Alveolar nasal

It has been suggested that voiceless alveolar nasal be merged into this article or section. (Discuss) Proposed since April 2012.

Alveolar nasal
n
Image
IPA number	116
Encoding
Entity (decimal)	n
Unicode (hex)	U+006E
X-SAMPA	n
Kirshenbaum	n
Sound
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The alveolar nasal is a type of consonantal sound used in numerous spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents dental, alveolar, and postalveolar nasals is ⟨n⟩, and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is n.

The vast majority of languages have either an alveolar or dental nasal. There are a few languages that lack either sound but have [m] (e.g., colloquial Samoan). There are some languages (e.g., Rotokas) that lack both [m] and [n].

Features

Features of the alveolar nasal:

• Its manner of articulation is occlusive, which means it is produced by obstructing airflow in the vocal tract. Since the consonant is also nasal, the blocked airflow is redirected through the nose.
• Its place of articulation is alveolar, which means it is articulated with either the tip or the blade of the tongue at the alveolar ridge, termed respectively apical and laminal.
• Its phonation is voiced, which means the vocal cords vibrate during the articulation.
• It is a nasal consonant, which means air is allowed to escape through the nose, either exclusively (nasal stops) or in addition to through the mouth.
• 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
Adyghe		нэфнэ	[nafnɛ]	'light'
Armenian		նուռ	[nur] (help·info)	'pomegranate'
Basque		ni	[ni]	'I'
Catalan[1]		nou	[ˈnɔw]	'new'	See Catalan phonology
Chinese	Mandarin	難/nán	[nan˧˥]	'difficult'	See Mandarin phonology
Czech		na	[na]	'on'	See Czech phonology
Dutch[2]		nacht	[nɑxt]	'night'	See Dutch phonology
English		nice	[naɪs]	'nice'	See English phonology
Finnish		annan	[ɑnːɑn]	'I give'	See Finnish phonology
Georgian[3]		კანი	[ˈkʼɑni]	'skin'
German		Lanze	[ˈlant͡sə]	'lance'	See German phonology
Greek		νάμα/náma	[ˈnama]	'communion wine'	See Modern Greek phonology
Gujarati		નહી	[nəhi]	'no'	See Gujarati phonology
Hawaiian[4]		naka	[naka]	'to shake'	See Hawaiian phonology
Hebrew		נבון	[navon]	'wise'	See Modern Hebrew phonology
Hindi-Urdu		नया/نیا	[nəjaː]	'new'	See Hindi–Urdu phonology
Hungarian		nagyi	[nɒɟi]	'grandma'	See Hungarian phonology
Italian[5]		nano	[ˈnano]	'dwarf'	See Italian phonology
Japanese[6]		反対/hantai	[hantai]	'opposite'	See Japanese phonology
Korean		나/na	[na]	'I'	See Korean phonology
Macedonian		нос	[nɔs]	'nose'	See Macedonian phonology
Malay		nasi	[nasi]	'cooked rice'
Malayalam[7]		കന്നി	[kənni]	'virgin'
Maltese		lenbuba	[lenbuˈba]	'truncheon'
Ngwe	Mmockngie dialect	[nøɣə̀]		'sun'
Norwegian		mann	[mɑnː]	'man'	See Norwegian phonology
Pirahã		gíxai	[níˈʔàì̯]	'you'
Slovak		na	[na]	'on'
Spanish[8]		nada	[ˈnað̞a]	'nothing'	See Spanish phonology
Tamil[9]		நாடு	[naːɽɯ]	'country'	See Tamil phonology
Turkish		neden	[ne̞d̪æn]	'reason'	See Turkish phonology
Vietnamese[10]		bạn đi	[ɓan˧ˀ˨ʔ ɗi]	'you're going'	Occurs only before alveolar consonants. See Vietnamese phonology
West Frisian		nekke	[nɛkə]	'neck'
Yi		ꆅ/na	[na˧ ]	'hurt'
Zapotec	Tilquiapan[11]	nanɨɨ	[nanɨˀɨ]	'lady'	contrasts with a fortis alveolar nasal that is not represented in the orthography.

See also

• List of phonetic topics
• Dental nasal

References

Bibliography

• Carbonell, Joan F.; Llisterri, Joaquim (1992), "Catalan", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 22 (1–2): 53–56, doi:10.1017/S0025100300004618 
• Cruz-Ferreira, Madalena (1995), "European Portuguese", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 25 (2): 90–94, doi:10.1017/S0025100300005223 
• Gussenhoven, Carlos (1992), "Dutch", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 22 (2): 45–47, doi:10.1017/S002510030000459X 
• Keane, Elinor (2004), "Tamil", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 34 (1): 111–116, doi:10.1017/S0025100304001549 
• Ladefoged, Peter (2005), Vowels and Consonants (Second ed.), Blackwell 
• 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 
• Merrill, Elizabeth (2008), "Tilquiapan Zapotec", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 38 (1): 107–114, doi:10.1017/S0025100308003344 
• Okada, Hideo (1991), "Phonetic Representation:Japanese", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 21 (2): 94–97, doi:10.1017/S002510030000445X 
• Rogers, Derek; d'Arcangeli, Luciana (2004), "Italian", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 34 (1): 117–121, doi:10.1017/S0025100304001628 
• Shosted, Ryan K.; Vakhtang, Chikovani (2006), "Standard Georgian", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 36 (2): 255–264, doi:10.1017/S0025100306002659 
• Thompson, Laurence (1959), "Saigon phonemics", Language 35 (3): 454–476, doi:10.2307/411232, JSTOR 411232 

v t e   International Phonetic Alphabet   IPA topics IPA International Phonetic Association History of the IPA Kiel convention (1989) Journal of the IPA (JIPA) Naming conventions Phonetics Diacritics* Segments Tone letter Place of articulation Manner of articulation Special topics Case variants of IPA letters Extensions to the IPA Obsolete and nonstandard symbols IPA chart for English dialects Encodings SAMPA X-SAMPA Conlang X-SAMPA Kirshenbaum TIPA Phonetic symbols in Unicode WorldBet   Consonants v t e IPA pulmonic consonants chartchart image • audio Place → Labial Coronal Dorsal Radical Glottal ↓ Manner Bila​bial Labio​dental Den​tal Alve​olar Post​alv. Retro​flex Pal​a​tal Ve​lar Uvu​lar Pha​ryn​geal Epi​glot​tal Glot​tal Nasal m̥ m ɱ n̪ n̥ n n̠ ɳ ɲ̥ ɲ ŋ̊ ŋ ɴ Plosive p b p̪ b̪ t̪ d̪ t d ʈ ɖ c ɟ k ɡ q ɢ ʡ ʔ Fricative ɸ β f v θ ð s z ʃ ʒ ʂ ʐ ç ʝ x ɣ χ ʁ ħ ʕ ʜ ʢ h ɦ Approximant ʋ ɹ ɻ j ɰ Trill ʙ r ɽ͡r ʀ я * Flap or tap ⱱ̟ ⱱ ɾ ɽ ɢ̆ ʡ̯ Lateral Fric. ɬ ɮ ɭ˔̊ ʎ̥˔ ʟ̝̊ ʟ̝ Lateral Appr. l ɭ ʎ ʟ Lateral flap ɺ ɺ̠ ʎ̯ Non-pulmonic consonants Clicks ʘ ǀ ǃ ǂ ǁ ʘ̃ ʘ̃ˀ ʘ͡q ʘ͡qʼ Implosives ɓ ɗ ʄ ᶑ ɠ ʛ Ejectives pʼ tʼ cʼ ʈʼ kʼ qʼ fʼ θʼ sʼ ɬʼ xʼ χʼ tsʼ tɬʼ cʎ̝̥ʼ tʃʼ ʈʂʼ kxʼ kʟ̝̊ʼ Affricates p̪f b̪v ts dz tʃ dʒ tɕ dʑ ʈʂ ɖʐ tɬ dɮ cç ɟʝ cʎ̥˔ kʟ̝̊ Co-articulated consonants Fricatives ɕ ʑ ɧ Approximants ʍ w ɥ ɫ Stops k͡p ɡ͡b ŋ͡m These tables contain phonetic symbols, which may not display correctly in some browsers. [Help] Where symbols appear in pairs, left—right represent the voiceless—voiced consonants. Shaded areas denote pulmonic articulations judged to be impossible. * Symbol not defined in IPA. Chart image Pulmonics Non-pulmonics Affricates Co-articulated   Vowels Front Near-​front Central Near-​back Back Close •iy •ɨʉ •ɯu •ɪʏ •ɪ̈ʊ̈ •ʊ •eø •ɘɵ •ɤo •e̞ø̞ ə •ɤ̞o̞ •ɛœ •ɜɞ •ʌɔ •æ ɐ •aɶ •ä •ɑɒ Near-close Close-mid Mid Open-mid Near-open Open Vowels: IPA help • chart •  chart with audio • view