Co-articulated consonant

Co-articulated consonants or complex consonants are consonants produced with two simultaneous places of articulation. They may be divided into two classes: doubly articulated consonants with two primary places of articulation of the same manner (both stop, or both nasal, etc.), and consonants with secondary articulation; that is, a second articulation not of the same manner.^[1]: 328

An example of a doubly articulated consonant is the voiceless labial–velar stop [k͡p], which is pronounced simultaneously at the velum (a [k]) and at the lips (a [p]).

In practically all languages of the world that have doubly articulated consonants, these are either clicks or labial–velars.

An example of a consonant with secondary articulation is the voiceless labialized velar stop [kʷ], which has only a single stop articulation, velar [k], with a simultaneous approximant-like rounding of the lips.

There is a large number of common secondary articulations. The most frequently encountered are:

• labialization (such as [kʷ] in many languages)
• palatalization (such as "soft" consonants in Slavic languages, like [pʲ] in Russian)
• velarization (such as "dark" l [lˠ] in many languages, including English)
• pharyngealization (such as "emphatic" consonants in Semitic languages, like [tˤ] in Arabic)

As might be expected from the approximant-like nature of secondary articulation, it is not always easy to tell whether a co-articulated approximant such as /w/ is doubly or secondarily articulated. In some English dialects, for example, /w/ is a labialized velar that could be transcribed as [ɰʷ].

The glottis controls phonation, and works simultaneously with many consonants. It is not normally considered an articulator, and an ejective such as [kʼ], with simultaneous closure of the velum and glottis, is not normally considered to be a co-articulated consonant.

• List of phonetics topics
• Gemination
• Voiceless labial–palatal fricative