A stop with no audible release, also known as an unreleased stop or an applosive, is a stop consonant with no release burst: no audible indication of the end of its occlusion (hold). In the International Phonetic Alphabet, lack of an audible release is denoted with an upper-right corner diacritic (U+031A◌̚COMBINING LEFT ANGLE ABOVE) after the consonant letter, as in: [p̚], [t̚], [k̚].[1]
Audibly released stops, on the other hand, are not normally indicated. If a final stop is aspirated, the aspiration diacritic ⟨◌ʰ⟩ is sufficient to indicate the release. Otherwise, the "unaspirated" diacritic of the Extended IPA may be employed for this: apt[ˈæp̚t˭].
In most dialects of English, the first stop of a cluster has no audible release, as in apt[ˈæp̚t], doctor[ˈdɒk̚tə], or logged on[ˌlɒɡ̚dˈɒn]. Although such sounds are frequently described as "unreleased", the reality is that since the two consonants overlap, the release of the former takes place during the hold of the latter, masking the former's release and making it inaudible.[2] That can lead to cross-articulations that seem very much like deletions or complete assimilation.
For example, hundred pounds may sound like [ˈhʌndɹɨbˈpʰaundz] but X-ray[3] and electropalatographic[4] studies demonstrate that since inaudible and possibly-weakened contacts may still be made, the second /d/ in hundred pounds does not entirely assimilate a labial place of articulation but co-occurs with it.
In American English, a word-final stop is typically unreleased; that is especially the case for /t/,[5] but in that position, it is also analyzed as experiencing glottal reinforcement.
Such sounds may occur between vowels, as in some pronunciations of out a lot. The overlap there appears to be with a glottal stop, [t̚ʔ]: the /t/ is pronounced, and since it is between vowels, it must be released. However, its release is masked by the glottal stop.[6] The term for this is t-glottalization.
The term "unreleased" is also used for a stop before a homorganicnasal, as in catnip. In such cases, however, the stop is released as a nasal in a nasal release and so it would be more precisely transcribed [ˈkætⁿnɪp].
Other languages
In most languages in East and Southeast Asia with final stops, such as Cantonese,[7]Hokkien,[8]Korean,[9]Malay,[10]Thai,[11] and West Coast Bajau,[12] the stops are not audibly released: mak[mak̚]. That is true even between vowels. That is thought to be caused by an overlapping glottal stop[6] and is more precisely transcribed [mak̚ʔ]. A consequence of an inaudible release is that any aspirated–unaspirated distinction is neutralized. Some languages, such as Vietnamese,[citation needed] which are reported to have unreleased final stops, turn out to have short voiceless nasal releases instead. The excess pressure is released (voicelessly) through the nose and so there is no audible release to the stop.
Formosan languages
The Formosan languages of Taiwan, such as Tsou and Amis realize all obstruents as released but not aspirated, as in Tsou [ˈsip˹tɨ] "four" and [smuˈjuʔ˹tsu] "to pierce", or Amis [tsᵊtsaj] "one" and [sᵊpat˹] "four".[citation needed] (The symbol for a release burst, ⟨˹⟩, is acknowledged but not supported by the IPA.[13])
In Pirahã, the only surviving dialect of the Mura language, there is a special register of speech using solely humming, which does not involve an audible release and may be transcribed as [m̚] of different length and tone.[15]
↑ The diacritic may not display properly with some fonts, appearing above the consonant rather than after it; in such cases, U+02FA◌˺MODIFIER LETTER END HIGH TONE, ⟨p˺⟩, may be used instead.
↑ Miller, Mark T. (2007). A Grammar of West Coast Bajau (Ph.D. thesis). University of Texas at Arlington. pp.31–32. hdl:10106/577.
↑ International Phonetic Association (1999). Handbook of the International Phonetic Association: A Guide to the Use of the International Phonetic Alphabet. Cambridge University Press. p.173.
↑ Page 27, A Grammar of RGyalrong, Jiǎomùzú (Kyom-kyo) Dialects: A Web of Relations Marielle Prins 2016, 9789004324565
Browman, Catherine P.; Goldstein, Louis (1990), "Tiers in articulatory phonology, with some implications for casual speech", in Kingston, John C.; Beckman, Mary E. (eds.), Papers in laboratory phonology I: Between the grammar and physics of speech, New York: Cambridge University Press, pp.341–376
Choo, Miho; O'Grady, William D. (2003), The Sounds of Korean: A Pronunciation Guide, Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press
Nolan, Francis (1992), "The descriptive role of segments: Evidence from assimilation.", in Docherty, Gerard J.; Ladd, D. Robert (eds.), Papers in laboratory phonology II: Gesture, segment, prosody, New York: Cambridge University Press, pp.261–280
Zsiga, Elizabeth (2003), "Articulatory Timing in a Second Language: Evidence from Russian and English", Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 25: 399–432, doi:10.1017/s0272263103000160, S2CID5998807
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