Voiced alveolar lateral affricate explained

The voiced alveolar lateral affricate is a type of consonantal sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet is (or ).

Features

Features of the voiced alveolar lateral affricate:

• Its manner of articulation is affricate, which means it is produced by stopping air flow entirely, followed by forcing it through a narrow channel, causing turbulence.
• Its place of articulation is alveolar, which means it is articulated with either the tip or the blade of the tongue against the alveolar ridge, termed respectively apical and laminal.
• Its phonation type is voiced, which means the vocal cords vibrate while making the sound.
• It is an oral consonant, which means air is allowed to escape through the mouth.
• It is a lateral consonant, which means it is produced by allowing the airstream to flow over the sides of the tongue, rather than the middle of the tongue.
• The airstream mechanism is pulmonic egressive, which means it is articulated by pushing air out of the lungs and through the vocal tract, rather than from the glottis or the mouth.

Occurrence

The voiced alveolar lateral affricate occurs in some languages of western North America, such as Haida and Tlingit. It is often spelled dl, though in the Zulu language, one of the few Old World languages with obstruent laterals, the digraph dl represents the ordinary fricative . There are few if any languages spoken outside North America and adjacent areas of Siberia which have lateral affricates, and certainly none which are widely spoken possess this sound.