Voiceless retroflex affricate
Consonantal sound
A voiceless retroflex sibilant affricate is a type of consonantal sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ⟨ʈ͡ʂ⟩ or ⟨t̠͡ʂ⟩, often simplified to ⟨tʂ⟩. There is also a ligature ⟨ꭧ⟩, which has been retired by the International Phonetic Association but is still used. In Americanist tradition, where ⟨c⟩ is used to transcribe the affricate /ts/, the letter ⟨𝼝⟩ has sometimes been used to transcribe the affricate referenced on this page.
A laminal variant occurs in Polish cz, and an apical variant in the Indo-Aryan languages.
01Features
Features of a voiceless retroflex affricate:
- Its manner of articulation is sibilant affricate, which means it is produced by first stopping the air flow entirely, then directing it with the tongue to the sharp edge of the teeth, causing high-frequency turbulence.
- Its place of articulation is retroflex, which prototypically means it is articulated subapical (with the tip of the tongue curled up), but more generally, it means that it is postalveolar without being palatalized. That is, besides the prototypical subapical articulation, the tongue can be apical (pointed) or, in some fricatives, laminal (flat).
- Its phonation is voiceless, which means it is produced without vibrations of the vocal cords. In some languages the vocal cords are actively separated, so it is always voiceless; in others the cords are lax, so that it may take on the voicing of adjacent sounds.
- It is an oral consonant, which means that air is not allowed to escape through the nose.
- It is a median consonant, which means it is produced by directing the airstream down the midline of the tongue, rather than to the sides.
- Its airstream mechanism is pulmonic, which means it is articulated by pushing air only with the intercostal muscles and abdominal muscles, as in most speech sounds.
02Occurrence
The affricate occurs in a number of languages:
- Asturian: Speakers of the western dialects of this language use it instead of the voiced palatal fricative, writing ḷḷ instead of ll.
- Slavic languages: Polish, Belarusian, Old Czech, Serbo-Croatian; some speakers of Russian may use it instead of the voiceless alveolo-palatal affricate.
- a number of Northwest Caucasian languages have retroflex affricates that contrast in secondary articulations like labialization.
- Mandarin and other Sinitic languages.
| Language | Word | IPA | Meaning | Notes | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Abkhaz | аҽада | [at͡ʂʰada]ⓘ | 'donkey' | See Abkhaz phonology | |
| Adyghe | чъыгы | [t͡ʂəɣə]ⓘ | 'tree' | See Adyghe phonology | |
| Asturian | Some dialects | ḷḷobu | [t̠͡ʂoβu] | 'wolf' | Corresponds to standard /ʎ/. |
| Belarusian | пачатак | [pat̠͡ʂatak] | 'the beginning' | Laminal. See Belarusian phonology | |
| Chinese | Mandarin | 中文 / Zhōngwén | [ʈ̺͡ʂ̺ʊŋ˥ u̯ən˧˥]ⓘ | 'Chinese language' | Apical. Contrasts with aspirated form. See Mandarin phonology |
| Hmong | White Hmong | 𖬒𖬶𖬯𖬵 / txov | [tso˨˦] | 'lion' or 'tiger' | |
| Khanty | Eastern dialects | ҷӓңҷ | [t̠͡ʂaɳt̠͡ʂ] | 'knee' | Corresponds to a voiceless retroflex fricative /ʂ/ in the northern dialects. |
| Southern dialects | |||||
| Mapudungun | trafoy | [t̠͡ʂa.ˈfoj] | 'it got broken' | Contrasts with a voiceless postalveolar affricate: chafoy [t͡ʃa.ˈfoj] 'he/she coughed' | |
| Northern Qiang | zhes | [t̠͡ʂəs] | 'day before yesterday' | Contrasts with aspirated and voiced forms. | |
| Polish | człowiek | [ˈt͡ʂɔvjɛk]ⓘ | 'man' | Laminal. See Polish phonology | |
| Quechua | Cajamarca-Cañaris | chupa | [t̠͡ʂupə] | 'tail' | |
| Russian | лу́чше / luchshe | [ˈɫut͡ʂʂə]ⓘ | 'better' | ||
| Serbo-Croatian | чеп / čep | [t̠͡ʂe̞p] | 'cork' | Apical. It may be palato-alveolar instead, depending on the dialect. See Serbo-Croatian phonology | |
| Silesian | szczopek | [ʂt̠͡ʂopɛk] | 'pike' | ||
| Slovak | čakať | [ˈt̠͡ʂäkäc] | 'to wait' | Laminal. | |
| Spanish | Chilean | cuatro | [ˈˈkwatʂo] | 'four' | Corresponding to [tɾ] in other dialects. |
| Torwali | ڇووو | [t̠͡ʂuwu] | 'to sew' | Contrasts with aspirated form. | |
| Vietnamese | trà | [t̠͡ʂaː˨˩] | 'tea' | Some speakers. | |
| Yi | ꍈ / zha | [t̠͡ʂa˧] | 'a bit' | Contrasts with aspirated form. | |
Sources and credits
This article is adapted from the Wikipedia article “Voiceless retroflex affricate”, written by its contributors and licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Fathomly has changed the layout, removed citation markers, navigation and maintenance notices, and adjusted punctuation. This adapted version is shared under the same license. For references, see the original article.
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- IPA Unicode 0xAB67.svg by Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0
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