Bilabial
Bilabial refers to a speech sound produced by bringing both lips together. In phonetics, bilabial sounds are classified as consonants, such as /p/ and /b/, and are characterized by the articulation of the lips. These sounds are common in many languages and are considered one of the basic articulatory features in the study of speech sounds.
7 Key excerpts on "Bilabial"
eBook - ePub- Patricia Ashby(Author)
- 2013(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...These established inherent relationships mean that, unless anything steps out of line (and the only thing flexible enough to do this, really, is the tip/blade section of the tongue) or if we want to be especially precise, it is not necessary to refer to the active articulator every time we mention a place of articulation. So, when the two lips articulate together (and you can see this happening twice if you look in your mirror and say baby) or the lower lip articulates with the teeth (and you can see this happening twice if you look in your mirror and say fever) we can say that all the consonant sounds being produced are LABIAL. Bilabial Labiodental The fact of the matter is that we do often need to distinguish between these two different kind of labial gestures (we would need to do this when describing consonant sounds in English, for example) and so we have two rather more precise place names for this purpose: Bilabial (‘both lips’ for the consonants in baby) and LABIODENTAL (‘lip and teeth’ for the consonants in fever). 5.4 Bilabial and labiodental adjustments in vocal tract diagrams The lips and teeth in our sagittal sections or vocal tract drawings can be adjusted to show these postures (see Fig. 5.4). Labial–velar Double articulation Sometimes, two places of articulation are operated at the same time. This is the case in English [w], for example. You can see the lips are involved, but at the same time, the back of your tongue is making a movement (which although you can’t see it you may be able to feel a bit) towards the velum. [w] therefore has a sort of double-barrelled name: LABIAL–VELAR. DOUBLE ARTICULATIONS of this kind are rare, but to use two places at once is a recognized way of increasing the number of different sounds we are capable of producing. EXERCISES 5.4 Do not use the Table 5.1 for this exercise, but look at the diagrams in Figures 5.1 and 5.3...
- David Hornsby(Author)
- 2014(Publication Date)
- Teach Yourself(Publisher)
...The symbol for a Bilabial click [ ⊙ ] reflects the lip-closure akin to kissing with which this sound is produced. The consonants of English Try pronouncing the word rapid, and then say rabid (to rhyme with rapid). Say these words together a few times, and pay particular attention to the middle sound in each case. You’ll notice that your lip and tongue positions are exactly the same for both words, but they are nonetheless quite distinct. The other sounds are not significantly different, so in what way are the consonants different? To answer this question, try saying just the p and b sounds, conveniently transcribed in IPA as [ p ] and [ b ] respectively, rapidly several times in succession, holding your larynx (or Adam’s apple) between thumb and forefinger as you do so. (Don’t be shy: you’re doing this for linguistic science.) Now do the same for t and d ([ t ] and [ d ] in IPA). You’ll feel your larynx vibrating for [ b ] and [ d ], but not for [ p ] and [ t ], because the former are voiced sounds, while [ p ] and [ t ] are voiceless. We can therefore distinguish a number of pairs of speech sounds (or phones) on the basis of whether they are voiceless (like [ p ], [ t ] and [ k ] or voiced (like [ b ], [d] and [ g ]). We can now subdivide them further on the basis of their place of articulation. The [p] and [b] sounds you produced earlier, for example, are produced by the lips coming together and being released: the tongue is not really involved at all. These sounds are therefore Bilabial. By contrast, for [t] and [d] the tongue touches the back of the teeth and the alveolar ridge to produce a dental-alveolar sound, while contact between tongue and soft palate produces the velar sounds [k] and [ g ]...
eBook - ePubThe Sounds of Language
An Introduction to Phonetics
- Henry Rogers(Author)
- 2014(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...The upper articulators are the upper lip, the upper teeth, the palate, the velum, the uvula and the rear wall of the pharynx. Places of articulation usually have a compound name giving the lower and upper articulators, with the name of the lower articulator first. Thus, apico-dental indicates that the lower articulator is the apex of the tongue, and the upper articulator is the upper teeth. Occasionally, when the lower articulator is obvious or unimportant, only the upper articulator is named: for example, velar, used alone, is interpreted as meaning dorso-velar. Table 10.1 illustrates a number of terms used to describe the articulators, with their Latin or Greek equivalents. Table 10.1 Terminology Labial Labial sounds are made with one or both lips and include Bilabials, labiodentals, and linguo-labials. Bilabial The lower lip articulates with the upper lip to form a Bilabial consonant (Figure 10.1). The term Bilabial is used rather than labio-labial. The Bilabial stops are voiceless [p] and voiced [b] as in English. The fricatives are voiceless [φ] phi, and voiced [β] beta. The nasal stop is [m] as in English. Bilabial stops and the nasal are extremely common in languages; indeed, a language without them is noteworthy. Bilabial fricatives, however, are rather uncommon; languages tend to have Bilabial stops and labio-dental fricatives. Figure 10.1 Labial articulations Ewe (Ghana, West Africa) is unusual in having contrasting Bilabial and labio-dental fricatives. High tone here is shown by [´] and low tone by [`]. Ewe Labiodental The lower lip articulates against the upper teeth to form labiodental consonants (Figure 10.1). Labiodental stops do not occur distinctively although they are quite easy to make if your teeth do not have gaps. The labiodental nasal [m] is reported in Teke (Laver, 1994)...
eBook - ePub- R.L. Trask, Peter Stockwell, Peter Stockwell(Authors)
- 2007(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...PLACE OF ARTICULATION A label for the speech organs most directly involved in producing a consonant. By definition, the production of a consonant involves a constriction (narrowing or closure) somewhere in the vocal tract between the glottis and the lips. We have a standard terminology for labelling the particular parts of the vocal tract directly involved in making that constriction, and each such label denotes a particular place of articulation. Toward the bottom end of the vocal tract, we can safely use simple labels like glottal and pharyngeal. Farther up, we need in principle to identify both the lower articulator and the upper one (in that order), and for this purpose we use a compound label with the first identifier ending in -o and the second in -al (or -ar). Examples: dorso-velar – back (dorsum) of tongue plus velum; e.g., [k] lamino-alveolar – blade (lamina) of tongue plus alveolar ridge; e.g., English [n] for most speakers apico-dental – tip (apex) of tongue plus upper teeth; e.g., French [t] sublamino-prepalatal – underside of tongue plus front of palate; e.g., [ɖ] in many Australian languages If the lower articulator is obvious or unimportant, we can omit it from the label; hence we can say velar instead of dorso-velar, or alveolar for any consonant involving the alveolar ridge. A few traditional terms are unsystematic, such as retroflex for any consonant in which the tip of the tongue is curled up, palatoalveolar for a consonant involving a long constriction from the alveolar ridge to the palate, and Bilabial in place of the expected labio-labial...
eBook - ePubRelevant Acoustic Phonetics of L2 English
Focus on Intelligibility
- Ettien Koffi(Author)
- 2021(Publication Date)
- CRC Press(Publisher)
...If the Bilabial nasal [m] is to be produced, a small portion of the air molecules that failed to go through the nasal cavities escape in the oral cavity. When the lower lip and the upper lip separate, a burst may or may not occur. It all depends on how forcefully the talkers release their lips. If an alveolar nasal [n] is articulated, the tip of the tongue detaches from the alveolar or dental area, and air molecules escape. If the velar nasal kJ] is pronounced, the velum moves away from the pharyngeal wall and air molecules escape mostly through the nostrils. Table 7.1 summarizes the places and manner of articulation of nasal consonants in GAE: Table 7.1 English Nasals. POA Bilabial Labiodental Interdental Alveolar Palatal Velar MOA Nassal m n ŋ In producing nasal consonants, if talkers release the articulators forcefully, one can feel some puff of air. This is due to that fact that air pressure builds up behind the closure points. Once articulators separate, built up air molecules fly out. For this reason, the segments [m, n, ŋ] are classified as stops in addition to being nasals. However, Ladefoged and Maddieson (1996:102) do not think that it is appropriate to use the label “stop” for nasal consonants because in reality, even though a tiny quantity of air molecules is stopped inside the mouth, a larger quantity flows continuously through the nostrils. I agree with Ladefoged and Maddieson and refrain from using the label “stop” for nasal consonants. An Overview of the Acoustics of Nasals Now that nasal consonants have been described articulatorily, let’s describe them acoustically and aerodynamically. Four key terms, nasal murmur, damping, antiformants or zeros, and bandwidth are often used in connection with the acoustic phonetic study of nasals. The issues involved in describing [m, n, rj] acoustically are just as complex as describing them articulatorily. Since a picture is worth a thousand words, an attempt will be made here to define nasals pictorially...
eBook - ePub- Hongyuan Dong(Author)
- 2014(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...Thus the p in “pā” is [ph] and the b in “bā” is [p]. The only distinction between these two words is the aspiration. They are not predictable. Therefore we say that /p h / and /p/ are two different phonemes. Note here that we generally put IPA symbols in square brackets, e.g. [p], but when we want to indicate that a certain sound is actually a phoneme, we use a pair of slashes, e.g. /p/. Thus all consonants can be described in the four dimensions, for example: [s] is a voiceless alveolar fricative [b] is a voiced Bilabial stop [tʃ] is a voiceless palato-alveolar affricate [p h ] is an aspirated voiceless Bilabial stop Now let’s see how vowels can be described by referring to the relevant articulators. By definition, if there is no obstruction of air stream or very little constriction of the vocal tract, the sound produced is a vowel. Vowels can be described by three different dimensions: the height of the tongue, the frontness or backness of the tongue and lip-rounding. If we imagine that the four vowels [i, u, a, ɑ], as described below, outline the whole space of vowels, then all of the possible vowels will be within the space represented in Figure AII.1. [i] tongue at highest and frontmost [u] tongue at highest and backmost [a] tongue at lowest and frontmost [ɑ] tongue at lowest and backmost The front vowels are usually unrounded, meaning that when you utter the vowels, the lips are not rounded. Suppose you are trying to pronounce [i] as in the English word “feet”, but round your lips first without moving your tongue position at all. You will get the rounded version of [i], i.e. [y], which is the ü (umlaut) in the German word “über”, or the French u in the word “tu”. The back vowels are normally rounded, such as [u], but if you unround your lips when you say [u], you get the unrounded version. Now if we divide the vertical space into four equidistant levels, i.e...
eBook - ePubPhonetics
Transcription, Production, Acoustics, and Perception
- Henning Reetz, Allard Jongman(Authors)
- 2011(Publication Date)
- Wiley-Blackwell(Publisher)
...For the articulation of vowels, the oral cavity is relatively open – in other words, the airflow is quite unobstructed. In addition, the vocal folds are usually vibrating. For consonants, on the other hand, the airstream is affected in a number of ways; it can either be: 1 blocked, resulting in an (oral) stop consonant; 2 impeded, resulting in either a fricative with a major constriction or an approximant with a minor constriction; 3 diverted through the nasal cavity, resulting in a nasal consonant. In addition, the vocal folds may or may not be vibrating, resulting in voiced or voiceless (= unvoiced) sounds. From now on, speech sounds will be classified as either consonants or vowels. We will start with the consonants. In order to produce a consonant, the airstream through the vocal tract must be obstructed in some way. Consonants can therefore be classified according to the location and extent of this obstruction, or, in linguistic terms, the place and manner of articulation. We start by describing the consonants of English in terms of their place and manner of articulation. In Chapter 4 we expand this description to sounds found in other languages of the world. 2.3.1 Place of articulation Going from front to back in the vocal tract, the following places of articulation can be distinguished in English: 1 Bilabial. Bilabials are produced with both lips. Examples in English are the initial sounds in the words p eak, b eak, and m eek. 2 Labiodental. The lower lip makes contact with the upper front teeth. Examples are the initial sounds in the words f ine and v ine. 3 Dental. Dental consonants involve the tip or blade of the tongue and the upper front teeth. Examples are the initial sounds in th igh and th y. 4 Alveolar. These sounds involve the tip or blade of the tongue and alveolar ridge as in t ip, d ip, s ip, z ip, l ip, r ip, and n ip. (For a discussion of the retroflex variant of “r,” see Section 3.1.5.) 5 Postalveolar...
