Epiglottal flap

Not to be confused with Pharyngeal flap surgery.

Epiglottal flap
ʡ̮
Audio sample
source · help
Image

An epiglottal or pharyngeal flap is not known to exist as a phoneme in any language. However, it exists as the intervocalic voiced allophone of the otherwise voiceless epiglottal stop /ʡ/ of Dahalo and perhaps of other languages. It may also exist in Iraqi Arabic, where the consonant 'ayn is too short to be an epiglottal stop, but has too much of a burst to be a fricative or approximant.

There is no dedicated symbol for this sound in the IPA, but it can be transcribed by adding an "extra short" diacritic to the symbol for the stop, ⟨ʡ̮⟩. (The diacritic is here placed under rather than above the letter to avoid the ascender.)

Features

Features of the voiceless epiglottal/pharyngeal flap

• Its manner of articulation is flap, which means it is produced with a single contraction of the muscles so that one articulator (usually the tongue) is thrown against another.
• Its place of articulation is epiglottal, which means it is articulated with the aryepiglottic folds against the epiglottis.
• Its phonation is voiced, which means the vocal cords vibrate during the articulation.
• 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 central–lateral dichotomy does not apply.
• The airstream mechanism is pulmonic, which means it is articulated by pushing air solely with the lungs and diaphragm, as in most sounds.

Occurrence

Language		Word	IPA	Meaning	Notes
Dahalo		[nd̠oːʡ̮o]		'mud'	Intervocallic allophone of the voiceless epiglottal stop /ʡ/, may be an approximant instead.