Voiceless retroflex plosive

Encyclopedia : V : VO : VOI : Voiceless retroflex plosive

IPA – number 105
IPA – text
IPA – image
Entity ʈ
X-SAMPA t`
Kirshenbaum t.

The voiceless retroflex plosive is a type of consonantal sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ʈ, and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is t`. Like all the retroflex consonants, the IPA symbol is formed by adding a rightward pointing hook extending from the bottom of the symbol used for the equivalent alveolar consonant, in this case the voiceless alveolar plosive which has the symbol t. If lowercase letter t in the font used already has a rightward pointing hook, then ʈ is distinguished from t by extending the righward pointing hook below the baseline as a descender. Compare t and ʈ.

IPA – number	105
IPA – text
IPA – image
Entity	ʈ
X-SAMPA	t`
Kirshenbaum	`t.`

Contents

1 Features
2 In
3 In other languages

3.1
3.2
3.3 Indian languages

4 External links
5 See also

Features

Features of the voiceless retroflex plosive:

Its manner of articulation is plosive or stop, which means it is produced by obstructing airflow in the vocal tract.
Its place of articulation is retroflex, which prototypically means it is articulated with the tip of the tongue curled up, but more generally means that it is postalveolar without being palatalized.
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
Standard English (RP) does not have the voiceless retroflex plosive. However, it is common in some dialects spoken by non-native speakers, such as Indian English. Also, this sound occurs as a conditioned allophone of voiceless alveolar plosive [t] in some dialects of American English, when the grapheme t is immediately preceded or followed by r—the retroflex approximant in such dialects; e.g., hurting. The tongue of course does not curve back as much as in Indian languages. Webster's New World Dictionary

In other languages

The Lhasa dialect, which is often considered standard, of Tibetan includes /ʈʂ/ and /ʈʰʂ/ as phonemes; these apparently developed from earlier consonant clusters including /r/, such as /tr/, /pr/, and /kr/. These sounds are often transcribed as "dr", "tr", or simply "t", as in Drepung, Tashilhunpo/Trashilhunpo or Trungpa tulku. The system of Tibetan Pinyin, which is official in China, instead transcribes these sounds as "zh" or "ch", e.g. Zhaibung, Zhaxilhünbo, Chungba.

In many dialects of Swedish (and Norwegian), the combination 'rt' after a long vowel (e.g., mört) may be pronounced as [ʈ].

Indian languages

This sound occurs in all the Indo-Aryan and Dravidian languages, such as Hindi, Sanskrit and Tamil, and is phonemically contrastive with its dental counterpart. Except for Tamil, the other languages also have its phonemically contarstive aspirated counterpart.

External links

[Phonology of English, including dialectical variations]