Describing consonants

What makes one consonant different from another?

Producing a consonant involves making the vocal tract narrower at some location than it usually
is. We call this narrowing a constriction. Which consonant you're pronouncing depends on
where in the vocal tract the constriction is and how narrow it is. It also depends on a few other
things, such as whether the vocal folds are vibrating and whether air is flowing through the nose.

We classify consonants along three major dimensions:

 place of articulation
 manner of articulation

 voicing

The place of articulation dimension specifies where in the vocal tract the constriction is.
The voicing parameter specifies whether the vocal folds are vibrating. The manner of
articulation dimesion is essentially everything else: how narrow the constriction is, whether air
is flowing through the nose, and whether the tongue is dropped down on one side.

For example, for the sound [d]:

  Place of articulation = alveolar. (The narrowing of the vocal tract involves the tongue tip
and the alveolar ridge.)
 Manner of articulation = oral stop. (The narrowing is complete -- the tongue is
completely blocking off airflow through the mouth. There is also no airflow through the
nose.)
 Voicing = voiced. (The vocal folds are vibrating.)

Voicing:

The vocal folds may be held against each other at just the right tension so that the air flowing
past them from the lungs will cause them to vibrate against each other. We call this
process voicing. Sounds which are made with vocal fold vibration are said to be voiced. Sounds
made without vocal fold vibration are said to be voiceless.

There are several pairs of sounds in English which differ only in voicing -- that is, the two
sounds have identical places and manners of articulation, but one has vocal fold vibration and the
other doesn't. The [θ] of thigh and the [ð] of thy are one such pair. The others are:

voiceles
voiced
s
[p] [b]

[t] [d]

[k] [ɡ]

[f] [v]

[θ] [ð]

[s] [z]

[ʃ] [ʒ]

[tʃ] [dʒ]

The other sounds of English do not come in voiced/voiceless pairs. [h] is voicess, and has no
voiced counterpart. The other English consonants are all voiced: [ɹ], [l], [w], [j], [m], [n], and [ŋ].
This does not mean that it is physically impossible to say a sound that is exactly like, for
example, an [n] except without vocal fold vibration. It is simply that English has chosen not to
use such sounds in its set of distinctive sounds. (It is possible even in English for one of these
sounds to become voiceless under the influence of its neighbours, but this will never change the
meaning of the word.)
 

Manners of articulation

Stops:

A stop consonant completely cuts off the airflow through the mouth. In the consonants [t], [d],
and [n], the tongue tip touches the alveolar ridge and cuts off the airflow at that point.
In [t]and [d], this means that there is no airflow at all for the duration of the stop. In [n], there is
no airflow through the mouth, but there is still airflow through the nose. We distinguish between

 nasal stops, like [n], which involve airflow through the nose, and
 oral stops, like [t] and [d], which do not.

Nasal stops are often simply called nasals. Oral stops are often called plosives. Oral stops can be
either voiced or voiceless. Nasal stops are almost always voiced. (It is physically possible to
produce a voiceless nasal stop, but English, like most languages, does not use such sounds.)

Fricatives:

In the stop [t], the tongue tip touches the alveolar ridge and cuts off the airflow. In [s], the tongue
tip approaches the alveolar ridge but doesn't quite touch it. There is still enough of an opening
for airflow to continue, but the opening is narrow enough that it causes the escaping air to
become turbulent (hence the hissing sound of the [s]). In a fricative consonant, the articulators
involved in the constriction approach get close enough to each other to create a turbluent
airstream. The fricatives of English are [f], [v], [θ], [ð], [s], [z], [ʃ], and [ʒ].

Approximants:

In an approximant, the articulators involved in the constriction are further apart still than they are
for a fricative. The articulators are still closer to each other than when the vocal tract is in its
neutral position, but they are not even close enough to cause the air passing between them to
become turbulent. The approximants of English are [w], [j], [ɹ], and [l].
Affricates:
An affricate is a single sound composed of a stop portion and a fricative portion. In English [tʃ],
the airflow is first interuppted by a stop which is very similar to [t] (though made a bit further
back). But instead of finishing the articulation quickly and moving directly into the next sound,
the tongue pulls away from the stop slowly, so that there is a period of time immediately after the
stop where the constriction is narrow enough to cause a turbulent airstream. In [tʃ], the period of
turbulent airstream following the stop portion is the same as the fricative [ʃ]. English [dʒ] is an
affricate like [tʃ], but voiced.

Laterals:

Pay attention to what you are doing with your tongue when you say the first consonant
of [lif] leaf. Your tongue tip is touching your alveolar ridge (or perhaps your upper teeth), but
this doesn't make [l] a stop. Air is still flowing during an [l] because the side of your tongue has
dropped down and left an opening. (Some people drop down the right side of their tongue during
an [l]; others drop down the left; a few drop down both sides.) Sounds which involve airflow
around the side of the tongue are called laterals. Sounds which are not lateral are called central.

[l] is the only lateral in English. The other sounds of Englihs, like most of the sounds of the
world's languages, are central.

More specifically, [l] is a lateral approximant. The opening left at the side of the tongue is wide
enough that the air flowing through does not become turbulent.

Places of articulation:

The place of articulation (or POA) of a consonant specifies where in the vocal tract the
narrowing occurs. From front to back, the POAs that English uses are:

Bilabial:

In a bilabial consonant, the lower and upper lips approach or touch

each other. English [p], [b], and [m] are bilabial stops.

The diagram to the right shows the state of the vocal tract during a
typical [p] or [b]. (An [m] would look the same, but with the velum
lowered to let out through the nasal passages.)

The sound [w] involves two constrictions of the vocal tract made

simultaneously. One of them is lip rounding, which you can think of
as a bilabial approximant.

Labiodental:

In a labiodental consonant, the lower lip approaches or touches the

upper teeth. English [f] and [v] are bilabial fricatives.

The diagram to the right shows the state of the vocal tract during a
typical [f] or [v]. 
Dental:

In a dental consonant, the tip or blade of the tongue approaches or

touches the upper teeth. English [θ] and [ð] are dental fricatives.
There are actually a couple of different ways of forming these
sounds:

 The tongue tip can approach the back of the upper teeth, but
not press against them so hard that the airflow is completely
blocked.
 The blade of the tongue can touch the bottom of the upper teeth, with the tongue tip
protruding between the teeth -- still leaving enough space for a turbulent airstream to
escape. This kind of [θ] and [ð] is often called interdental.

The diagram to the right shows a typical interdental [θ] or [ð].

Alveolar:

In an alveolar consonant, the tongue tip (or less often the tongue
blade) approaches or touches the alveolar ridge, the ridge
immediately behind the upper teeth. The English stops [t], [d],
and [n] are formed by completely blocking the airflow at this place of
articulation. The fricatives [s] and [z] are also at this place of
articulation, as is the lateral approximant [l].

The diagram to the right shows the state of the vocal tract during
plosive [t] or [d]. 
Postalveolar:

In a postalveolar consonant, the constriction is made immediately

behind the alveolar ridge. The constriction can be made with either
the tip or the blade of the tongue. The English
fricatives [ʃ] and [ʒ] are made at this POA, as are the corresponding
affricates [tʃ] and [dʒ].

The diagram to the right shows the state of the vocal tract during the
first half (the stop half) of an affricate [tʃ] or [dʒ].

Retroflex:
In a retroflex consonant, the tongue tip is curled backward in the
mouth. English [ɹ] is a retroflex approximant -- the tongue tip is
curled up toward the postalveolar region (the area immediately
behind the alveolar ridge).

The diagram to the right shows a typical English retroflex [ɹ].

Both the sounds we've called "postalveolar" and the sounds we've
called "retroflex" involve the region behind the alveolar ridge. In fact,
at least for English, you can think of retroflexes as being a sub-type of postalveolars, specifically,
the type of postalveolars that you make by curling your tongue tip backward.

(In fact, the retroflexes and other postalveolars sound so similar that you can usually use either
one in English without any noticeable effect on your accent. A substantial minority North
American English speakers don't use a retroflex [ɹ], but rather a "bunched" R -- sort of like a
tongue-blade [ʒ] with an even wider opening. Similarly, a few people use a curled-up tongue tip
rather than their tongue blades in making [ʃ] and [ʒ].

Palatal:

In a palatal consonant, the body of the tongue approaches or touches the hard palate.
English [j] is a palatal approximant -- the tongue body approaches the hard palate, but closely
enough to create turbulence in the airstream.

Velar:

In a velar consonant, the body of the tongue approaches or touches

the soft palate, or velum. English [k], [ɡ], and [ŋ] are stops made at
this POA. The [x] sound made at the end of the German
name Bach or the Scottish word loch is the voiceless fricative made
at the velar POA.

The diagram to the right shows a typical [k] or [ɡ] -- though where

exactly on the velum the tongue body hits will vary a lot depending
on the surrounding vowels.

As we have seen, one of the two constrictions that form a [w] is a bilabial approximant. The
other is a velar approximant: the tongue body approaches the soft palate, but does not get even as
close as it does in an [x].

Glottal:
The glottis is the opening between the vocal folds. In an [h], this opening is narrow enough to
create some turbulence in the airstream flowing past the vocal folds. For this reason, [h] is often
classified as a glottal fricative.

 Summary of English consonants:

[p] voiceless Bilabial Plosive

[b] voiced Bilabial Plosive
[t] voiceless Alveolar Plosive
[d] voiced Alveolar Plosive
[k] voiceless Velar Plosive
[ɡ] voiced Velar Plosive
[tʃ] voiceless postalveolar Affricate
[dʒ] voiced postalveolar Affricate
[m] voiced Bilabial Nasal
[n] voiced Alveolar Nasal
[ŋ] voiced Velar Nasal
[f] voiceless Labiodentals Fricative
[v] voiced Labiodentals Fricative
[θ] voiceless Dental Fricative
[ð] voiced Dental Fricative
[s] voiceless Alveolar Fricative
[z] voiced Alveolar Fricative
[ʃ] voiceless postalveolar fricative
[ʒ] voiced postalveolar fricative
[ɹ] voiced Retroflex approximant
[j] voiced Palatal approximant
[w] voiced labial + velar approximant
[l] voiced Alveolar lateral approximant
[h] voiceless Glottal fricative

 Consonant charts:

It is often useful to display the consonants of a language in the form of a chart. There is a
conventional way of doing so:
  Columns show places of articulation, arranged (roughly) from the front of the vocal tract
to the back.
 Rows show manners of articulation.
 Within each cell, the symbol for a voiceless sound is shown toward the left of the cell and
the symbol for a voiced sound toward the right.

Chart for English consonants

bilabial labiodental dental alveolar postalveolar retroflex palatal velar glottal

plosive p b     t d       k ɡ  
nasal   m       n         ŋ  
fricative   f v θ ð s z ʃ ʒ       h  

approximant   (w)           ɹ   j   (w)  

lateral
        l          
approximant
affricate         tʃ dʒ