most of

3024-473: The tongue, and point of contact on the upper side of the mouth. The following variables affect sibilant sound quality, and, along with their possible values, are ordered from sharpest (highest-pitched) to dullest (lowest-pitched): Generally, the values of the different variables co-occur so as to produce an overall sharper or duller sound. For example, a laminal denti-alveolar grooved sibilant occurs in Polish , and

3080-454: The underside of the tongue tip ( subapical ). These sounds are sometimes described as "true" retroflex consonants. However, retroflexes are commonly taken to include other consonants having a similar place of articulation without such extreme curling of the tongue; these may be articulated with the tongue tip ( apical ) or the tongue blade ( laminal ). Retroflex consonants, like other coronal consonants , come in several varieties, depending on

3136-621: The world have this pattern. Perhaps most common is the pattern, as in English and Arabic, with alveolar and palato-alveolar sibilants. Modern northern peninsular Spanish has a single apico-alveolar sibilant fricative [s̠] , as well as a single palato-alveolar sibilant affricate [tʃ] . However, there are also languages with alveolar and apical retroflex sibilants (such as Standard Vietnamese ) and with alveolar and alveolo-palatal postalveolars (e.g. alveolar and laminal palatalized [ʃ ʒ tʃ dʒ] i.e. [ʃʲ ʒʲ tʃʲ dʒʲ] in Catalan and Brazilian Portuguese ,

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