Voiceless bidental fricative

The voiceless bidental fricative is a rare consonantal sound. The only natural language known to use it is the Shapsug dialect of Adyghe, where it appears as a variant of /x/.[1] People with hypoglossia (abnormally small tongue) may use it for target /s/.

Voiceless bidental fricative
h̪͆

Features

Features of the voiceless bidental fricative:

  • Its phonation 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 only.
  • Because the sound is not produced with airflow over the tongue, the centrallateral dichotomy does not apply.

Occurrence

LanguageWordIPAMeaningNotes
AdygheBlack Sea (Shapsug) dialectдахэ[daːh̪͆a]'pretty'Corresponds to [x] in other dialects.

See also

References

  1. Ladefoged, Peter; Maddieson, Ian (1996). The Sounds of the World's Languages. Oxford: Blackwell. pp. 144–145. ISBN 978-0-631-19815-4.
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