consonant

(k n s -n nt) adj. 1. Being in agreement or accord: remarks consonant with our own beliefs. 2. Corresponding or alike in sound, as words or syllables. 3. Harmonious in sound or tone. n. 1. A speech sound produced by a partial or complete obstruction of the air stream by any of various constrictions of the speech organs, such as (p), (f), (r), (w), and (h). 2. A letter or character representing such a speech sound. [Middle English, from Old French, from Latin c nson ns, c nsonant-, present participle of c nson

re, to agree : com-, com- + son re, to sound; see swen- in Indo-European roots.]

con sonantly adv.

The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition copyright 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2009. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.

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consonant [knsnnt]
n

(Linguistics / Grammar) a speech sound or letter of the alphabet other than a vowel; a stop, fricative, or continuant

adj

1. (postpositive; foll by with or to) consistent; in agreement

2. harmonious in tone or sound

3. (Music, other) Music characterized by the presence of a consonance

4. (Linguistics / Grammar) being or relating to a consonant

[from Latin consonns, from consonre to sound at the same time, be in harmony, from sonre to sound]

consonantly adv

consonant (kn s nnt)

n.

1. a speech sound produced by occluding (p, b, t, d, k, g), diverting (m, n, ng), or obstructing (f, v, s, z, etc.) the flow of air from the lungs (opposed to vowel).

2. a letter or other symbol representing or usu. representing a consonant sound.

adj.

3. in accord: behavior consonant with his character.

4. corresponding in sound, as words.

5. pertaining to or being a musical consonance. [13501400; Middle English (< Anglo-French) < Latin consonant-, s. of consonns, present participle ofconsonre to sound with or together. See con-, sonant] consonantly, adv.

Random House Kernerman Webster's College Dictionary, 2010 K Dictionaries Ltd. Copyright 2005, 1997, 1991 by Random House, Inc. All rights reserved.

Thesaurus Legend:

Synonyms Related Words Antonyms

Noun 1. consonant - a speech sound that is not a vowel speech sound, phone, sound - (phonetics) an individual sound unit of speech without concern as to whether or not it is a phoneme of some language alveolar, alveolar consonant, dental, dental consonant - a consonant articulated with the tip of the tongue near the gum ridge obstruent - a consonant that is produced with a partial or complete blockage of the airflow from the lungs through the nose or mouth aspirate - a consonant pronounced with aspiration labial, labial consonant - a consonant whose articulation involves movement of the lips

labiodental, labiodental consonant - a consonant whose articulation involves the lips and teeth nasal, nasal consonant - a consonant produced through the nose with the mouth closed lingual - a consonant that is produced with the tongue and other speech organs liquid - a frictionless continuant that is not a nasal consonant (especially `l' and `r') geminate - a doubled or long consonant; "the `n' in `thinness' is a geminate" surd, voiceless consonant - a consonant produced without sound from the vocal cords velar, velar consonant - a consonant produced with the back of the tongue touching or near the soft palate guttural, guttural consonant, pharyngeal, pharyngeal consonant - a consonant articulated in the back of the mouth or throat vowel, vowel sound - a speech sound made with the vocal tract open 2. consonant - a letter of the alphabet standing for a spoken consonant alphabetic character, letter of the alphabet, letter - the conventional characters of the alphabet used to represent speech; "his grandmother taught him his letters" Adj. 1. consonant - involving or characterized by harmony harmonical, harmonised, harmonized, harmonic harmonious - musically pleasing 2. consonant - in keeping; "salaries agreeable with current trends"; "plans conformable with your wishes"; "expressed views concordant with his background" concordant, accordant, agreeable, conformable consistent - (sometimes followed by `with') in agreement or consistent or reliable; "testimony consistent with the known facts"; "I have decided that the course of conduct which I am following is consistent with my sense of responsibility as president in time of war"- FDR

Consonant
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The letter T, the most common consonant letter in English.[1] For the alternative rock group, see Consonant (band). Not to be confused with the musical concept of consonance
Places of articulation

Labial Bilabial Labialvelar

Labialcoronal Labiodental Dentolabial Bidental Coronal Linguolabial Interdental Dental Denti-alveolar Alveolar Postalveolar Palato-alveolar Retroflex Dorsal Postalveolar Alveolo-palatal Palatal Labialpalatal Velar Uvular Uvularepiglottal Radical Pharyngeal Epiglotto-pharyngeal Epiglottal Glottal Peripheral

Tongue shape

Apical Laminal Subapical

Lateral Sulcal Palatal Pharyngeal See also:Manner of articulation

This page contains phoneticinformation in IPA, which may not display correctly in some browsers. [Help]

In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract. Examples are [p], pronounced with the lips; [t], pronounced with the front of the tongue; [k], pronounced with the back of the tongue; [h], pronounced in the throat; [f] and [s], pronounced by forcing air through a narrow channel (fricatives); and [m] and[n], which have air flowing through the nose (nasals). Contrasting with consonants are vowels. Since the number of possible sounds in all of the world's languages is much greater than the number of letters in any one alphabet,linguists have devised systems such as the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) to assign a unique and unambiguous symbol to each attested consonant. In fact, the English alphabet has fewer consonant letters than English has consonant sounds, so digraphslike "ch", "sh", "th", and "zh" are used to extend the alphabet, and some letters and digraphs represent more than one consonant. For example, the sound spelled "th" in "this" is a different consonant than the "th" sound in "thin". (In the IPA they are transcribed [] and[], respectively.)

Contents
[hide]

1 Terminology 2 Letters 3 Consonants versus vowels 4 Features 5 Examples o 5.1 Most common 6 Audio samples 7 See also 8 References 9 External links 10 References

[edit] Terminology
The word consonant comes from Latin oblique stem cnsonant-, from cnsonns (littera) "sounding-together (letter)", a calque of Greek smphnon (plural smphna).[2][3] Dionysius Thrax calls consonants smphna "pronounced with" because they can only be pronounced with a vowel.[4] He divides them into two subcategories: hmphna, semivowels ("half-pronounced"),[5] which correspond to continuants, not semivowels,[6]and phna, mute or silent consonants ("unvoiced"),[7] which correspond to stops, not voiceless consonants.[8] This description does not apply to some human languages, such as the Salishan languages, in which stops sometimes occur without vowels (see Nuxlk), and the modern conception of consonant does not require co-occurrence with vowels.

[edit] Letters
Main article: Writing system The word consonant is also used to refer to a letter of an alphabet that denotes a consonant sound. The 21 consonant letters in the English alphabet are B, C, D, F, G, H, J, K, L, M, N, P, Q, R, S, T, V, X, Z, and usually W and Y: The letter Y stands for the consonant [j] in "yoke", the vowel [] in "myth" and the vowel [i] in "funny", and "yummy" for both consonant and vowel, for examples; W almost always represents a consonant except in rare words (mostly loanwords from Welsh) like "crwth" "cwm".

[edit] Consonants versus vowels

Consonants and vowels correspond to distinct parts of a syllable: The most sonorous part of the syllable (that is, the part that's easiest to sing), called the syllabic peak or nucleus, is typically a vowel, while the less sonorous margins (called the onset andcoda) are typically consonants. Such syllables may be abbreviated CV, V, and CVC, where C stands for consonant and V stands for vowel. This can be argued to be the only pattern found in most of the world's languages, and perhaps the primary pattern in all of them. However, the distinction between consonant and vowel is not always clear cut: there are syllabic consonants and non-syllabic vowels in many of the world's languages. One blurry area is in segments variously called semivowels, semiconsonants, or glides. On the one side, there are vowel-like segments that are not in themselves syllabic but that form diphthongs as part of the syllable nucleus, as the i in English boil [ ]. On the other, there are approximants that behave like consonants in forming onsets but are articulated very much like vowels, as they in English yes [ js]. Some phonologists model these as both being the underlying vowel /i/, so that the English word bit wouldphonemically be /bit/, beet would be phonemically , and yield would be . Likewise, foot would be /fut/, foodwould

be , wood would be , and wooed would be . However, there is a (perhaps allophonic) difference in articulation between these segments, with the [j] in [ js] yes and [ j ] yield and the [w] of [ w ] wooed having more constriction and a more definite place of articulation than the [] in [ ] boil or [ ] bit or the [] of [ ] foot.

The other problematic area is that of syllabic consonants, segments articulated as consonants but occupying the nucleus of a syllable. This may be the case for words such as church in rhotic dialects of English, although phoneticians differ in whether they consider this to be a syllabic consonant, Some distinguish an approximant for rural as , or a rhotic vowel, . : that corresponds to a vowel ,

or[ ]; others see these as a single phoneme,

Other languages use fricative and often trilled segments as syllabic nuclei, as in Czech and several languages in Democratic Republic of the Congo, and China, including Mandarin Chinese. In Mandarin, they are historically allophones of /i/, and spelled that way in Pinyin. Ladefoged and Maddieson[9] call these "fricative vowels"

and say that "they can usually be thought of as syllabic fricatives that are allophones of vowels". That is, phonetically they are consonants, but phonemically they behave as vowels. Many Slavic languages allow the trill [ ] and the lateral [ ] as syllabic nuclei (see Words without vowels). In languages like Nuxalk, it is difficult to know what the nucleus of a syllable is, or if all syllables even have nuclei. If the concept of 'syllable' applies in Nuxalk, there are syllabic consonants in words like s s ( s s ?) 'seal fat'. Miyako in Japan is similar, with s 'to build' and s s 'to pull'.

[edit] Features
Manners of articulation

Obstruent Stop Affricate Fricative Sibilant Sonorant Nasal Flap/Tap Approximant Liquid Vowel Semivowel Lateral Trill Airstreams

Pulmonic Ejective Implosive Lingual (clicks) Linguo-pulmonic Linguo-ejective

Alliteration Assonance Consonance See also:Place of articulation

This page contains phoneticinformation in IPA, which may not display correctly in some browsers.[Help]

Each spoken consonant can be distinguished by several phonetic features:

The manner of articulation is how air escapes from the vocal tract when the consonant or approximant (vowel-like) sound is made. Manners include stops, fricatives, and nasals. The place of articulation is where in the vocal tract the obstruction of the consonant occurs, and which speech organs are involved. Places include bilabial (both lips), alveolar (tongue against the gum ridge), and velar (tongue against soft palate). In addition, there may be a simultaneous narrowing at another place of articulation, such as palatalisation orpharyngealisation. The phonation of a consonant is how the vocal cords vibrate during the articulation. When the vocal cords vibrate fully, the consonant is called voiced; when they do not vibrate at all, it is voiceless. The voice onset time (VOT) indicates the timing of the phonation. Aspiration is a feature of VOT. The airstream mechanism is how the air moving through the vocal tract is powered. Most languages have exclusivelypulmonic egressive consonants, which use the lungs and diaphragm, but ejectives, clicks, and implosives use different mechanisms. The length is how long the obstruction of a consonant lasts. This feature is borderline distinctive in English, as in "wholly"[ho ] vs. "holy" [ho ], but cases are limited to morpheme boundaries. Unrelated roots are differentiated in various languages such as Italian, Japanese, and Finnish, with two length

levels, "single" and "geminate". Estonian and some Sami languages have three phonemic lengths: short, geminate, and long geminate, although the distinction between the geminate and overlong geminate includes suprasegmental features. The articulatory force is how much muscular energy is involved. This has been proposed many times, but no distinction relying exclusively on force has ever been demonstrated.

All English consonants can be classified by a combination of these features, such as "voiceless alveolar stop" [t]. In this case, the airstream mechanism is omitted. Some pairs of consonants like p::b, t::d are sometimes called fortis and lenis, but this is a phonological rather than phonetic distinction. Consonants are scheduled by their features in a number of IPA charts:

V T E

IPA pulmonic consonantschart image

Place

audio

Manner Nasal Stop Fricative Approximant Flap or tap Trill Lateral fricative Lateral approximant Lateral flap

Labial Coronal Dorsal Radical Glottal Bila- Labio- Den Alve Post- Retro Alveolo- Pala Velar Uvu Pha Epiglot Glottal bial dental tal olar alveolar flex palatal tal lar ryn tal geal

m p b

f v

n td r l r sz x j j

c k q

h *

Non-pulmonic consonants
Clicks

Implosives

ts dz c c q

kx

Co-articulated consonants
Continuants Occlusives

These tables contain phonetic symbols, which may not display correctly in some browsers. [Help] Where symbols appear in pairs, leftright represent the voicelessvoiced consonants. Shaded areas denote pulmonic articulations judged to be impossible. * Symbol not defined in IPA.

w kp b

[edit] Examples

The recently extinct Ubykh language had only 2 or 3 vowels but 84 consonants;[10] the Taa language has 87 consonants under one analysis, 164 under another, plus some 30 vowels and tone.[11] The types of consonants used in various languages are by no means universal. For instance, nearly all Australian languages lack fricatives; a large percentage of the world's languages lack voiced stops as phonemes such as [b], [d], and []. Most languages, however, do include one or more fricatives, with [s] being the most common, and a liquid consonant or two, with [l] the most common. The approximant [w] is also widespread, and virtually all languages have one or more nasals, though a very few, such as the Central dialect of Rotokas, lack even these. This last language has the smallest number of consonants in the world, with just six. [edit] Most common The most common consonants around the world are the three voiceless stops [p], [t], [k], and the two nasals [m], [n]. However, even these common five are not universal. Several languages in the vicinity of the Sahara Desert, including Arabic, lack [p]. Several languages of North America, such as Mohawk, lack both of the labials [p] and [m]. The Wichita language of Oklahoma and some West African languages such as Ijo lack the consonant /n/ on a phonemic level, but do use it as an allophone of another consonant (of /l/ in the case of Ijo, and of in Wichita). A few languages on Bougainville Island and around Puget Sound, such asMakah, lack both of the nasals [m] and [n]. The 'click language' Nng lacks [t],[12] and colloquial Samoan lacks both alveolars, [t] and [n].[13] Despite the 80-odd consonants of Ubykh, it lacks the plain velar /k/ in native words, as do the related Adyghe and Kabardian languages. But with a few striking exceptions, such asXavante and Tahitianwhich have no dorsal consonants whatsoevernearly all

other languages have at least one velar consonant: the few languages that do not have a simple [k] usually have a consonant that is very similar.[14] For instance, an areal feature of the Pacific Northwest coast is that historical *[k] has become palatalized in many languages, so that Saanich for example has [ ] and [ ] but no plain [k];[15][16] similarly, historical *[k] in the Northwest Caucasian languagesbecame palatalized to languages is [k] in Ubykh and in most Circassian dialects.[17]

The most frequent consonant (that is, the one appearing most often in speech) in many

Consonant
The Tagalog consonants are b, d, k, g, h, l, m, n, ng, p, ( ' ), r, s, t, w, and y. Ng represents the velar nasal, and the apostrophe ( ' ) represents the glottal stop. The charts below show the articulatory description of the consonant sounds
Sounds/Positions Stops, voiceless Stops, voiced Fricatives, voiceless Nasals, voiced Lateral, voiced Flap, voiced Semi-vowels, voiced Labial Dental Palatal Velar Glottal

p b -m --w

t d -n l r --

--s ---y

k g -ng ----

' -h -----

Back to top Click on the audio icon to listen to the consonant sounds in the following pairs of words: p/b t/d k/g k/' h/'
lapis kutkot titik balik hipon (pencil) (scratch) (letter) (return) (shrimp) labis kudkod titig bali' 'ipon (too much) (scrape) (stare) (broken) (save)

s/h m/n n / ng n/l d/r l/r w/y Back to top

sipag masa nayon nayon dilis balat wari'

(diligence) (masses) (town) (town) (kind of fish) (skin) (seems)

hipag nasa ngayon layon rilis barat yari'

(sister-inlaw) (desire) (now) (purpose) (railroad) (stingy) (finish)

The Glottal Stop The glottal stop is produced when the glottis (the opening between the vocal chords) is tightly closed, stopping the air coming from the lungs. It contrasts with other consonants in Tagalog as shown by the following examples (click on the audio icons to listen):

bata (bathrobe)

bata' (child)

batay (based on something)

baga (ember)

baga' (lungs)

bagay (object)

The glottal stop is generally not indicated in conventional spelling. Words beginning with a vowel in written form, when pronounced in isolation, actually begin with the glottal stop. A sequence of vowels actually has the glottal intervening between them, as in aalis ['a'alis] "will go." When the stop occurs between a consonant and a vowel, conventional spelling represents it with a hyphen, as in nagaaral [nag'a'aral] "studying."

Back to top

The Consonant Ng Ng occurs in word-initial, -medial, and -final positions. English also has the consonant ng, but it only occurs at the end of words like sing and ring. On the other hand, in Tagalog ng can occur at the beginning, middle, or end of a word. Because English speakers are only accustomed to ng in the word-final position, they may have difficulty pronouncing ng when it occurs at the beginning or middle of a word. Click on the audio icons to listen to the following examples:

word-initial ngayon
(now)

word-medial langit
(heaven)

word-final magaling
(good)

ngiti
(smile)

hangin
(air)

singsing
(ring)

ngipin
(tooth)

bangin
(cliff)

kinang
(sparkle)

Back to top

P, T, and K These consonants are never aspirated in Tagalog, even in word-initial position. Click on the audio icons to listen to the following examples:

Sounds p

word-initial ulap
(clouds)

word-medial lapis
(pencil)

word-final palay
(rice)

t k

guhit
(draw)

bata'
(child)

tatay
(father)

balik
(return)

bakal
(iron)

kamay
(hand)

Back to top

The Consonant R This sound in Tagalog is a tap. It is produced with the tip of the tongue slightly tapping the alveolar ridge (the area above the teeth or the gum ridge). Click on the audio icons to listen to the following examples:
word-initial rito
(here)

word-medial aral
(to study)

word-final lugar
(place)

roon
(there)

pera
(money)

andar
(to run)

riles
(railway)

pero
(but)

altar
(altar)

Back to top

The Consonant L This sound in Tagalog is produced with the tongue flat from the tip to the back with the tip touching the back of the upper teeth. Click on the audio icons to listen to the following examples:
word-initial langit
(heaven)

word-medial alay
(offering)

word-final bukal
(spring)

lupa
(earth)

kaluluwa
(soul)

sanggol
(baby)

limot
(forget)

balot
(to wrap)

butil
(grain)

Back to top

T, D, N, and S These sounds in Tagalog are produced with the tongue tip at the back of the upper teeth. Click on the audio icons to listen to the following examples:
Sounds t d n s word-initial tayo
(we)

word-medial atay
(liver)

word-final apat
(four)

dahon
(leaf)

duda
(doubt)

tulad
(similar)

nayon
(village)

sana
(hoping)

saan
(where)

sulat
(letter)

asin
(salt)

landas
(path)

Back to top

Other Tagalog Consonants The consonants h, b, g, m, y, and w are similar to the corresponding sounds in English. Click on the audio icons to listen to the following examples:
Sounds h b g m word-initial hangin
(air)

word-medial bahay
(house)

word-final --alab
(fire)

buhay
(life)

taba'
(fat)

guhit
(drawing)

bago
(new)

hulog
(fall)

mula
(since)

kamay
(hand)

alam
(to know)

y w

yari
(made of)

saya
(skirt)

kulay
(color)

wari
(seem)

awa
(pity)

ikaw
(you)