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In articulatory phonetics, the place of articulation of a consonant is a location along the vocal tract where its production occurs. It is a point where a constriction is made between an active and a passive articulator. Active articulators are organs capable of voluntary movement which create the constriction, while passive articulators are so called because they are normally fixed and are the parts with which an active articulator makes contact. Along with the manner of articulation and phonation, the place of articulation gives the consonant its distinctive sound.
The field of articulatory phonetics is a subfield of phonetics that studies articulation and ways that humans produce speech. Articulatory phoneticians explain how humans produce speech sounds via the interaction of different physiological structures. Generally, articulatory phonetics is concerned with the transformation of aerodynamic energy into acoustic energy. Aerodynamic energy refers to the airflow through the vocal tract. Its potential form is air pressure; its kinetic form is the actual dynamic airflow. Acoustic energy is variation in the air pressure that can be represented as sound waves, which are then perceived by the human auditory system as sound.
The palatine uvula, usually referred to as simply the uvula, is a conic projection from the back edge of the middle of the soft palate, composed of connective tissue containing a number of racemose glands, and some muscular fibers. It also contains many serous glands, which produce thin saliva. It is only found in human beings.
Snoring is the vibration of respiratory structures and the resulting sound due to obstructed air movement during breathing while sleeping. The sound may be soft or loud and unpleasant. Snoring during sleep may be a sign, or first alarm, of obstructive sleep apnea (OSA). Research suggests that snoring is one of the factors of sleep deprivation.
A cleft lip contains an opening in the upper lip that may extend into the nose. The opening may be on one side, both sides, or in the middle. A cleft palate occurs when the palate contains an opening into the nose. The term orofacial cleft refers to either condition or to both occurring together. These disorders can result in feeding problems, speech problems, hearing problems, and frequent ear infections. Less than half the time the condition is associated with other disorders.
The soft palate is, in mammals, the soft tissue constituting the back of the roof of the mouth. The soft palate is part of the palate of the mouth; the other part is the hard palate. The soft palate is distinguished from the hard palate at the front of the mouth in that it does not contain bone.
Oral myology is the field of study that involves the evaluation and treatment of the oral and facial musculature, including the muscles of the tongue, lips, cheeks, and jaw.
Velopharyngeal inadequacy is a malfunction of a velopharyngeal mechanism which is responsible for directing the transmission of sound energy and air pressure in both the oral cavity and the nasal cavity. When this mechanism is impaired in some way, the valve does not fully close, and a condition known as 'velopharyngeal inadequacy' can develop. VPI can either be congenital or acquired later in life.
A palatal obturator is a prosthesis that totally occludes an opening such as an oronasal fistula. They are similar to dental retainers, but without the front wire. Palatal obturators are typically short-term prosthetics used to close defects of the hard/soft palate that may affect speech production or cause nasal regurgitation during feeding. Following surgery, there may remain a residual orinasal opening on the palate, alveolar ridge, or vestibule of the larynx. A palatal obturator may be used to compensate for hypernasality and to aid in speech therapy targeting correction of compensatory articulation caused by the cleft palate. In simpler terms, a palatal obturator covers any fistulas in the roof of the mouth that lead to the nasal cavity, providing the wearer with a plastic/acrylic, removable roof of the mouth, which aids in speech, eating, and proper air flow.
Velopharyngeal insufficiency is a disorder of structure that causes a failure of the velum to close against the posterior pharyngeal wall during speech in order to close off the nose during oral speech production. This is important because speech requires sound and airflow to be directed into the oral cavity (mouth) for the production of all speech sound with the exception of nasal sounds. If complete closure does not occur during speech, this can cause hypernasality and/or audible nasal emission during speech. In addition, there may be inadequate airflow to produce most consonants, making them sound weak or omitted.
Katherine Safford Harris is a noted psychologist and speech scientist. She is Distinguished Professor Emerita in Speech and Hearing at the CUNY Graduate Center and a member of the Board of Directors of Haskins Laboratories. She is also the former President of the Acoustical Society of America and Vice President of Haskins Laboratories.
The human nose is the most protruding part of the face. It bears the nostrils and is the first organ of the respiratory system. It is also the principal organ in the olfactory system. The shape of the nose is determined by the nasal bones and the nasal cartilages, including the nasal septum which separates the nostrils and divides the nasal cavity into two. On average the nose of a male is larger than that of a female.
Moschorhinus is an extinct genus of therocephalian in the family Akidnognathidae with only one species: M. kitchingi. It was a carnivorous synapsid which has been found in the Late Permian to Early Triassic of the South African Karoo Supergroup. It was a large carnivore, reaching 1.5 m (4.9 ft) in total body length with the largest skull comparable to that of a lion in size. It had a broad, blunt snout which bore long, straight canines. It appears to have replaced the gorgonopsids ecologically, and hunted much like a big cat. While most abundant in the Late Permian, it survived a little after the Permian Extinction, though these Triassic individuals had stunted growth.
The pharynx is the part of the throat behind the mouth and nasal cavity, and above the esophagus and trachea. It is found in vertebrates and invertebrates, though its structure varies across species. The pharynx carries food and air to the esophagus and larynx respectively. The flap of cartilage called the epiglottis stops food from entering the larynx.
A jaw abnormality is a disorder in the formation, shape and/or size of the jaw. In general abnormalities arise within the jaw when there is a disturbance or fault in the fusion of the mandibular processes. The mandible in particular has the most differential typical growth anomalies than any other bone in the human skeleton. This is due to variants in the complex symmetrical growth pattern which formulates the mandible.
Glanosuchus is a genus of scylacosaurid therocephalian from the Late Permian of South Africa. The type species G. macrops was named by Robert Broom in 1904. Glanosuchus had a middle ear structure that was intermediate between that of early therapsids and mammals. Ridges in the nasal cavity of Glanosuchus suggest it had an at least partially endothermic metabolism similar to modern mammals.
Hypernasal speech is a disorder that causes abnormal resonance in a human's voice due to increased airflow through the nose during speech. It is caused by an open nasal cavity resulting from an incomplete closure of the soft palate and/or velopharyngeal sphincter. In normal speech, nasality is referred to as nasalization and is a linguistic category that can apply to vowels or consonants in a specific language. The primary underlying physical variable determining the degree of nasality in normal speech is the opening and closing of a velopharyngeal passage way between the oral vocal tract and the nasal vocal tract. In the normal vocal tract anatomy, this opening is controlled by lowering and raising the velum or soft palate, to open or close, respectively, the velopharyngeal passageway.
Awankari is an Indo-Aryan dialect of Pakistan. Classified as a dialect of Hindko, and hence of Lahnda, it is spoken mostly in parts of Chakwal District in the north-west of the province of Punjab.
A lisp is a speech impairment in which a person misarticulates sibilants. These misarticulations often result in unclear speech.
A velopharyngeal fricative, also known as a posterior nasal fricative, is a sound produced by some children with speech disorders, including some with a cleft palate, as a substitute for sibilants, which cannot be produced with a cleft palate. It results from "the approximation but inadequate closure of the upper border of the velum and the posterior pharyngeal wall." To produce a velopharyngeal fricative, the soft palate approaches the pharyngeal wall and narrows the velopharyngeal port, such that the restricted port creates fricative turbulence in air forced through it into the nasal cavity. The articulation may be aided by a posterior positioning of the tongue and may involve velar flutter.
References
- ↑ Horiguchi S., Bell-Berti F. (1987.) "The Velotrace: a device for monitoring velar position", Cleft Palate J, 24(2):104-11.
- ↑ Bell-Berti F., Krakow R. A., Ross D., Hroiguchi S. (1993.) "The rise and fall of the soft palate: the Velotrace", J Acoust Soc Am, 93(4):2416.
- ↑ Baken R. J., Orlikoff R. F. (2000.) Clinical Measurement of Speech and Voice, Cengage Learning, p. 495.