Alveolar ejective fricative

The alveolar ejective fricative is a type of consonantal sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is sʼ, and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is s_>.

Features

Features of the alveolar ejective fricative:

* Its manner of articulation is sibilant fricative, which means it is produced by directing air flow through a groove in the tongue at the place of articulation and directing it over the sharp edge of the teeth, causing high-frequency turbulence.
* Its place of articulation is alveolar, which means it is articulated with either the tip or the blade of the tongue against the alveolar ridge, termed respectively "apical" and "laminal".
* 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 center of the tongue, rather than the sides.
* The airstream mechanism is glottalic egressive, which means it is produced by pushing air with the glottis, rather than with the diaphragm.

ee also

* List of phonetic topics