An affricate is a
consonant
In articulatory phonetics
The field of articulatory phonetics is a subfield of phonetics
Phonetics is a branch of linguistics that studies how humans produce and perceive sounds, or in the case of sign languages, the equivalent aspects of sig ...
that begins as a
stop and releases as a
fricative
Fricatives are consonant
In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract. Examples are , pronounced with the lips; , pronounced with the front of the tongue; , pron ...
, generally with the same
place of articulation
In articulatory phonetics
The field of articulatory phonetics is a subfield of phonetics
Phonetics is a branch of linguistics that studies how humans produce and perceive sounds, or in the case of sign languages, the equivalent aspects of sig ...
(most often
coronal
Coronal may refer to:
* a nuptial crown
* anything relating to a Corona (disambiguation), corona
* Coronal plane, an anatomical term of location
* The Commonly used terms of relationship and comparison in dentistry, coronal direction on a tooth
* Co ...
). It is often difficult to decide if a stop and fricative form a single
phoneme
In phonology and linguistics, a phoneme is a unit of sound that distinguishes one word from another in a particular language.
For example, in most List of dialects of English, dialects of English, with the notable exception of the West Midlan ...
or a consonant pair. English has two affricate phonemes, and , often spelled ''ch'' and ''j'', respectively.
Examples
The
English
English usually refers to:
* English language
English is a West Germanic languages, West Germanic language first spoken in History of Anglo-Saxon England, early medieval England, which has eventually become the World language, leading lan ...

sounds spelled "ch" and "j" (
broadly transcribed as and in the
IPA
IPA commonly refers to:
* India pale ale, a style of beer
* International Phonetic Alphabet
The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is an alphabetic system of phonetic notation based primarily on the Latin script
Latin script, also ...
),
German
German(s) may refer to:
Common uses
* of or related to Germany
* Germans, Germanic ethnic group, citizens of Germany or people of German ancestry
* For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law
* German language
The German la ...

and
Italian
Italian may refer to:
* Anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Italy
** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic
** Italian language, a Romance language
*** Regional Italian, regional variants of the ...

''z'' and
Italian
Italian may refer to:
* Anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Italy
** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic
** Italian language, a Romance language
*** Regional Italian, regional variants of the ...

''z'' are typical affricates, and sounds like these are fairly common in the world's languages, as are other affricates with similar sounds, such as those in
Polish
Polish may refer to:
* Anything from or related to Poland
Poland ( pl, Polska ), officially the Republic of Poland ( pl, Rzeczpospolita Polska, links=no ), is a country located in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 Voivodeships of Pol ...
and
Chinese
Chinese can refer to:
* Something related to China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by population, world's most populous country, with a populat ...
. However, voiced affricates other than are relatively uncommon. For several places of articulation they are not attested at all.
Much less common are
affricates, such as in German and
Izi, or
velar affricates, such as in
Tswana
Tswana may refer to:
* Tswana people, a Bantu people in Botswana, South Africa, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Zambia, and other Southern Africa regions
* Tswana language, the language spoken by the (Ba)Tswana people
* Bophuthatswana, the former bantustan for ...
(written ''kg'') or in High Alemannic
Swiss German
Swiss German (Standard German
Standard High German (SHG), less precisely Standard German or High German (not to be confused with High German
The High German languages or High German dialects (german: hochdeutsche Mundarten) comprise th ...
dialects. Worldwide, relatively few languages have affricates in these positions even though the corresponding
stop consonant
In phonetics
Phonetics 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. Phoneticians—linguists who specialize in phonetics—study the physical ...
s, and , are common or virtually universal. Also less common are alveolar affricates where the fricative release is
lateral
Lateral is a geometric term of location
{{unreferenced, date=March 2014
Geometric terms of location describe directions or positions relative to the shape of an object. These terms are used in descriptions of engineering, physics, and other scienc ...
, such as the sound found in
Nahuatl
Nahuatl (; ),The Classical Nahuatl word (noun stem ''nāhua'', + absolutive ''-tl'' ) is thought to mean "a good, clear sound" This language name has several spellings, among them náhuatl (the standard spelling in the Spanish language),() Nao ...

and
Navajo
The Navajo (; British English: Navaho; nv, Diné or ') are a of the .
At more than 399,494 enrolled tribal members , the is the largest federally recognized tribe in the U.S. (the being the second largest); the Navajo Nation has the larges ...
. Some other
Athabaskan languages
Athabaskan (also spelled ''Athabascan'', ''Athapaskan'' or ''Athapascan'', and also known as Dene) is a large family of indigenous languages
An indigenous language or autochthonous language, is a language
A language is a structured system ...

, such as
Dene Suline, have unaspirated, aspirated, and ejective series of affricates whose release may be dental, alveolar, postalveolar, or lateral: , , , , , , , , , , , and .
Notation
Affricates are transcribed in the
International Phonetic Alphabet
The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is an alphabet
An alphabet is a standardized set of basic written symbols
A symbol is a mark, sign, or word
In linguistics, a word of a spoken language can be defined as the smallest seq ...
by a combination of two letters, one for the stop element and the other for the fricative element. In order to show that these are parts of a single consonant, a
tie bar
Tie has two principal meanings:
* Tie (draw)
A draw or tie occurs in a competitive sport when the results are identical or inconclusive. Ties or draws are possible in some, but not all, sports and games. Such an outcome, sometimes referred to as d ...
is generally used. The tie bar appears most commonly above the two letters, but may be placed under them if it fits better there, or simply because it is more legible. Thus:
:
or
:.
A less common notation indicates the release of the affricate with a superscript:
:
This is derived from the IPA convention of indicating other releases with a superscript. However, this convention is more typically used for a fricated release that is too brief to be considered a true affricate.
Though they are no longer standard IPA, ligatures are available in
Unicode
Unicode, formally the Unicode Standard, is an information technology standard
Standard may refer to:
Flags
* Colours, standards and guidons
* Standard (flag), a type of flag used for personal identification
Norm, convention or requireme ...

for eight common affricates
:.
Any of these notations can be used to distinguish an affricate from a sequence of a stop plus a fricative, which exists in some languages such as Polish. However, in languages where there is no such distinction, such as English, the tie bars are commonly dropped.
In other phonetic transcription systems, such as the
Americanist system, affricates may be transcribed with single letters. The affricates , , , , , are transcribed respectively as or ; , , or (older) ; or ; , , or (older) ; ; and or . Within the IPA, and are sometimes transcribed with the symbols for the palatal stops, and .
Affricates vs. stop–fricative sequences
In some languages, affricates contrast phonemically with stop–fricative sequences:
*
Polish
Polish may refer to:
* Anything from or related to Poland
Poland ( pl, Polska ), officially the Republic of Poland ( pl, Rzeczpospolita Polska, links=no ), is a country located in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 Voivodeships of Pol ...
affricate in ''czysta'' 'clean
(f.)' versus stop–fricative in ''trzysta'' 'three hundred'.
*
Klallam
Klallam (also Clallam, although the spelling with "K" is preferred in all four modern Klallam communities) refers to four related indigenous Native American/First Nations
The First Nations (french: Premières Nations ) are the largest group ...
affricate in ''k'ʷə́nc'' 'look at me' versus stop–fricative in ''k'ʷə́nts'' 'he looks at it'.
The exact phonetic difference varies between languages. In stop–fricative sequences, the stop has a release burst before the fricative starts; but in affricates, the fricative element ''is'' the release. Phonologically, stop–fricative sequences may have a
syllable
A syllable is a unit of organization for a sequence of speech sounds. It is typically made up of a syllable nucleus (most often a vowel
A vowel is a Syllable, syllabic speech sound pronounced without any stricture in the vocal tract. Vowels a ...

boundary between the two segments, but not necessarily.
In English, and (''nuts'', ''nods'') are considered phonemically stop–fricative sequences. They often contain a
morpheme
A morpheme is the smallest meaningful lexical item in a language. A morpheme is not a word. The difference between a morpheme and a word is that a morpheme bound and free morphemes, sometimes does not stand alone, but a word on this definition alw ...
boundary (for example, ''nuts'' = ''nut'' + ''s''). The English affricate phonemes and do not generally contain morpheme boundaries. Depending on dialect, English speakers may distinguish an affricate from a stop–fricative sequence in some contexts such as when the sequence occurs across syllable boundaries:
*''bent shudder'' →
*''bench udder'' →
The in 'bent shudder'
debuccalizes to a
before in many dialects, making it phonetically distinct from .
One
acoustic
Acoustic may refer to:
Music Albums
* Acoustic (Bayside EP), ''Acoustic'' (Bayside EP)
* Acoustic (Britt Nicole EP), ''Acoustic'' (Britt Nicole EP)
* Acoustic (Joey Cape and Tony Sly album), ''Acoustic'' (Joey Cape and Tony Sly album), 2004
* Aco ...
criterion for differentiating affricates and stop–fricative sequences is the rate of
amplitude
The amplitude of a ic is a measure of its change in a single (such as or ). There are various definitions of amplitude (see below), which are all s of the magnitude of the differences between the variable's . In older texts, the of a period f ...

increase of the frication noise, which is known as the ''rise time''. Affricates have a short rise time to the peak frication amplitude; stop–fricative sequences have longer rise times (Howell & Rosen 1983, Johnson 2003, Mitani et al. 2006).
List of affricates
In the case of coronals, the symbols are normally used for the stop portion of the affricate regardless of place. For example, is commonly seen for .
The exemplar languages are ones that have been reported to have these sounds, but in several cases they may need confirmation.
Sibilant affricates
The
Northwest Caucasian languages
The Northwest Caucasian languages, also called West Caucasian, Abkhazo-Adyghean, Abkhazo-Circassian, Circassic, or sometimes ''Pontic languages'' (as opposed to ''Caspian languages'' for the Northeast Caucasian languages), are a group of language ...

Abkhaz and
Ubykh both contrast sibilant affricates at four places of articulation: alveolar, postalveolar, alveolo-palatal and retroflex. They also distinguish voiceless, voiced, and
ejective
In phonetics
Phonetics 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. Phoneticians—linguists who specialize in phonetics—study the physical p ...
affricates at each of these.
When a language only has one type of affricate, it is usually a sibilant; this is the case in e.g.
Arabic
Arabic (, ' or , ' or ) is a Semitic language
The Semitic languages are a branch of the Afroasiatic language family originating in the Middle East
The Middle East is a list of transcontinental countries, transcontinental region ...

(), most dialects of
Spanish
Spanish may refer to:
* Items from or related to Spain:
**Spaniards, a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain
**Spanish language
**Spanish cuisine
Other places
* Spanish, Ontario, Canada
* Spanish River (disambiguation), the name of several ...

(), and
Thai
Thai or THAI may refer to:
* Of or from Thailand, a country in Southeast Asia
** Thai people, the dominant ethnic group of Thailand
** Thai language, a Tai-Kadai language spoken mainly in and around Thailand
*** Thai script
*** Thai (Unicode block) ...

().
Non-sibilant affricates
Lateral affricates
Trilled affricates
Pirahã and
Wari' have a
dental stop with bilabial trilled release .
Heterorganic affricates
Although most affricates are
homorganic
In phonetics
Phonetics 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. Phoneticians—linguists who specialize in phonetics—study the physical p ...
, Navajo and
Chiricahua Apache
Chiricahua ( ) is one of the socio-culturally related Native American tribes in the Southwestern United States, which include the Tsokanende (Chiricahua), Ndendahe (Mogollon, Carrizaleño), Tchihende (Mimbreño), Sehende (Mescalero), Lipan, Saline ...
have a heterorganic alveolar-velar affricate (Hoijer & Opler 1938, Young & Morgan 1987, Ladefoged & Maddeison 1996, McDonough 2003, McDonough & Wood 2008, Iskarous, et al. 2012).
Wari' and
Pirahã have a voiceless dental bilabially trilled affricate
̪ʙ̥(see
#Trilled affricates),
Blackfoot
The Blackfoot Confederacy, ''Niitsitapi'' or ''Siksikaitsitapi'' (ᖹᐟᒧᐧᒣᑯ, meaning "the people" or " Blackfoot-speaking real people"), is a historic collective name for linguistically related groups that make up the Blackfoot or Black ...
has . Other heterorganic affricates are reported for
Northern Sotho
Northern Sotho, or as an endonym
An endonym (from Greek: , 'inner' + , 'name'; also known as autonym) is a common, internal name
A name is a term used for identification by an external observer. They can identify a class or category of ...
(Johnson 2003) and other
Bantu languages
The Bantu languages (English: , Proto-Bantu: *bantʊ̀) are a large family of languages
In human society, family (from la, familia) is a group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or affinity (by marriage or o ...
such as
Phuthi
Phuthi (''Síphùthì'') is a Nguni languages, Nguni Bantu language spoken in southern Lesotho and areas in South Africa adjacent to the same border. The closest substantial living relative of Phuthi is Swati language, Swati (or ''Siswati''), spo ...
, which has alveolar–labiodental affricates and , and
Sesotho
Sotho () or Sesotho () is a Southern Bantu languages, Southern Bantu language of the Sotho-Tswana languages, Sotho-Tswana (S.30) group, spoken primarily by the Basotho people, Basotho in Lesotho, where it is the national language, national an ...
, which has bilabial–palatoalveolar affricates and .
Djeoromitxi (Pies 1992) has and .
Phonation, coarticulation and other variants
The coronal and dorsal places of articulation attested as
ejectives
In phonetics, ejective consonants are usually voiceless consonants that are pronounced with a Airstream mechanism#Glottalic initiation, glottalic egressive airstream. In the phonology of a particular language, ejectives may contrast with Aspirated ...
as well: . Several Khoisan languages such as
!Xóõ are reported to have voiced ejective affricates, but these are actually ''pre''-voiced: . Affricates are also commonly
aspirated: ,
murmured
Breathy voice (also called murmured voice, whispery voice, soughing and susurration) is a phonation in which the vocal folds vibrate, as they do in normal (modal) voicing, but are adjusted to let more air escape which produces a sighing-like s ...
: , and
prenasalized
Prenasalized consonants are phonetics, phonetic sequences of a nasal consonant, nasal and an obstruent (or occasionally a non-nasal sonorant such as ) that behave phonology, phonologically like single consonants. The primary reason for considering ...
: .
Labialized
Labialization is a secondary articulatory feature of sounds in some languages. Labialized sounds involve the lips while the remainder of the oral cavity
In animal anatomy
Anatomy (Greek ''anatomē'', 'dissection') is the branch of biolog ...
,
palatalized,
velarized
Velarization is a secondary articulation of consonant
In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract. Examples are , pronounced with the lips; , pronounced wit ...
, and
pharyngealized
Pharyngealization is a secondary articulation of consonant
In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract. Examples are , pronounced with the lips; , pronounced wi ...

affricates are also common. Affricates may also have phonemic length, that is, affected by a
chroneme
In linguistics, a chroneme is a basic, theoretical unit of sound that can distinguish words by duration only of a vowel or consonant. The noun ''chroneme'' is derived from Greek χρόνος (chrónos, ''time''), and the suffixed ''-eme'', which ...
, as in
Italian
Italian may refer to:
* Anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Italy
** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic
** Italian language, a Romance language
*** Regional Italian, regional variants of the ...

and
.
Phonological representation
In phonology, affricates tend to behave similarly to stops, taking part in phonological patterns that fricatives do not. Kehrein analyzes phonetic affricates as phonological stops. A sibilant or lateral (and presumably trilled) stop can be realized phonetically only as an affricate and so might be analyzed phonemically as a sibilant or lateral stop. In that analysis, affricates other than sibilants and laterals are a phonetic mechanism for distinguishing stops at similar places of articulation (like more than one labial, coronal, or dorsal place). For example,
Chipewyan
The Chipewyan (chi-pew-yan/tʃɪpə'waɪən or chip-ə-WHY-en, also called ''Denésoliné'' or ''Dënesųłı̨né'' or ''Dënë Sųłınë́'', meaning "the original/real people") are a Dene
The Dene people () are an indigenous
Indigenous ...
has laminal dental vs. apical alveolar ; other languages may contrast velar with palatal and uvular .
Affricates may also be a strategy to increase the phonetic contrast between aspirated or ejective and tenuis consonants.
According to Kehrein, no language contrasts a non-sibilant, non-lateral affricate with a stop at the same place of articulation and with the same phonation and airstream mechanism, such as and or and .
In
feature-based phonology, affricates are distinguished from stops by the feature
delayed release
Affrication (sometimes called ''affricatization'') is a
sound change
A sound change, in historical linguistics
Historical linguistics, also termed diachronic linguistics, is the scientific study of language change
Language change is variation over time in a language
A language is a structured syste ...
by which a consonant, usually a
stop or
fricative
Fricatives are consonant
In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract. Examples are , pronounced with the lips; , pronounced with the front of the tongue; , pron ...
, changes into an affricate. Examples include:
*
Proto-Germanic
Proto-Germanic (abbreviated PGmc; also called Common Germanic) is the reconstructed
Reconstruction may refer to:
Politics, history, and sociology
*Reconstruction (law), the transfer of a company's (or several companies') business to a new ...
> Modern English , as in ''chin'' (cf. German ''Kinn'':
Anglo-Frisian palatalization)
*
Proto-Semitic
Proto-Semitic is the hypothetical Linguistic reconstruction, reconstructed proto-language ancestral to the Semitic languages. There is no consensus regarding the location of the Proto-Semitic ''Urheimat''; scholars hypothesize that it may have o ...

> Standard Arabic in all positions, as in ''جمل'' (camel) (cf.
Aramaic
Aramaic (Classical Syriac
The Syriac language (; syc, / '), also known as Syriac Aramaic (''Syrian Aramaic'', ''Syro-Aramaic'') and Classical Syriac (in its literary and liturgical form), is an Aramaic
Aramaic (Classical Syriac ...
: גמלא (gamlā'),
Amharic
Amharic ( or ; (Amharic: ), ', ) is an Ethiopian Semitic languages, Ethiopian Semitic language, which is a subgrouping within the Semitic languages, Semitic branch of the Afroasiatic languages. It is spoken as a first language by the Amhara pe ...

: ግመል (gəmäl), and
Hebrew
Hebrew (, , or ) is a Northwest Semitic languages, Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is regarded as one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-survivi ...
: גמל (gamal)).
* Early Modern English > (
yod-coalescence
The phonological history of the English language includes various changes in the phonology
Phonology is a branch of linguistics that studies how languages or dialects systematically organize their sounds (or signs, in sign languages). The te ...
)
* > in the
High German consonant shift
In historical linguistics
Historical linguistics, also termed diachronic linguistics, is the scientific study of language change over time. Principal concerns of historical linguistics include:
# to describe and account for observed changes ...
* > before respectively in 16th-century Japanese
* > word-initially in
In rare instances, a fricative–stop contour may occur. This is the case in dialects of
Scottish Gaelic
Scottish Gaelic ( gd, Gàidhlig ), also known as Scots Gaelic and Gaelic, is a Goidelic language
The Goidelic or Gaelic languages ( ga, teangacha Gaelacha; gd, cànanan Goidhealach; gv, çhengaghyn Gaelgagh) form one of the two groups o ...
that have velar frication where other dialects have
pre-aspiration. For example, in the
Harris
Harris may refer to:
Places Canada
* Harris, Ontario
* Northland Pyrite Mine (also known as Harris Mine)
* Harris, Saskatchewan
* Rural Municipality of Harris No. 316, Saskatchewan
Scotland
* Harris, Outer Hebrides (sometimes called the Isle of H ...
dialect there is 'seven' and 'eight' (or , ).
[Laver (1994) ''Principles of Phonetics'', p. 374.]
See also
*
Apical consonant
An apical consonant is a phone
A telephone is a telecommunications device that permits two or more users to conduct a conversation when they are too far apart to be heard directly. A telephone converts sound, typically and most efficiently th ...
*
Hush consonant
*
Laminal consonant
A laminal consonant is a phone
A telephone is a telecommunications device that permits two or more users to conduct a conversation when they are too far apart to be heard directly. A telephone converts sound, typically and most efficient ...
*
Index of phonetics articles
A
* Acoustic phonetics
Acoustic phonetics is a subfield of phonetics
Phonetics 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. Phoneticians— ...
References
*Hoijer, Harry; & Opler, Morris E. (1938). ''Chiricahua and Mescalero Apache texts''. The University of Chicago publications in anthropology; Linguistic series. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
*Howell Peter; & Rosen, Stuart. (1983). Production and perception of rise time in the voiceless affricate/fricative distinction. ''The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America'', ''73'' (3), 976–984.
*Iskarous, K; McDonough, J; & Whalen, D. (2012) A gestural account of the velar fricative in Navajo. ''Journal of Laboratory Phonology'' 195-210.
*Johnson, Keith. (2003). ''Acoustic & auditory phonetics'' (2nd ed.). Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing.
*Ladefoged, P. (1995) ''A Course in Phonetics'' (5th ed] Wadsworth, Inc
*Ladefoged, P; & Maddieson, I. (1996) ''Sounds of the Worlds Languages''. Blackwell.
*Maddieson, Ian. (1984). ''Patterns of sounds''. Cambridge University Press.
*McDonough, J (2003) ''The Navajo Sound System''. Kluwer
*McDonough, Joyce; & Wood, Valerie. (2008). The stop contrasts of the Athabaskan languages. ''Journal of Phonetics'' 36, 427-449.
*Mitani, Shigeki; Kitama, Toshihiro; & Sato, Yu. (2006). Voiceless affricate/fricative distinction by frication duration and amplitude rise slope. ''The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America'', ''120'' (3), 1600–1607.
*Young, R & Morgan W. (1987) ''The Navajo Language''. University of New Mexico Press.
External links
Affricates in English
{{DEFAULTSORT:Affricate Consonant
Manner of articulation