Retroflex clicks

Retroflex click
(plain)
ǃ˞
ǃǁ
Voiced retroflex click
ǃ̬˞
ᶢǃˡ
‼̬
ᶢ‼
Retroflex nasal click
ǃ̃˞
ᵑǃ˞
‼̃
ᵑ‼

The retroflex clicks are a family of click consonants known only from the Central !Kung dialects of Namibia and the Damin ritual jargon of Australia. They may be sub-apical retroflex and should not be confused with the more widespread postalveolar clicks, which are sometimes called retroflex.

There is no symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents the forward articulation of these sounds, but one may be derived with a rhotic diacritic from the alveolar click: ǃ˞. In the literature they are typically written with the ad hoc digraph , the convention since Doke first described them in 1926. (Doke's proposed symbol, resembling ψ (or more precisely an inverted , descender only), did not catch on. A triple pipe, , may have been used by other authors for the same thing.) They then went largely unnoticed until ca. 2005.

(For Damin, the retroflex nasal click, which may or may not be similar to the clicks of Central !Kung, was transcribed with the Kirschenbaum convention, n.!.)

Miller (2009) notes that the Grootfontein retroflex clicks have a lateral release, and alternatively transcribes them ǃǁ.[1] Whereas the alveolar and alveolar lateral clicks are apical, these are laminal and postalveolar; where the others are powered by tongue-root retraction, these are powered by lowering the center of the tongue (Miller 2009). They obey the back-vowel constraint common among retroflex consonants. (Neither characteristic is likely to have applied to Damin.)

Basic retroflex clicks are:

Trans. I Trans. II Description
tenuis retroflex click
‼ʰ aspirated retroflex click
‼̬ ᶢ‼ voiced retroflex click
‼̃ ᵑ‼ retroflex nasal click
‼̥̃ʰ ᵑ̊‼ʰ aspirated retroflex nasal click
‼̃ˀ ᵑ‼ˀ glottalized retroflex nasal click

Features

Features of postalveolar clicks:

Occurrence

As with other click articulations, retroflex clicks may be produced with various manners. An example is the voiced retroflex click in the Grootfontein !Kung (Central Juu) word for 'water', /ǃ̬˞ˡú/ (g‼ú).

Damin is the only other language known to have had such a sound, though only the nasal click occurred.

A retroflex series claimed for Ekoka !Kung turns out to be domed palatal clicks.

References

  1. The standard IPA diacritic for lateral release, ǃˡ, would presumably also work.

See also

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 4/18/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.