Some languages have the voiced pre-velar plosive,[1] which is articulated slightly more front compared with the place of articulation of the prototypical velar plosive, though not as front as the prototypical palatal plosive.
Conversely, some languages have the voiced post-velar plosive,[2] which is articulated slightly behind the place of articulation of the prototypical velar plosive, though not as back as the prototypical uvular plosive.
IPA symbol
The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ⟨ɡ⟩, and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is g. Strictly, the IPA symbol is the so-called single-storey G , but the double-storey G is considered an acceptable alternative. The Unicode character U+0067gLATIN SMALL LETTER G renders as either a single-storey G or a double-storey G depending on font; the character U+0261ɡLATIN SMALL LETTER SCRIPT G is always a single-storey G, but it is generally available only in fonts supporting the IPA ExtensionsUnicode character block.
Features
Features of the voiced velar stop:
Its manner of articulation is occlusive, which means it is produced by obstructing airflow in the vocal tract. Since the consonant is also oral, with no nasal outlet, the airflow is blocked entirely, and the consonant is a plosive.
Of the six stops that would be expected from the most common pattern worldwide—that is, three places of articulation plus voicing ([pb,td,kɡ])—[p] and [ɡ] are the most frequently missing, being absent in about 10% of languages that otherwise have this pattern. Absent stop [p] is an areal feature (see also Voiceless bilabial stop). Missing [ɡ], (when the language uses voicing to contrast stops) on the other hand, is widely scattered around the world, for example /ɡ/ is not a native phoneme of Belarusian, Dutch, Czech, or Slovak and occurs only in borrowed words in those languages. A few languages, such as Modern Standard Arabic and part of the Levantine dialects (e.g. Lebanese and Syrian), are missing both, although most Modern Arabic dialects have /ɡ/ in their native phonemic systems as a reflex of ⟨ق⟩ or less commonly of ⟨ج⟩.
It seems that [ɡ] is somewhat more difficult to articulate than the other basic stops. Ian Maddieson speculates that this may be due to a physical difficulty in voicing velars: Voicing requires that air flow into the mouth cavity, and the relatively small space allowed by the position of velar consonants means that it will fill up with air quickly, making voicing difficult to maintain in [ɡ] for as long as it is in [d] or [b]. This could have two effects: [ɡ] and [k] might become confused, and the distinction is lost, or perhaps a [ɡ] never develops when a language first starts making voicing distinctions. With uvulars, where there is even less space between the glottis and tongue for airflow, the imbalance is more extreme: Voiced [ɢ] is much rarer than voiceless [q].[3]
[g] is represented by letter G when followed by vowels [a], [o] [u], while when in front of vowels [i], [e] and [ɛ], the pronunciation changes to d͡ʒ, for the phoneme [g] to appear on the vowels [i], [e] and [ɛ], the GH digraph is used.
^Instead of "pre-velar", it can be called "advanced velar", "fronted velar", "front-velar", "palato-velar", "post-palatal", "retracted palatal" or "backed palatal".
^Instead of "post-velar", it can be called "retracted velar", "backed velar", "pre-uvular", "advanced uvular" or "fronted uvular".
Abrahams, Henrik (1949), Études phonétiques sur les tendances évolutives des occlusives germaniques, Aarhus University Press
Carbonell, Joan F.; Llisterri, Joaquim (1992), "Catalan", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 22 (1–2): 53–56, doi:10.1017/S0025100300004618, S2CID249411809
Dum-Tragut, Jasmine (2009), Armenian: Modern Eastern Armenian, Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company
Fischer-Jørgensen, Eli (1952), "Om stemtheds assimilation", in Bach, H.; et al. (eds.), Festskrift til L. L. Hammerich, Copenhagen: G. E. C. Gad, pp. 116–129
Gilles, Peter; Trouvain, Jürgen (2013), "Luxembourgish", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 43 (1): 67–74, doi:10.1017/S0025100312000278
Goblirsch, Kurt (2018), Gemination, Lenition, and Vowel Lengthening: On the History of Quantity in Germanic, Cambridge University Press, ISBN978-1-107-03450-1
Martínez-Celdrán, Eugenio; Fernández-Planas, Ana Ma.; Carrera-Sabaté, Josefina (2003), "Castilian Spanish", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 33 (2): 255–259, doi:10.1017/S0025100303001373
Okada, Hideo (1999), "Japanese", in International Phonetic Association (ed.), Handbook of the International Phonetic Association: A Guide to the Use of the International Phonetic Alphabet, Cambridge University Press, pp. 117–119, ISBN978-0-521-63751-0
Padgett, Jaye (2003), "Contrast and Post-Velar Fronting in Russian", Natural Language & Linguistic Theory, 21 (1): 39–87, doi:10.1023/A:1021879906505, S2CID13470826
Puggaard-Rode, Rasmus; Horslund, Camilla Søballe; Jørgensen, Henrik (2022), "The rarity of intervocalic voicing of stops in Danish spontaneous speech", Laboratory Phonology, 13 (1), doi:10.16995/labphon.6449, hdl:1887/3304670
Rogers, Derek; d'Arcangeli, Luciana (2004), "Italian", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 34 (1): 117–121, doi:10.1017/S0025100304001628
Watson, Janet (2002), The Phonology and Morphology of Arabic, New York: Oxford University Press
Landau, Ernestina; Lončarića, Mijo; Horga, Damir; Škarić, Ivo (1999), "Croatian", Handbook of the International Phonetic Association: A guide to the use of the International Phonetic Alphabet, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 66–69, ISBN978-0-521-65236-0
