CONSONANTS

A consonant is a sound produced by an obstruction of an air-stream either in the pharynx or in the vocal tract. All
consonants generally have two things in common:

phonetically, they are made with an obstruction of air

phonologically, they typically occur at the margins of syllables.

CLASSIFICATION OF CONSONANTS ACCORDING TO:

 Voicing:

What the vocal cords are doing at the moment of speaking.

LENIS (Voiced) made with weak breath force, or little muscular tension.

/h, ŋ, n, m, l, r, w, j/

FORTIS (Voiceless) made with more force, or higher tension.

/p, b, t, d, k, f, v, s, z, ð, θ, dʒ, ʒ, tʃ, ʃ/

ENG and ESP sounds are pulmonic, the diaphragm compresses the lungs so that the air contained in them is pushed
out so the sounds are set to be egressive.

Consonant sounds involve some constriction of the air flow whereas in vowels, the air escapes freely through the
mouth that's why they are continuant.

 Place of articulation

It refers to where in the vocal track the constriction of airflow takes place.

The articulators that are movable are

ACTIVE: lips, tip of the tongue, the blade/front of a tongue, back of the tongue, vocal folds; and the ones that don't
move

PASSIVE: upper front teeth, alveolar ridge, back of alveolar ridge, front of hard palate, the hard palate, soft palate
and velar.
CLASSIFICATION:

Bilabial: (P, B, M) produced by pressing together both lips.

Labiodental: (F, V) produced by pressing the lower lips against the upper front teeth.

Dental/interdental: (θ, ð) the tongue tip approaching the upper front teeth.

Alveolar: (T, D, S, Z, N, L) the tip of the tongue touching the alveolar ridge.

Post alveolar: (R) the tip and blade of the tongue articulate at the back of the alveolar ridge.

Palato Alveolar: (tʃ, dʒ, ʃ, ʒ) the blade of the tongue articulates with the alveolar ridge and the front of the tongue
moves in the direction of the hard palate.

Palatal: /J/ front of the tongue articulates with the hard palate. The english palatal /J/ is produced with no friction
or obstruction in the oral cavity. It is described as an approximant, but also as a semi-vowel.

Velar: (K, G) placing the back of the tongue near the soft palate.

Glottal: (H, ʔ) produced in the larynx where air passes thru the glottis (between the two vocal folds) the two vocal
cords approach each other to interfere with the air stream.

Labio velar: (W)

 Manner of articulation

How the airflow is constricted in the vocal track.

Plosives: /p, t, k, b, d ,g/ Complete oral closure. Made up of 3 stages:

1. closing stage, the active articulator approaches the passive articulator

2. compression stage, the air coming from the lungs build pressure behind the oral closure

3. release stage, abrupt separation of articulators.

Fricatives: /v, z, ʃ, θ/ articulation of narrow stricture that produces turbulence as the air coming from the lungs
fights its way out of the oral cavity. The active articulator comes close to the passive articulator and forms a narrow
channel.

Affricates: /tʃ, dʒ/ Made of 2 elements: initial plosive element and second fricative element. Made up of 3 stages:

1. closing stage, the active articulator approaches the passive articulator

2. compression stage, the air coming from the lungs build pressure behind the oral closure

3. slow fricative release stage, the narrow passage forces the airstream to cause friction.

Approximants: /l, r, w, j/ two articulators coming towards each other but not enough to cause friction.

Nasal: /n, m, ŋ/ the velum is lowered so the passage to the nasal cavity is open. The air is forced through the nasal
cavity.
ASPIRATION

STRONG OR FULL ASPIRATION

Syllable-initial & Stressed /p, t, k/ + a vowel sound.

pen [ˈpʰen] talk [ˈtʰɔːk] car [ˈkʰɑː] oppose [əˈpʰəʊz] attend [əˈtʰend] accord [əˈkʰɔːd]

LACK OF ASPIRATION

It occurs when the voiceless plosives are preceded by /s/ and followed by a vowel in the word. The voiceless plosive
is no longer syllable-initial. Notice that whenever /s/ is followed by a voiceless plosive, the syllable begins right
before /s/.

spin [ˈsp=ɪn] crispy [ˈkrɪsp=i] stay [ˈst=eɪ] misty [ˈmɪst=i] ski [ˈsk=iː] husky [ˈhʌsk=i]

Ploives & Allophonic Variants:

A phonemic transcription that uses the minimum symbols to represent the utterance and shows little phonetic
detail: Broad transcription // An allophonic transcription shows more phonetic detail: Narrow transcription [] When
we make a narrow transcription, we include as much detail as possible about how speakers produce sounds, which
means including diacritics.

A phoneme is one of the basic distinctive units in the phonetics of a language. Each phoneme is composed of a
number of different variants. This range is called allophonic variation and the variants are called allophones.

The phoneme /p/ for example comprises both aspirated and unaspirated allophones [ph] [p=]

Allophones don't bring a change in meaning and we can tell when they can occur, that means we can describe the
context of occurrence (change of voice, place, or manner). Their distribution is either complementary (predictable by
rule from the context) or in free variation (random)

FRICATIVE SOUNDS

In the articulation of a fricative consonant, two organs are brought and held sufficiently close together for the
escaping airstream to produce local air turbulence; fricatives are, therefore, like plosives and affricates,
characterized by a noise component. This turbulence may or may not be accompanied by voice.

The GB fricative phonemes comprise four pairs /f, v / /s, z/ /θ, ð/ / ʃ, ʒ/ and /h/

 Place of articulation:

/f,v/-Labiodental;

/θ, ð/ dental;

/s,z/-alveolar;

/ ʃ, ʒ/ -palato-alveolar;

/h/-glottal.

 Force of articulation: within the four pairs, /f, s, θ, ʃ/ FORTIS tend to be pronounced with relatively more
muscular energy and stronger breath force than /v, z, ð, ʒ/; LENIS. /h/ is normally fortis in character, but may
have a lenis allophone.

 Voicing: like the voiced plosives and affricates, /v, z, ð, ʒ/ tend to be devoiced when preceded or followed
by silence /pause and voiceless consonants.

The greatest difficulties in this group are:

 Spanish does not exploit fricatives as much as English. Spanish has only four fricative sounds while English
has nine.
  As for /s/ and /z/, students tend to confuse them and forget to make the contrast between them, especially
at the end of words.

 / ð/ Students find it hard to articulate it with friction, because it is an approximant in Spanish . They also
forget to distinguish / ð/ from /d/.

Fricatives are made when air is forced through a very narrow gap between two speech organs, producing audible
friction.

In the articulation of a fricative consonant, two organs are bought and held sufficiently close together for the
escaping airstream to produce local air turbulence; fricatives are, therefore, like plosives and affricates,
characterized by a noise component.

The GB fricative phonemes comprise four pairs /f, v / /s, z/ /θ, ð/ / ʃ, ʒ/ and /h/

If you look at the drawing that exemplifies the pronunciation of /s/ and /z/ you will see that the main organs, in the
production of these two sounds, are the tongue and the alveolar ridge, but the tongue is not touching the alveolar
ridge, but the two organs of speech are quiet close leaving a narrow space for the air to escape. So, when the air
goes out it causes friction because the space through which it has to come out is quite narrow.

The same happens with all the fricatives sounds:

There is friction in the production of these sounds. But, the first sound in the pairs is voiceless and the second one is
voiced.

/f/ fortis voiceless labiodental fricative

/v/ lenis voiced labiodental fricative

/θ/ fortis voiceless dental fricative

/ð/ lenis voiced dental fricative

/s/ fortis voiceless alveolar fricative

/z/ lenis voiced alveolar fricative

/ʃ/ fortis voiceless palato alveolar fricative

/ʒ/ lenis voiced palato alveolar fricative

/h/ fortis voiceless glottal fricative

Place of articulation:

Labiodental: is the upper teeth touching the lower lip (the /f/ and /v/).

The soft palate is raised so that the air is forced to go through the mouth. The bottom lip is very close to the upper
front teeth which forms the narrowing and when air is pushed through this narrowing it causes slight friction.
Dental: The tongue is touching the upper teeth.

The soft palate is raised so that all the breath is forced to go through the mouth. The tip of the tongue is close to the
upper front teeth, this is the narrowing where the friction is made.

Alveolar fricative: it is produced by bringing the front of the tongue close to the alveolar ridge (the ridge behind the
upper teeth) without touching it. The air is forced through the narrow gap, resulting in the "s" sound.

Similarly, the sound /z/ is also an alveolar fricative. It is produced in the same place of articulation as /s/, but it differs
in voicing. The vocal cords vibrate while producing the sound /z/, creating a voiced "z" sound instead of the voiceless
"s" sound.

The soft palate is raised so that all the breath is forced to go through the mouth. The tip and blade of the tongue are
very close to the alveolar ridge. There is a very considerable narrowing at this point, not near the teeth and not near
the hard palate.

Palato-alveolar: the tip and the blade of the tongue approximate the alveolar ridge, and the main body of the
tongue comes closer to the front of the hard part palate. The soft palate is raised so that all the breath is forced to go
through the mouth. There is a narrowing between the tip of the tongue and the back of the alveolar ridge. The front
of the tongue is higher than for /s/ and /z/ .

Glottal fricative: sound of breath passing between the open vocal folds and out of the mouth which is already
prepared for the following vowel. To make this sound, simply open your mouth and push air up and out straight
from the lungs.

Difficulties for spanish speakers:

/v/ is a difficult sound for Spanish speakers. They don't make the difference between /b/ (the bilabial plosive) and
/v/ (the labiodental fricative). The other problem is that sometimes students acquire the place of articulation but
there is no friction in the sound.

Can not see the difference between ð and d, one is dental and the other one is alveolar. The other problem is they
make the articulation but there is no friction in the production of that sound. It is dental but is not a fricative sound.

/z/ difference with /s/.

/ʒ/ difference with /ʃ/. the problem is that /ʒ/ is not produced.
AFFRICATE CONSONANTS /tʃ - dʒ/

An affricate is a type of consonant consisting of a plosive followed by a fricative with the same place of articulation:
examples are the

/tʃ/ voiceless post palato alveolar affricate

/dʒ/ voiced post palate alveolar affricate

It consists of three stages:

(1) a closing stage, (2) a compression stage, and (3) a slow fricative release stage. It’s this last one that
differentiates an affricate from a plosive. The release is not abrupt this time: the organs separate so as to let the
compressed air out, but they are quite close to each other so that this narrow passage forces the airstream to cause
friction.

Description:

The soft palate being raised and the nasal resonator shut off, the obstacle to the airstream is formed by a closure
made between the tip, blade and rims of the tongue and the upper alveolar ridge and side teeth.

At the same time, the front of the tongue is raised towards the hard palate in readiness for the fricative release. The
closure is released slowly, the air escaping in a diffuse manner over the whole of the central surface of the tongue
with friction occurring between the blade/front region of the tongue and the alveolar/front palatal section of the
roof of the mouth.

During both stop and fricative stages, the vocal cords are wide apart for /tʃ/, but may be vibrating for all or part of
/dʒ/ according to the position.( /dʒ/ shares the features of devoicing in initial and final positions exhibited by
plosives, see and fricatives However, they differ from plosives in that they never lose their (fricative) release stage.
The lip position will be conditioned by that of adjacent sounds, especially that of a following vowel (the greater lip-
rounding of /tʃ/, in the word choose in relation to that of cheese),though with some speakers a certain amount of lip
protrusion is always present.

NASAL CONSONANTS (m) (n) (ŋ)

A nasal consonant is one in which the air escapes only through the nose. For this to happen, two articulatory actions
are necessary: firstly, the soft palate(or velum) must be lowered to allow air to escape past it, and secondly, a
closure must be made in the oral cavity to prevent air from escaping through it. The closure may be at any place of
articulation from bilabial at the front of the oral cavity to uvular at the back (in the latter case there is contact
between the tip of the lowered soft palate and the raised back of the tongue). A closure any further back than this
would prevent air from getting into the nasal cavity, so a pharyngeal or glottal nasal is a physical impossibility.
/m/ voiced bilabial nasal

/n/ voiced alveolar nasal

/ŋ/ voiced velar nasal

/m/ The upper and the lower lips. During the articulation of /m/ the two lips are pressed together and a closure is
made. The soft palate is lowered; consequently the air then goes up the nasal cavity and passes out through the
nose. The vocal folds vibrate, hence it is a voiced bilabial nasal sound.

/n/ The tip of the tongue and the alveolar ridge. During the articulation of /n/the tip of the tongue touches the
alveolar ridge and creates a closure. The air is held behind the closure for a while. The soft palate is lowered;
consequently the air then goes up the nasal cavity and passes out through the nose. The vocal folds vibrate, hence it
is a voiced alveolar nasal sound.

/ŋ/ The back of the tongue and the soft palate are the articulators. During the articulation the back of the tongue
comes near the soft palate and creates a closure. The soft palate is lowered; consequently the air then goes up the
nasal cavity and passes out through the nose. During the articulation of this sound the vocal folds vibrate, hence it is
a voiced velar nasal sound

We will now look at some ways in which the distribution of /ŋ/ is unusual:

1. In initial position we find /m, n/ occurring freely, but /ŋ/ never occurs in this position. With the possible
exception of /ʒ/, this makes /ŋ/ the only English consonant that does not occur initially.

2. Medially, /ŋ/ occurs quite frequently, but there is a rather complex and quite interesting rule concerning the
question of when /ŋ/ may be pronounced without a following plosive. When we find the letters "nk" in the
middle of a word in its orthographic form, a /k/ will always be pronounced like in the word "banker"
/bæŋkə/ ; however, some words with orthographic ‘ng’ in the middle will have a pronunciation containing
/ŋɡ/ and others will have /ŋ/ without /g/. For example:

A B

finger /fɪŋɡə/ singer /sɪŋə/

anger /æŋɡə/ hanger /hæŋə

In the words of column A /ŋ/ is followed by /g/, while the words of column B have no /g/.

The difference is in the way the words are constructed - their morphology. The words of column B can be divided
into two grammatical pieces: ‘sing’ + ‘-er’, ‘hang’ + ‘-er’. These pieces are called morphemes, and we say that column
B words are morphologically different from column A words, since these cannot be divided into two morphemes.
‘Finger’ and ‘anger’ consist of just one morpheme each.

Unfortunately, rules often have exceptions. The main exception to the above morpheme-based rule concerns the
comparative and superlative suffixes ‘-er’ and ‘-est’.

ADJECTIVE COMPARATIVE SUPERLATIVE

long /lɒŋ/ longer /lɒŋɡə/ longest /lɒŋɡəst/

strong /strɒŋ/ stronger /strɒŋɡə/ strongest /strɒŋɡəst/

young /jʌŋ/ younger /jʌŋɡə/ youngest /jʌŋɡəst/

3. A third way in which the distribution of /ŋ/ is unusual is the small number of vowels it is found to follow. It
rarely occurs after a diphthong or long vowel, so only the short vowels /ɪ, e, æ, ʌ, ɒ, ʊ, ə/ are regularly found
preceding this consonant.
Approximants /l, r, w, y/

A manner of articulation produced with the articulators sufficiently apart so that there is no audible friction.
Approximants can be of two types, either lateral (e.g. English /l/) or central approximants (e.g. English /w, r, j/). As
the names suggest, the airstream flows to the side of an obstruction for the lateral approximant and along the
midline of the oral cavity for the central approximants.

/l/ voiced alveolar lateral approximant.

/r/ voiced Post-alveolar approximant.

/j/ voiced palatal approximant.

/w/ voiced labial-velar approximant.