Voiced velar fricative

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Sound sample (help·info)
IPA – number	141
IPA – text	ɣ
IPA – image
Entity	ɣ
X-SAMPA	`G`
Kirshenbaum	`Q`

The voiced velar fricative is a type of consonantal sound, used in various spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ɣ (a variant of the Greek letter gamma, which is used for this sound in Modern Greek), and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is G.

[edit] Features

Features of the voiced velar fricative:

Its manner of articulation is fricative, which means it is produced by constricting air flow through a narrow channel at the place of articulation, causing turbulence.
Its place of articulation is velar which means it is articulated with the back part of the tongue (the dorsum) against the soft palate (the velum).
Its phonation type is voiced, which means the vocal cords are vibrating during the articulation.
It is an oral consonant, which means air is allowed to escape through the mouth.
It is a central consonant, which means it is produced by allowing the airstream to flow over the middle of the tongue, rather than the sides.
The airstream mechanism is pulmonic egressive, which means it is articulated by pushing air out of the lungs and through the vocal tract, rather than from the glottis or the mouth.

[edit] Occurs in

A voiced velar fricative occurs in Arabic, Modern Greek, Persian, and many Turkic languages, including Azerbaijani, where it is usually transliterated as ğ. (In some Arabic dialects the gh may be uvular or laryngeal.)

The sound also occurs as a distinct phoneme for some Dutch speakers. It is written as g and replaces the [g]] sound. However, for many it collapses with [x] when not between vowels. It is replaced by a palatal ([ʝ]) in southern dialects, making the contrast with [x] (written as ch) far more distinct there.

Many North American Indian languages contain this sound, notably the Athabaskan family. Navajo, the indigenous language of the United States with the most speakers, writes this sound with the digraph gh.

One finds this sound also in Irish, written gh or dh (formerly [ð], but merged with original [ɣ] in Middle Irish) before the broad or leathan vowels a, á, o, ó, u, and ú. The same constraints apply to Scottish Gaelic. The sound, curiously, is absent from the related Brythonic languages.

In eastern Polish dialects, h usually represents [ɣ], contrary to ch, which represents [x]. In the rest of Poland, both are usually pronounced [x].

The velar fricative symbol <ɣ> is often used when transcribing the "weak" allophone of /g/ in Spanish. However, these "soft" allophones of /b, d, g/ are typically approximants (with slight frication) rather than fricatives, and it would be more accurate to use the IPA symbol <ɰ>.

This sound also occurs in the constructed language Klingon, where it is spelled gh in the most common Romanization.