Editing Glottal consonant

{{Short description|Place of articulation}}
{{Distinguish|glottalic consonant|laryngeal consonant}}
{{Multiple issues|
{{More footnotes|date=July 2019}}
{{One source|date=July 2019}}
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'''Glottal consonants''' are [[consonant]]s using the [[glottis]] as their primary [[place of articulation|articulation]]. Many phoneticians consider them, or at least the glottal fricative, to be transitional states of the glottis without a point of articulation as other consonants have, while some{{who|date=July 2019}} do not consider them to be consonants at all. However, glottal consonants behave as typical consonants in many languages. For example, in [[Modern Standard Arabic|Literary Arabic]], most words are formed from a root ''C-C-C'' consisting of three consonants, which are inserted into templates such as {{IPA|/CaːCiC/}} or {{IPA|/maCCuːC/}}. The glottal consonants {{IPA|/h/}} and {{IPA|/ʔ/}} can occupy any of the three root consonant slots, just like "normal" consonants such as {{IPA|/k/}} or {{IPA|/n/}}.

The glottal consonants in the [[International Phonetic Alphabet]] are as follows:

{| class=wikitable
|-
! rowspan="2" | IPA
! rowspan="2" | Description
! colspan="4" | Example
|-
! <small>Language</small>
! <small>Orthography</small>
! <small>IPA</small>
! <small>Meaning</small>
|-
! <big>{{IPA|ʔ}}</big>
| [[glottal stop]]
| [[Hawaiian language|Hawaiian]]
| {{lang|haw|Hawai'''ʻ'''i}}
| {{IPA|[həˈvɐjʔi, həˈwɐjʔi]}}
| [[Hawaii]]
|-
! <big>{{IPA|ɦ}}</big>
| [[voiced glottal fricative|voiced glottal fricative]]
| [[Czech language|Czech]]
| {{lang|cs|Pra'''h'''a}}
| {{IPA|[ˈpra.ɦa]}}
| [[Prague]]
|-
! <big>{{IPA|h}}</big>
| [[voiceless glottal fricative]]
| [[English language|English]]
| '''h'''at
| {{IPA|[ˈhæt]}}
| [[hat]]
|-
! <big>{{IPA|ʔ͜h}}</big>
| [[voiceless glottal affricate]]
| [[Southwestern_Mandarin|Yuxi dialect]]
| {{lang|cmn-Hani|[[Chinese characters|可]]}}
| {{IPA|[ʔ͜ho˥˧]}}
| 'can, may'
|-
! <big>{{IPA|ʔ̞}}</big>
| [[creaky-voiced glottal approximant]]
| [[Gimi language|Gimi]]
| ha'''g'''ok
| {{IPA|[haʔ̞oʔ]}}
| 'many'
|}

==Characteristics==
In many languages, the "fricatives" are not true [[Fricative consonant|fricatives]]. This is a historical usage of the word. They instead represent transitional states of the glottis ([[phonation]]) without a specific place of articulation, and may behave as [[approximant]]s. {{IPA|[h]}} is a voiceless transition. {{IPA|[ɦ]}} is a [[breathy voice|breathy-voiced]] transition, and could be transcribed as {{IPA|[h̤]}}. [[Peve language|Lamé]] is one of very few languages that [[Contrast (linguistics)|contrasts]] voiceless and voiced glottal fricatives.<ref name="gr125">{{Harvcoltxt|Grønnum|2005|p=125}}</ref>

The [[glottal stop]] occurs in many languages. Often all vocalic onsets are preceded by a glottal stop, for example in [[German language|German]] (in careful pronunciation; often omitted in practice). The [[Hawaiian language]] writes the glottal stop as the [[‘okina]] '''‘''', which resembles a single open quotation mark. Some alphabets use [[diacritic]]s for the glottal stop, such as [[hamza]] <span style="font-size:140%">{{angle bracket|{{lang|ar|ء}}}}</span> in the [[Arabic alphabet]]; in many languages of [[Mesoamerica]], the Latin letter {{angle bracket|h}} is used for glottal stop, in [[Maltese language|Maltese]], the letter {{angle bracket|q}} is used, and in many [[Languages of the Caucasus|indigenous languages of the Caucasus]], the letter commonly referred to as [[Heng (letter)|heng]] {{angle bracket|Ꜧ ꜧ}} is used.{{cn|date=July 2020}}

Because the glottis is necessarily closed for the glottal stop, it cannot be voiced. So-called voiced glottal stops are not full stops, but rather [[creaky voiced glottal approximant]]s that may be transcribed {{IPA|[ʔ̞]}}. They occur as the intervocalic allophone of glottal stop in many languages. [[Gimi language|Gimi]] contrasts {{IPA|/ʔ/}} and {{IPA|/ʔ̞/}}, corresponding to {{IPA|/k/}} and {{IPA|/ɡ/}} in related languages.

==See also==
* [[Glottalic consonant]]
* [[Glottalization]]
* [[Place of articulation]]
* [[Index of phonetics articles]]
* [[Guttural]]

==References==
{{Reflist}}
* {{citation |last=Grønnum |first=Nina |year=2005 |title=Fonetik og fonologi, Almen og Dansk |edition=3rd |publisher=Akademisk Forlag |place=Copenhagen |isbn=87-500-3865-6 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9RtCAgAAQBAJ}}
* {{cite book|author-link=Peter Ladefoged|last=Ladefoged|first=Peter|author-link2=Ian Maddieson|last2=Maddieson|first2=Ian|year=1996|title=The Sounds of the World's Languages|location=Oxford|publisher=Blackwell|isbn=0-631-19814-8}}

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[[Category:Place of articulation]]
[[Category:Glottal consonants| ]]