Page 80 - DENG504_LINGUISTICS

Linguistics Gowher Ahmad Naik, Lovely Professional University

Notes
Unit 6: Consonants and Its Phonetic Transcription

CONTENTS
Objectives
Introduction
6.1 Nasals
6.2 The Consonant l
6.3 The Consonant r
6.4 The Consonants j and w
6.5 Summary
6.6 Key-Words
6.7 Review Questions
6.8 Further Readings

Objectives

After reading this Unit students will be able to:
• Understand Consonants and its Phonetic Transcription.
Introduction

There are two kinds of language sounds: consonants and vowels. Consonants involve interrupting
the air that comes out of your mouth; vowels are made by opening the mouth and letting air come out
freely. Consonants are relatively stable and invariable; vowels are extremely variable and are more
difficult to transcribe. We’ll start with consonants. You must refer to your handout giving the phonetic
transcription symbols, as these symbols are not reproduced on this web page.
There are two basic ways of making consonants: voiced and unvoiced. Voiced consonants involve a
vibration of the vocal cords that you can feel when you place your hand on your throat. Unvoiced
consonants involve no vibration of the vocal cords.
There are five types of consonants: stops, fricatives, nasals, affricates, and semivowels. Nasals and
semivowels are always voiced; stops, fricatives and affricates can be voiced or unvoiced.
Stops are the simplest kind of consonant; you simply stop the air coming out of your mouth. You
cannot “hold” a stop consonant; you simply block and then release the air. The stop consonants are
distinguished by what part of your mouth you use to block the air.
Stopping the air with both lips together produces a bilabial (two-lip) stop. If voiced, the bilabial stop
is the initial consonant of bill. If unvoiced, it’s the initial consonant of pill.
Further back in the mouth, we pronounce alveolar stops. These are made by placing your tongue
against the alveolar ridge--the hard ridge in the top of your mouth, behind your teeth--and stopping
the air there. The voiced alveolar stop is the initial consonant of dill. The unvoiced alveolar stop is the
initial consonant of till.
Still further back are the velar stops. The back of your tongue stops the air at the back of your hard
palate. The voiced velar stop is the initial consonant of gill. The unvoiced velar stop is the initial
consonant of kill.
Furthest back is the glottal stop, which does not (yet, anyway) distinguish one word from another in
English, but is increasingly replacing the intervocalic alveolar stop in British English, and is heard in
many American dialects in various places. The glottal stop is unvoiced in English. If you say “Iowa
apples” you will hear it before each of the initial vowels in those words.

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