Epiglottal consonant
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An epiglottal consonant is a consonant
that is articulated with the aryepiglottic
folds (see larynx)
against the epiglottis.
They are occasionally called aryepiglottal consonants.
The epiglottal consonants identified by the International
Phonetic Alphabet are:
- A voiced epiglottal plosive may not be possible. When
one becomes voiced intervocalically in Dahalo,
for example, it becomes a tap.
- Although traditionally placed in the fricative
row of the IPA chart, [ʢ]
is usually an approximant.
The IPA symbol itself is ambiguous, but no language has
a distinct fricative and approximant at this place of
articulation. Sometimes the lowering diacritic is used
to specify that the manner is approximant: [ʢ̞].
- Epiglottal trills
are quite common (for epiglottals, that is), but this
can usually be considered a phonemic plosive or a fricative,
with the trill being phonetic detail. The IPA has no symbol
for this, though [я] is sometimes seen in the literature.
Epiglottals are not known from many languages. However,
this may partially be an effect of the difficulty European
language-speaking linguists have in recognizing them. On
several occasions, when supposedly pharyngeal
consonants were actually measured, they turned out to
be epiglottals. This was the case for Dahalo,
for example.
Epiglottals are primarily known from the Mideast (in the
Semitic
languages) and from British
Columbia ("pharyngeal trills" in northern Haida),
but may occur elsewhere. It is likely that several of the
Salish
or Wakashan
languages of British Columbia reported to have "pharyngeals"
actually have epiglottals, and the same may be true of some
of the languages
of the Caucasus.
Recently, a possible new place of articulation, epiglotto-pharyngeal,
was reported.
See also
References
Consonants
This table contains phonetic
information in IPA,
which may not display correctly in some browsers.
Where symbols appear in pairs, the one to the right represents
a voiced
consonant. Shaded areas denote pulmonic articulations
judged to be impossible.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epiglottal_consonant
Published - November 2008
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