Voiceless palatal fricative
The
voiceless palatal fricative is a type of
consonantal sound, used in some
spoken languages. The symbol in the
International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is , and the equivalent
X-SAMPA symbol is
C. The symbol ç is the letter c with a
cedilla, as used to spell
French words like
façade, although the sound represented by the letter ç in either French or
English orthography is not a voiceless palatal fricative, but simply , the
voiceless alveolar fricative.
Features of the voiceless palatal fricative:
* Its
manner of articulation is
fricative, which means it is produced by constricting air flow through a narrow channel at the place of articulation, causing
turbulence.
* Its
place of articulation is
palatal which means it is articulated with the middle or back part of the
tongue raised against the
hard palate.
* Its
phonation type is voiceless, which means it is produced without vibrations of the vocal cords.
* It is an
oral consonant, which means air is allowed to escape through the mouth.
* It is a
central consonant, which means it is produced by allowing the airstream to flow over the middle of the tongue, rather than the sides.
* The
airstream mechanism is
pulmonic egressive, which means it is articulated by pushing air out of the
lungs and through the vocal tract, rather than from the
glottis or the mouth.
In some dialects of English, the sequence is sometimes realized as the voiceless palatal fricative, via coalescence, a type of
assimilation. For example,
human ( might be realized as ). However, there are no
minimal pairs for and , so the voiceless palatal fricative is not a separate
phoneme in English.
In Norwegian language, the sound /ç/ in written "kj" for the most time, in words like
kjøkken "kichen", it is sometimes also written as "ki", in words like
kirke "church".
German features the sound in words like
ich "I" and is often referred to as
ich-Laut and is generally an
allophone of the /x/ when it follows a
front vowel. can be found in a few words where would be expected, such as
Frauchen "
diminutive of woman", and so is marginally phonemic. See
German phonology.
In Irish is written "ch" and it is used when it follows "e", "i" or when it is followed by "e" , "i". It is called "slender ch" as opposed to its allophone "broad ch" next to "a", "o", "u" or "ae". Formerly it was written "ċ" ("c" with dot) in Gaelic typefaces. It is used particularly at the beginning of words due to initial consonant mutation of the letter "c" .
In Scots Gaelic, is written "ch" and it appears in words such as
oidhche (night).
*
List of phonetics topics
