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Labiodental consonant
View on WikipediaIn phonetics, labiodentals are consonants articulated with the lower lip and the upper teeth, such as [f] and [v]. In English, labiodentalized /s/, /z/ and /r/ are characteristic of some individuals; these may be written [sᶹ], [zᶹ], [ɹᶹ].[1]
Labiodental consonants in the IPA
[edit]The labiodental consonants identified by the International Phonetic Alphabet are:
| IPA | Description | Example | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Language | Orthography | IPA | Meaning | ||
| ɱ̊ | voiceless labiodental nasal | Angami[2] | [example needed] | allophone of /m̥/ before /ə/ | |
| ɱ | voiced labiodental nasal | Kukuya[3] (disputed) | [ɱíì] | 'eyes' | |
| p̪ | voiceless labiodental plosive | Greek | σάπφειρος | [ˈsap̪firo̞s̠] | 'sapphire' |
| b̪ | voiced labiodental plosive | Sika | [example needed] | ||
| p̪͜f | voiceless labiodental affricate | Tsonga | timpfuvu | [tiɱp̪͜fuβu] | 'hippos' |
| b̪͜v | voiced labiodental affricate | Tsonga | shilebvu | [ʃileb̪͜vu] | 'chin' |
| f | voiceless labiodental fricative | English | fan | [fæn] | |
| v | voiced labiodental fricative | English | van | [væn] | |
| ʋ | voiced labiodental approximant | Dutch | wang | [ʋɑŋ] | 'cheek' |
| ⱱ | voiced labiodental flap | Mono | vwa | [ⱱa] | 'send' |
| p̪͜fʼ | labiodental ejective affricate | Tsetsaut[4][5] | apfʼo | [ap̪͜fʼo] | 'boil' |
| fʼ | labiodental ejective fricative | Yapese[6] | fʼaang | [fʼaːŋ] | 'type of eel' |
| ʘ̪ | labiodental click release (many different consonants) | Nǁng | ʘoe | [k͜ʘ̪oe] | 'meat' |
The IPA chart shades out labiodental lateral consonants.[7] This is sometimes read as indicating that such sounds are not possible. In fact, the fricatives [f] and [v] often have lateral airflow, but no language makes a distinction for centrality, and the allophony is not noticeable.
The IPA symbol ɧ was devised for a consonant of Swedish that has various pronunciations, in one dialect a rounded velarized labiodental less ambiguously transcribed as [fˠʷ]. The labiodental click is an allophonic variant of the (bi)labial click.
Occurrence
[edit]The only common labiodental sounds to occur phonemically are the fricatives and the approximant. The labiodental flap occurs phonemically in over a dozen languages, but it is restricted geographically to central and southeastern Africa.[8] With most other manners of articulation, the norm are bilabial consonants (which together with labiodentals, form the class of labial consonants).
[ɱ] is quite common, but in nearly all languages in which it occurs, it occurs only as an allophone of /m/ before labiodental consonants such as /v/ and /f/. It has been reported to occur phonemically in a dialect of Teke, but similar claims in the past have proven spurious.
The XiNkuna dialect of Tsonga features a pair of affricates as phonemes. In some other languages, such as Xhosa, affricates may occur as allophones of the fricatives. These differ from the German voiceless labiodental affricate ⟨pf⟩, which commences with a bilabial p. All these affricates are rare sounds.[citation needed]
The stops are not confirmed to exist as separate phonemes in any language. They are sometimes written as ȹ ȸ (qp and db ligatures). They may also be found in children's speech or as speech impediments.[9]
Origins
[edit]The frequency of labiodentals (especially f and v) has been argued to be linked to the Agricultural Revolution.[10][11]
See also
[edit]References
[edit]- ^ John Laver (1994: 323) Principles of Phonetics.
- ^ Blankenship, Barbara; Ladefoged, Peter; Bhaskararao, Peri; Chase, Nichumeno (Fall 1993). "Phonetic structures of Khonoma Angami" (PDF). Linguistics of the Tibeto-Burman Area. 16 (2). doi:10.32655/LTBA.16.2.03.
- ^ Paulian (1975), p. 41.
- ^ Boas, Franz; Goddard, Pliny Earle (July 1924). "Ts'ets'aut, an Athapascan Language from Portland Canal, British Columbia". International Journal of American Linguistics. 3 (1): 1–35. doi:10.1086/463746.
- ^ Tharp, George W. (January 1972). "The Position of the Tsetsaut among Northern Athapaskans". International Journal of American Linguistics. 38 (1): 14–25. doi:10.1086/465179. JSTOR 1264498. S2CID 145318136.
- ^ Ballantyne, Keira Gebbie (2005). Textual Structure and Discourse Prominence in Yapese Narrative (PhD dissertation). University of Hawaiʻi. p. 32. hdl:10125/11702.
- ^ IPA (2018). "Consonants (Pulmonic)". International Phonetic Association. Archived from the original on June 22, 2020. Retrieved June 20, 2020.
- ^ Olson & Hajek (2003).
- ^ Hesketh, Anne; Dima, Evgenia; Nelson, Veronica (2007). "Teaching phoneme awareness to pre-literate children with speech disorder: a randomized controlled trial". International Journal of Language & Communication Disorders. 42 (3): 251–271. doi:10.1080/13682820600940141. ISSN 1368-2822. PMID 17514541.
- ^ Staff, ScienceAlert (2019-03-14). "The Rise of Farming And Soft Foods Might Have Forever Changed The Way Humans Speak". ScienceAlert. Retrieved 2025-03-22.
- ^ George, Alison. "Humans couldn't pronounce 'f' and 'v' sounds before farming developed". New Scientist. Retrieved 2025-03-22.
Sources
[edit]- Ladefoged, Peter; Maddieson, Ian (1996). The Sounds of the World's Languages. Oxford: Blackwell. ISBN 0-631-19815-6.
- Olson, Kenneth S.; Hajek, John (2003). "Crosslinguistic insights on the labial flap". Linguistic Typology. 7 (2): 157–186. doi:10.1515/lity.2003.014.
- Paulian, Christiane (1975). Le kukuya, langue teke du Congo: phonologie, classes nominales. Paris: SELAF. ISBN 978-2-85297-008-3.
- Vebæk, Mâliâraq (2006). The southernmost People of Greenland-Dialects and Memories. Monographs on Greenland. Vol. 337. doi:10.26530/OAPEN_342373. ISBN 978-87-635-1273-2.
Further reading
[edit]- Blasi, Damián E.; Moran, Steven; Moisik, Scott R.; Widmer, Paul; Dediu, Dan; Bickel, Balthasar (2019). "Human sound systems are shaped by post-Neolithic changes in bite configuration". Science. 363 (6432) eaav3218. doi:10.1126/science.aav3218. PMID 30872490.
- Hockett, Charles (1989). "Distinguished Lecture: F". American Anthropologist. 87 (2): 263–281. doi:10.1525/aa.1985.87.2.02a00020. JSTOR 678561.
- Moran, Steven; Bickel, Balthasar (15 March 2019). "Softer, processed foods changed the way ancient humans spoke". The Conversation.
Labiodental consonant
View on GrokipediaPhonetic Characteristics
Articulation
Labiodental consonants are produced through articulation involving contact or approximation between the lower lip and the upper teeth, creating a constriction in the vocal tract. This place of articulation is distinct from bilabial sounds, which rely on the two lips coming together, and from interdental articulations, which involve the tongue tip or blade against the teeth. The lower lip acts as the active articulator due to its high mobility, allowing it to elevate and press against or near the upper teeth, which serve as the passive articulator in their fixed position. This configuration enables complete closure for stop consonants or a narrow channel for turbulent airflow in fricatives, where the lip-teeth contact generates friction. The primary airstream mechanism for labiodental consonants is pulmonic egressive, in which air is expelled outward from the lungs through the contraction of respiratory muscles. While this is the standard mechanism across nearly all languages for such sounds, non-pulmonic variants like glottalic egressive (ejectives) or ingressive (implosives) are theoretically conceivable but unattested for labiodental places of articulation. Acoustically, labiodental fricatives exhibit a relatively flat spectrum with frication noise arising from the turbulent airflow through the relatively small dental constriction, extending up to approximately 10 kHz and generally lower intensity compared to fricatives at other places due to the anterior location and jet-surface interactions with the teeth and lips.[8] Anatomical prerequisites for efficient labiodental articulation include an overbite or overjet, where the upper incisors protrude over the lower ones, positioning the lower lip closer to the upper teeth and reducing the muscular effort required for contact. Variations in dental structure, such as edge-to-edge bites prevalent in populations with heavy occlusal wear from coarse diets, can hinder production by increasing the distance the lower lip must travel, potentially leading to substitutions or greater articulatory demands.Types and Manners of Articulation
Labiodental consonants are classified primarily by their manner of articulation, which describes how the airstream is modified during production at the labiodental place of articulation, involving contact between the lower lip and upper teeth. The most prevalent manner is that of fricatives, produced with turbulent airflow through a narrow channel formed by the lower lip and upper teeth, resulting in audible friction.[9] These fricatives exhibit voicing contrasts, with voiceless variants lacking vocal fold vibration and voiced variants involving vibration, alongside rarer laryngeal features such as aspiration in some contexts where airflow includes a breathy release.[9] Stops or plosives, involving a complete closure to build up oral pressure before release, are extremely rare among labiodental consonants due to the anatomical difficulty in achieving a airtight seal between the soft lower lip and rigid upper teeth, which often permits air leakage and prevents sufficient pressure accumulation.[10] When attested, they may show voiceless, voiced, or aspirated forms, with ejection (glottalized release) being virtually absent owing to the same articulatory constraints.[10] Nasals, by contrast, are more feasible, featuring a lowered velum to direct airflow through the nasal cavity while the oral closure at the teeth-lip contact is maintained; these are typically voiced, though voiceless nasals occur sparingly in specific phonetic environments, and the labiodental nasal [ɱ] typically occurs as an allophone of the bilabial nasal /m/ before labiodental fricatives in many languages.[9] Approximants involve a smooth, non-turbulent airflow with the lower lip approaching but not constricting against the upper teeth, usually voiced and lacking significant friction.[9] Flaps entail a brief, single contact or tap of the lower lip against the upper teeth, interrupting airflow momentarily; these are rare, predominantly voiced, and concentrated in certain African languages, with voiceless variants even scarcer.[11] Trills, requiring multiple rapid vibrations of the lower lip against the teeth, and laterals, necessitating lateral airflow around a central closure, are phonetically unstable and unattested in natural languages, as the lip's flexibility hinders sustained vibration or directed lateral escape of air without reverting to fricative-like turbulence.[9] Affricates combine a stop closure with a fricative release at the labiodental site, typically voiceless and rare, often influenced by adjacent bilabial elements in realization.[9] Realizations of labiodental consonants may exhibit slight bilabial influence, such as lip rounding, particularly in approximants or nasals, deviating from strict lip-teeth contact.[11] Retroflexion, involving tongue curling, is incompatible and absent in pure labiodental articulations. Breathy-voiced variants, marked by a murmured laryngeal setting, appear in some fricatives or approximants but remain marginal compared to standard voicing distinctions.[9]Representation in the IPA
Core Symbols
The core symbols in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) for labiodental consonants represent the most frequently occurring manners of articulation at this place of articulation, where the lower lip contacts the upper teeth. The voiceless labiodental fricative is transcribed as , produced by directing airflow through a narrow channel between the lower lip and upper teeth, creating turbulent noise without vocal fold vibration.[12] The voiced counterpart, the voiced labiodental fricative , involves the same constriction but with added vocal fold vibration for voicing.[12] The voiced labiodental approximant [ʋ] denotes a smoother, non-turbulent approximation without frication, often occurring as an allophone or in specific languages.[12] Finally, the labiodental nasal [ɱ] is symbolized for nasal airflow through the same labiodental closure, typically appearing before labiodental fricatives in assimilation processes.[12] Diacritics modify these core symbols to indicate variations in articulation or phonation. The dental diacritic, a subscript dot (̪), specifies a more dental contact, as in [f̪] for a labiodental fricative with the lip against the teeth edges rather than the inner surface.[12] Voicing modifications include the voiceless diacritic (̥) for devoiced versions, such as [v̥], and the voiced diacritic (̬) for added voicing, like [f̬], though these are less common for the inherently voiced or voiceless pairs.[12] Breathy voicing can be marked with (̤), as in [v̤], to capture breathier realizations in certain phonetic contexts.[12] The historical development of these symbols traces back to the IPA's origins in 1888, when the International Phonetic Association adopted and directly from Latin script to represent the familiar labiodental fricatives, reflecting their widespread use in European languages. The nasal [ɱ], a modified 'm' with a hook, was included in early consonant charts to distinguish it from the bilabial . The approximant symbol [ʋ], a turned 'v', is used to represent the non-fricative labiodental approximant, distinguishing it from the fricative . IPA transcription guidelines emphasize precise articulation for symbol selection: , , [ʋ], and [ɱ] are reserved for sounds where the lower lip actively contacts the upper teeth, contrasting with bilabial symbols like [ɸ] or [β] for lip-to-lip approximations without dental involvement. Transcribers should use diacritics like (̪) only when the dental quality deviates from the standard labiodental norm, prioritizing the core symbols for typical realizations to maintain consistency across languages. In major languages like English, these sounds are commonly represented orthographically by the lettersfor in loanwords from Greek origins. The approximant [ʋ] and nasal [ɱ] lack dedicated orthographic symbols in English but appear in phonetic transcriptions or assimilated forms, such as [ɱ] in "comfort" before /f/.
