A voiced palatal approximant is a type of consonant used in many spoken languages. It is familiar to English-speakers as the "y" sound in "young".

The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ; the equivalent symbol in the Americanist phonetic notation is . If it is necessary to avoid the implication that the approximant is spread as its vocalic equivalent is, it may instead be transcribed or (or , which is now dated). When this sound occurs in the form of a palatal glide it is frequently, but not exclusively, denoted as a superscript j in IPA.

This sound is traditionally called a yod, after its name in Hebrew. This is reflected in the names of certain phonological changes, such as yod-dropping and yod-coalescence.

A palatal approximant is often the semivocalic equivalent of a close front unrounded vowel . They alternate with each other in certain languages, such as French, and in the diphthongs of some languages as and , with the non-syllabic diacritic used in some phonetic transcription systems to represent the same sound.

Phonetic ambiguity and transcription usage

Some languages, however, have a palatal approximant that is unspecified for rounding and so cannot be considered the semivocalic equivalent of either or its rounded counterpart, , which would normally correspond to . An example is Spanish, which distinguishes two palatal approximants: a semivowel approximant , which is always unrounded (and is a phonological vowel - an allophone of ), and a spirant approximant unspecified for rounding, (which is a phonological consonant). Eugenio Martínez Celdrán describes the difference between them as follows (with audio examples added):

Celdrán also considers that "the IPA shows a lack of precision in the treatment it gives to approximants, if we take into account our understanding of the phonetics of Spanish. and are two different segments, but they have to be labelled as voiced palatal approximant consonants. I think that the former is a real consonant, whereas the latter is a semi-consonant, as it has traditionally been called in Spanish, or a semi-vowel, if preferred. The IPA, though, classifies it as a consonant."

There is a parallel problem with transcribing voiced velar approximants.

In the writing systems used for most languages of Central, Northern, and Eastern Europe, the letter j denotes a palatal approximant, as in German 'year', which is followed by IPA. Although it may be seen as counterintuitive for English-speakers, there are a few words with that orthographical spelling in certain loanwords in English like Hebrew "hallelujah" and German "Jägermeister".

In grammars of Ancient Greek, a palatal approximant, which was lost early in the history of Greek, is sometimes written as , an iota with the inverted breve below, which is the nonsyllabic diacritic or marker of a semivowel.

Features Features of a voiced palatal approximant:

The most common type of this approximant is glide or semivowel. The term glide emphasizes the characteristic of movement (or 'glide') of from the vowel position to a following vowel position. The term semivowel emphasizes that, although the sound is vocalic in nature, it is not 'syllabic' (it does not form the nucleus of a syllable). For a description of the spirant approximant variant used e.g. in Spanish, see . The otherwise identical post-palatal variant is articulated slightly behind the hard palate, making it sound slightly closer to the velar .

Occurrence

Palatal Language Word IPA Meaning Notes Adyghe / 'dirt' Afrikaans 'yes' See Afrikaans phonology Arabic Standard / 'day' See Arabic phonology Aragonese 'falls' Unspecified for rounding approximant consonant; the language also features an unrounded palatal approximant semivowel (which may replace before ). Armenian Eastern / 'fat' Assamese / 'humanity' Assyrian / 'sea' Azerbaijani 'dream' Basque 'yes' Bengali / 'eye' A phonetic merger of the non-syllabic front vowels /i̯ e̯/. See Bengali phonologyBreton'porridge' Bulgarian / 'mother' See Bulgarian phonology Catalan Most dialects 'berries' See Catalan phonology Some dialects 'I' Chechen / 'six' Chinese Cantonese / 'day' See Cantonese phonology Mandarin () / 'duck' See Mandarin phonologyChuvash / 'tree' Czech 'is' See Czech phonology Danish 'I' See Danish phonology Dutch Standard 'yes' Frequently realized as a fricative , especially in emphatic speech. See Dutch phonology English you 'you' See English phonology Esperanto 'year' See Esperanto phonology Estonian 'leg' See Estonian phonology Finnish 'leg' See Finnish phonology French 'eyes' See French phonology German Standard 'jacket' Also described as a fricative and a sound variable between a fricative and an approximant. See Standard German phonology Greek Ancient Greek / 's/he shall come' See Ancient Greek phonology Hebrew / 'kid' See Modern Hebrew phonology Hindustani / / 'vehicle' See Hindustani phonology Hungarian 'game' See Hungarian phonology Irish 'would cut' See Irish phonology Ingush / 'grain' See Ingush phonology Italian 'ion' See Italian phonology Jalapa Mazatec Contrasts voiceless , plain voiced and glottalized voiced approximants. Japanese / 'to bake' See Japanese phonology Kabardian / 'game' Kazakh / 'so' Khmer / 'to cry' See Khmer phonology Korean / 'six' See Korean phonology Latin 'to throw' See Latin spelling and pronunciation Lithuanian 'she' Also described as a fricative . See Lithuanian phonology Macedonian / 'end' See Macedonian phonology Malay 'love' Malayalamപായ/paya'mat'See Malayalam phonology Maltese 'he eats' Mapudungun 'six' May be a fricative instead. Marathi / 'success' Nepali / 'season' See Nepali phonology Norwegian Urban East 'to give' May be a fricative instead. See Norwegian phonology Odia / 'time' Persian / 'Yazd' See Persian phonology Polish 'tomorrow' See Polish phonology PortugueseDelta: Documentation of studies on theoric and applied Linguistics – Problems in the tense variant of carioca speech . 'buoy', 'float' Allophone of both and ,The acoustic-articulatory path of the lateral palatal consonant's allophony. Pages 223 and 228. as well as a very common epenthetic sound before coda sibilants in some dialects. See Portuguese phonology Punjabi / 'friend' Romanian 'again' See Romanian phonology Russian / 'pit' See Russian phonology Serbo-Croatian / 'South' See Serbo-Croatian phonology Slovak 'to eat' See Slovak phonologySlovene 'I' Solos 'up' See Alphabet section in Solos language Spanish Standard 'yesterday' Unspecified for rounding approximant consonant; the language also features an unrounded palatal approximant semivowel. Contrast with . See Spanish phonology 'earth' Rioplatense 'ice' Swedish 'I' May be realized as a palatal fricative instead. See Swedish phonology Tagalog 'sparrow' Tamil 'elephant' See Tamil phonology Telugu / 'agony' Turkish 'way' See Turkish phonology Turkmen 'silk' Ubykh / 'you did it' See Ubykh phonology Ukrainian / 'hedgehog' See Ukrainian phonology Vietnamese Southern dialects 'cinnamon' Corresponds to northern . See Vietnamese phonology Washo 'leaf' Contrasts voiceless and voiced approximants. Welsh 'language' See Welsh phonology West Frisian 'coat' See West Frisian phonology Zapotec Tilquiapan 'neck'

Post-palatal

There is also a post-palatal or pre-velar approximant in some languages, which is articulated more back than the place of articulation of the prototypical palatal approximant but less far back than the prototypical velar approximant. It can be considered the semivocalic equivalent of the close central unrounded vowel . The International Phonetic Alphabet does not have a separate symbol for that sound, but it can be transcribed as , (a retracted ), or (an advanced ). Other possible transcriptions include (a centralized ), (a centralized ), and (a non-syllabic ). The para-IPA symbol (a barred ) may also be used to represent this approximant.L2/24-171: Miscellaneous historical and para-IPA modifier letters

Language Word IPA Meaning Notes Spanish 'to follow' Lenited allophone of before front vowels; typically transcribed in IPA with . See Spanish phonology Turkish Standard prescriptive 'wedding' Either post-palatal or palatal; phonetic realization of (also transcribed as ) before front vowels. See Turkish phonology

Nasal

A nasalized voiced palatal approximant is a type of consonantal sound used in some oral languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is .

, written , is a common realization of before nasal vowels in many languages of West Africa that do not have a phonemic distinction between voiced nasal and oral stops, such as Yoruba, Ewe and Bini languages.

Language Word IPA Meaning Notes Nheengatu 'to speak' Influenced Brazilian Portuguese sound. Sometimes written with Hindustani / 'patience' Allophone of before . See Hindustani phonology Kaingang 'brave' Possible word-initial realization of before a nasal vowel. Lombard 'need for (something)' Allophone of before a consonant. See Lombard phonology Louisiana Creole sinñin 'bleed' Intervocalic allophone of Marathi / saṁyukta'united'Realisation of anuswara (ṁ) preceding य (y). See Marathi phonology Polish 'state, country' Allophone of before fricatives. See Polish phonology Portuguese Brazilian 'dream' Allophone of between vowels, nasalizes the preceding vowel. Language's original sound.Portuguese vinho: diachronic evidence for biphonemic nasal vowels See Portuguese phonology Most dialects 'dogs' Allophone of after nasal vowels. Some dialects 'love me!' Non-syllabic allophone of between nasal sounds. Shipibo Allophone of after nasal vowels. Spanish Zwolle-Ebarb 'year' Allophone of between vowels, nasalizing the preceding vowel. Other dialects, occasional in rapid, unguarded speech 'kids' Allophone of . Because nasality is retained and there is no potential merger with any other Spanish phonemes, this process is rarely noticed, and its geographical distribution has never been determined. Sakha 'sin, transgression' is not distinguished from in the orthography.

See also Palatal lateral approximant Index of phonetics articles

Notes

References

External links