Chapter four
Consonant sounds in English
This chapter focuses on the inventory of English consonants, which are classified and described in accordance with the point of articulation, articulator, manner of articulation, and state of the vocal cords relevant to the production of each sound. Despite the fact that the English alphabet comprises twenty-one letters representing consonants, a few more than twenty-one consonant sounds are employed in spoken English. Like other languages, English has six groups of consonants, namely, stops, fricatives, affricates, nasals, liquids, and glides. Table 2 given below shows the English consonant classification on the basis of the four major criteria mentioned.
MAJOR CONSONANT SOUNDS
As illustrated in the chart to follow, the English consonant inventory consists of twenty-five major sounds, or phonemes, each of which is represented by _a symbol. As a matter of fact, when the language is spoken, some of these sounds, such as the voiceless stops and the lateral liquid, may be manifested in various phonetic forms, depending upon their environments. Since the differences in phonetic properties of these sounds are automatic, or predictable, and do not function to distinguish the meaning of words in which the sounds occur, such variations of sounds are said to be allophones of the same phonemes.
In describing consonants, linguists normally refer to (1) the state of the vocal cords - whether it is a voiced or voiceless sound, (2) the point of articulation and the articulator, and (3) the manner of articulation that characterizes the types of consonant. To distinguish