Postalveolar click

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IPA – number	178
IPA – text	ǃ
IPA – image
Entity	ǃ
X-SAMPA	!\
Kirshenbaum	S!
Sound sample (help·info)

The alveolar and postalveolar clicks are a family of click consonants found only in Africa and in the Damin ritual jargon of Australia.

The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents the forward articulation of these sounds is ǃ. The symbol is not an exclamation mark in origin, but rather a pipe with a subscript dot, the old diacritic for retroflex consonants. It must be combined with a symbol for the rear articulation to represent an actual speech sound. Attested (post)alveolar clicks include:

IPA	Description
[k͡ǃ] or [ǃ͡k]	voiceless velar (post)alveolar click (may also be aspirated, ejective, affricated, etc.)
[ɡ͡ǃ] or [ǃ͡ɡ]	voiced velar (post)alveolar click (may also be breathy voiced, affricated, etc.)
[ŋ͡ǃ] or [ǃ͡ŋ]	nasal velar (post)alveolar click (may also be voiceless, aspirated, etc.)
[q͡ǃ] or [ǃ͡q]	voiceless uvular (post)alveolar click
[ɢ͡ǃ] or [ǃ͡ɢ]	voiceless uvular (post)alveolar click (commonly prenasalized)
[ɴ͡ǃ] or [ǃ͡ɴ]	nasal uvular (post)alveolar click
[ǃ͡ʔ]	glottalized (post)alveolar click

The last is what is heard in the sound sample at right, as non-native speakers tend to glottalize clicks to avoid nasalizing them.

Prior to 1989, [ʗ] was the IPA representation of the voiceless velar postalveolar click.

[edit] Features

Features of postalveolar clicks:

• The manner of articulation is a sharp, plosive-like release in southern Africa, but in Hadza and Sandawe they are frequently flapped, with the underside of the tip of the tongue striking the floor of the mouth after the release of the click; in some cases, the release is rather faint, and it is this sub-apical percussive sound that dominates.

The rear closure may be voiced, nasal, ejective, or affricate, and have any of several phonations.

• They are produced with two articulatory closures in the oral cavity. The forward place of articulation is alveolar or postalveolar, depending on the language, and apical, which means it is articulated with the tip of the tongue against the alveolar ridge or the roof of the mouth behind the alveolar ridge. (Damin had both articulations as separate phonemes.) The rear place of articulation may be either velar or uvular.
• (Post)alveolar clicks may be either oral or nasal, which means air is allowed to escape either through the mouth or the nose.
• They are central consonants, which means they are produced by allowing the airstream to flow over the middle of the tongue, rather than the sides.
• The airstream mechanism is velaric ingressive (AKA lingual ingressive), which means the pocket of air trapped between the two closures is rarefied by a "sucking" action of the tongue, rather than by the glottis or the lungs. The release of the forward closure produces the 'click' sound.

[edit] Occurrence

Language		Word	IPA	Meaning	Notes
ǃKung		[ŋ!áŋ]		'inside'
Hadza		[la!ko]		'to trip'
		[ke!kʰena]		'to be slow'
		[ɦe!ŋeʔe]		'dead leopard'
		[teŋ!kʔe]		'to carry'
Sesotho		ho qoqa	[ho ǃɔǃɑ]	'to examine'	Contrasts with murmured, aspirated, and nasal alveolar clicks. See Sesotho phonology
Xhosa		iqanda	[i!anda]	'egg'	Contrasts with murmured, aspirated, and nasal alveolar clicks.
Zulu		iqaqa	[iːˈ!aː!a]	'polecat'	Contrasts with murmured, aspirated, and nasal alveolar clicks.

[edit] See also

• List of phonetics topics

Consonants (List, table)	See also: IPA, Vowels
Pulmonics Bila​bial Labio​dental Den​tal Alve​olar Post-​alve​olar Retro​flex Pal​a​tal Ve​lar Uvu​lar Pha​ryn​geal Epi​glot​tal Glot​tal Non-pulmonics and other symbols Nasals m ɱ n̪ n ɳ ɲ ŋ ɴ Clicks  ʘ ǀ ǃ ǂ ǁ Plosives p b p̪ b̪ t̪ d̪ t d ʈ ɖ c ɟ k ɡ q ɢ ʡ ʔ Implo­­sives  ɓ ɗ ʄ ɠ ʛ Fricatives  ɸ β f v θ ð s z ʃ ʒ ʂ ʐ ç ʝ x ɣ χ ʁ ħ ʕ ʜ ʢ h ɦ Ejec­­tives  pʼ tʼ kʼ qʼ sʼ Approximants  ʋ ɹ ɻ j ɰ Affricates  t͡s d͡z t͡ʃ d͡ʒ t͡ɕ d͡ʑ t͡ʂ d͡ʐ t͡ɬ d͡ɮ p̪͡f Trills ʙ r • ʀ • Other laterals  ɺ • ɫ Flaps & Taps • ѵ ɾ ɽ • • Co-articulated fricatives  ɕ ʑ ɧ Lat. Fricatives ɬ ɮ • • • Co-articulated approximants  ʍ w ɥ Lat. Appr'mants l ɭ ʎ ʟ Co-articulated stops  k͡p ɡ͡b ŋ͡m
This page contains phonetic information in IPA, which may not display correctly in some browsers. [Help] Where symbols appear in pairs, the one to the right represents a voiced consonant. Shaded areas denote pulmonic articulations judged impossible.