Please help improve this article by introducing appropriate citations of additional sources. (August 2008)
| Phonation |
|---|
| Glottal states (from open to closed) |
| voiceless (full airstream) |
| breathy voice (murmur) |
| slack voice |
| modal voice (maximum vibration) |
| stiff voice |
| creaky voice (restricted airstream) |
| glottalized (blocked airstream) |
| Supra-glottal phonation |
| faucalized voice ("hollow") |
| harsh voice ("pressed") |
| strident (harsh trilled) |
| Non-phonemic phonation |
| whisper |
| falsetto |
|
|
This article or section relies largely or entirely upon a single source. Please help improve this article by introducing appropriate citations of additional sources. (August 2008) |
The term slack voice (or lax voice) describes the pronunciation of consonants with a glottal opening slightly wider than that occurring in modal voice. Such sounds are often referred to informally as lenis or half-voiced. In some Chinese languages, such as Wu, and in many Austronesian languages, the 'intermediate' phonation of slack stops confuses listeners of languages without these distinctions, so that different transcription systems may use /p/ or /b/ for the same consonant. Although the IPA has no dedicated diacritic for slack voice, the voiceless diacritic (the under-ring) may be used with a voiced consonant letter.[1]
The Shanghainese "muddy" consonants are slack voice, the primary effect of which is a slightly breathy quality of the following vowel [1]
| Shanghainese | form | translation | form | translation | form | translation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| slack voice | [b̥ʌ̌ʔ] | white | [d̥ǐ] | earth | [ɡ̊ə̀ʔ] | (possessive particle) |
| tenuis | [pʌ́ʔ] | hundred | [tíʔ] | (a grammatical particle) | [kóʔ] | corner |
| aspirated | [pʰóʔ] | to strike | [tʰí] | heaven | [kʰʌ́ʔ] | competence |
Javanese contrasts slack and stiff voiced bilabial, dental, retroflex, and velar stops [1]
| phonation | IPA | trans. | IPA | trans. | IPA | translation | IPA | trans. | IPA | trans. |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| stiff voice | [b̬aku] | nail | [d̬amu] | guest | [d̬z̬ariʔ] | sheet (of paper) | [ɖ̬iɖ̬iʔ] | little | [ɡ̌ali] | river |
| slack voice | [b̥aku] | standard | [d̥amu] | blow | [d̥z̥arit] | (type of women's clothing) | [ɖ̥isiʔ] | first | [ɡ̊ali] | to dig |