Vocal cordsIn humans, the vocal cords, also known as vocal folds, are folds of throat tissues that are key in creating sounds through vocalization. The size of vocal cords affects the pitch of voice. Open when breathing and vibrating for speech or singing, the folds are controlled via the recurrent laryngeal branch of the vagus nerve. They are composed of twin infoldings of mucous membrane stretched horizontally, from back to front, across the larynx. They vibrate, modulating the flow of air being expelled from the lungs during phonation.
FricativeA fricative is a consonant produced by forcing air through a narrow channel made by placing two articulators close together. These may be the lower lip against the upper teeth, in the case of [f]; the back of the tongue against the soft palate in the case of German [x] (the final consonant of Bach); or the side of the tongue against the molars, in the case of Welsh [ɬ] (appearing twice in the name Llanelli). This turbulent airflow is called frication. A particular subset of fricatives are the sibilants.
LarynxThe larynx (ˈlæɹɪŋks), commonly called the voice box, is an organ in the top of the neck involved in breathing, producing sound and protecting the trachea against food aspiration. The opening of larynx into pharynx known as the laryngeal inlet is about 4–5 centimeters in diameter. The larynx houses the vocal cords, and manipulates pitch and volume, which is essential for phonation. It is situated just below where the tract of the pharynx splits into the trachea and the esophagus.
PhoneticsPhonetics is a branch of linguistics that studies how humans produce and perceive sounds, or in the case of sign languages, the equivalent aspects of sign. Linguists who specialize in studying the physical properties of speech are phoneticians. The field of phonetics is traditionally divided into three sub-disciplines based on the research questions involved such as how humans plan and execute movements to produce speech (articulatory phonetics), how various movements affect the properties of the resulting sound (acoustic phonetics), or how humans convert sound waves to linguistic information (auditory phonetics).
Index of phonetics articlesAcoustic phonetics Active articulator Affricate Airstream mechanism Alexander John Ellis Alexander Melville Bell Alfred C. Gimson Allophone Alveolar approximant (ɹ) Alveolar click (ǃ) Alveolar consonant Alveolar ejective affricate (tsʼ) Alveolar ejective (tʼ) Alveolar ejective fricative (sʼ) Alveolar flap (ɾ) Alveolar lateral approximant (l, l̥) Alveolar lateral ejective affricate (tɬʼ) Alveolar lateral ejective fricative (ɬʼ) Alveolar lateral flap (ɺ) Alveolar nasal (n) Alveolar ridge Alveolar trill (r, r̥) Alveolo-palatal consonant Alveolo-palatal ejective fricative (ɕʼ) Apical consonant Approximant consonant Articulatory phonetics Aspirated consonant (◌h) Auditory phonetics Back vowel Basis of articulation Bernd J.
Pharyngeal consonantA pharyngeal consonant is a consonant that is articulated primarily in the pharynx. Some phoneticians distinguish upper pharyngeal consonants, or "high" pharyngeals, pronounced by retracting the root of the tongue in the mid to upper pharynx, from (ary)epiglottal consonants, or "low" pharyngeals, which are articulated with the aryepiglottic folds against the epiglottis at the entrance of the larynx, as well as from epiglotto-pharyngeal consonants, with both movements being combined.
GlottisThe glottis is the opening between the vocal folds (the rima glottidis). The glottis is crucial in producing vowels and voiced consonants. From Ancient Greek γλωττίς (glōttís), derived from γλῶττα (glôtta), variant of γλῶσσα (glôssa, "tongue"). Phonation As the vocal folds vibrate, the resulting vibration produces a "buzzing" quality to the speech, called voice or voicing or pronunciation. Sound production that involves moving the vocal folds close together is called glottal. English has a voiceless glottal transition spelled "h".
Modal voiceModal voice is the vocal register used most frequently in speech and singing in most languages. It is also the term used in linguistics for the most common phonation of vowels. The term "modal" refers to the resonant mode of vocal folds; that is, the optimal combination of airflow and glottal tension that yields maximum vibration. In linguistics, modal voice is the only phonation found in the vowels and other sonorants (consonants such as m, n, l, and r) of most of the languages of the world, but a significant minority contrasts modal voice with other phonations.
VoicelessnessIn linguistics, voicelessness is the property of sounds being pronounced without the larynx vibrating. Phonologically, it is a type of phonation, which contrasts with other states of the larynx, but some object that the word phonation implies voicing and that voicelessness is the lack of phonation. The International Phonetic Alphabet has distinct letters for many voiceless and modally voiced pairs of consonants (the obstruents), such as [p b], [t d], [k ɡ], [q ɢ], [f v], and [s z].
Voice onset timeIn phonetics, voice onset time (VOT) is a feature of the production of stop consonants. It is defined as the length of time that passes between the release of a stop consonant and the onset of voicing, the vibration of the vocal folds, or, according to other authors, periodicity. Some authors allow negative values to mark voicing that begins during the period of articulatory closure for the consonant and continues in the release, for those unaspirated voiced stops in which there is no voicing present at the instant of articulatory closure.
