Lateral alveolar click
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Template:Infobox IPA The lateral alveolar clicks are a family of click consonants found only in Africa.
The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents the forward articulation of these sounds is . This must be combined with a symbol for the rear articulation to represent an actual speech sound. Attested lateral clicks include .
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Features
Features of lateral clicks:
- Their manner of articulation is click, which means they are produced with two articulatory closures in the oral cavity. The pocket of air trapped between the two closures is rarefied by a "sucking" action of the tongue. The release of the forward closure produces the 'click' sound. In the case of the lateral clicks, the release is noisy, like an affricate, rather than sharp like a plosive.
- The forward place of articulation is alveolar, which means it is articulated with the tongue against the alveolar ridge. The rear place of articulation may be either velar or uvular.
- Lateral clicks may be either oral or nasal, which means air is allowed to escape either through the mouth or the nose.
- They are lateral consonants, which means they are produced by allowing the airstream to flow over the sides of the tongue, rather than the middle of the tongue. Some speakers pronounce them one one side of the mouth, some on both.
- The airstream mechanism is velaric ingressive, which means it is produced by movement of air into the mouth by action of the tongue, rather than by the glottis or the lungs.
There is also dental lateral click reported from the !Xũũ language of Namibia. This is provisionally written with three pipes, |||, rather than the two of . At least in this language, the dental click is laminal alveolar or dent-alveolar, (), while the click transcribed as is apical postalveolar, .
In English
English does not have the lateral click (or any click consonants, for that matter) as a phoneme. However, it is the clucking sound used by equestrians to urge on their horses.
In other languages
The lateral clicks are common in Khoisan languages and the neighboring Nguni languages (e.g. Zulu, Xhosa).
Xhosa and Zulu
In the Nguni languages, the tenuis click is denoted by the letter x, the murmured click by gx, the aspirated click by xh (as in "Xhosa"), and the nasal click by nx. The prenasalized clicks are written ngx and nkx.
See also