The voiced alveolar nasal is a type of
consonant
In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract. Examples are and pronounced with the lips; and pronounced with the front of the tongue; and pronounced w ...
al sound used in numerous spoken
language
Language is a structured system of communication. The structure of a language is its grammar and the free components are its vocabulary. Languages are the primary means by which humans communicate, and may be conveyed through a variety of ...
s. The symbol in the
International Phonetic Alphabet
The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is an alphabetic system of phonetic notation based primarily on the Latin script. It was devised by the International Phonetic Association in the late 19th century as a standardized representation ...
that represents
dental,
alveolar, and
postalveolar nasals is , and the equivalent
X-SAMPA symbol is
n
.
The vast majority of languages have either an alveolar or dental nasal. There are a few languages that lack either sound but have , such as
Yoruba
The Yoruba people (, , ) are a West African ethnic group that mainly inhabit parts of Nigeria, Benin, and Togo. The areas of these countries primarily inhabited by Yoruba are often collectively referred to as Yorubaland. The Yoruba constitute ...
,
Palauan, and colloquial
Samoan (however, these languages all have . An example of a language without and is
Edo
Edo ( ja, , , "bay-entrance" or "estuary"), also romanized as Jedo, Yedo or Yeddo, is the former name of Tokyo.
Edo, formerly a ''jōkamachi'' (castle town) centered on Edo Castle located in Musashi Province, became the ''de facto'' capital of ...
). There are some languages (e.g.
Rotokas) that lack both and .
True dental consonants are relatively uncommon. In the
Romance,
Dravidian, and
Australian languages, ''n'' is often called "dental" in the literature. However, the rearmost contact, which gives a consonant its distinctive sound, is actually alveolar or
denti-alveolar
In linguistics, a denti-alveolar consonant or dento-alveolar consonant is a consonant that is articulated with a flat tongue against the alveolar ridge and the upper teeth, such as and in languages such as French, Italian and Spanish. That is, ...
. The difference between the Romance languages and English is not so much where the tongue contacts the roof of the mouth but the part of the tongue that makes contact. In English, it is the tip of the tongue (such sounds are termed
apical), but in the Romance languages, it is the flat of the tongue just above the tip (such sounds are called
laminal
A laminal consonant is a phone (speech sound) produced by obstructing the air passage with the blade of the tongue, the flat top front surface just behind the tip of the tongue in contact
with upper lip, teeth, alveolar ridge, to possibly, as ...
).
However, there are languages with true apical (or less commonly laminal) dental ''n''. It is found in the
Mapuche language of South America, where it is actually
interdental. A true dental generally occurs
allophonically before in the languages that have it, as in English ''tenth''. Similarly, a denti-alveolar allophone occurs in languages that have denti-alveolar stops, as in Spanish ''cinta''.
Some languages contrast laminal denti-alveolar and apical alveolar nasals. For example, in the
Malayalam
Malayalam (; , ) is a Dravidian language spoken in the Indian state of Kerala and the union territories of Lakshadweep and Puducherry ( Mahé district) by the Malayali people. It is one of 22 scheduled languages of India. Malayalam wa ...
pronunciation of ''Nārāyanan'', the first ''n'' is dental, the second is retroflex, and the third alveolar.
A postalveolar nasal occurs in a number of
Australian Aboriginal languages, including
Djeebbana and
Jingulu.
Features
Features of the voiced alveolar nasal:
* There are four specific variants of :
**
Dental, which means it is articulated with either the tip or the blade of the tongue at the upper
teeth, termed respectively ''
apical'' and ''
laminal
A laminal consonant is a phone (speech sound) produced by obstructing the air passage with the blade of the tongue, the flat top front surface just behind the tip of the tongue in contact
with upper lip, teeth, alveolar ridge, to possibly, as ...
''.
**
Denti-alveolar
In linguistics, a denti-alveolar consonant or dento-alveolar consonant is a consonant that is articulated with a flat tongue against the alveolar ridge and the upper teeth, such as and in languages such as French, Italian and Spanish. That is, ...
, which means it is articulated with the blade of the tongue at the
alveolar ridge, and the tip of the tongue behind upper teeth.
**
Alveolar, which means it is articulated with either the tip or the blade of the tongue at the alveolar ridge, termed respectively ''apical'' and ''laminal''.
**
Postalveolar, which means it is articulated with either the tip or the blade of the tongue behind the alveolar ridge, termed respectively ''apical'' and ''laminal''.
Occurrence
Dental or denti-alveolar
Alveolar
Postalveolar
Variable
See also
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Index of phonetics articles
Notes
References
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External links
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{{IPA navigation
Alveolar consonants
Dental consonants
Postalveolar consonants
Nasal consonants
Pulmonic consonants
Voiced consonants