Voiced palatal lateral flap

The voiced palatal lateral flap is a rare type of consonantal sound, used in some spoken languages. There is no dedicated symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound. However, the symbol for a palatal lateral approximant with a breve denoting extra-short ⟨ʎ̆⟩ may be used.

Voiced palatal lateral flap
ʎ̆
Audio sample
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Features

Features of the voiced palatal lateral flap:

• Its manner of articulation is tap or flap, which means it is produced with a single contraction of the muscles so that one articulator (usually the tongue) is thrown against another.
• Its place of articulation is palatal, which means it is articulated with the middle or back part of the tongue raised to the hard palate.
• Its phonation is voiced, which means the vocal cords vibrate during the articulation.
• It is an oral consonant, which means air is allowed to escape through the mouth only.
• It is a lateral consonant, which means it is produced by directing the airstream over the sides of the tongue, rather than down the middle.
• Its airstream mechanism is pulmonic, which means it is articulated by pushing air solely with the intercostal muscles and abdominal muscles, as in most sounds.

Occurrence

The Iwaidja and Ilgar languages of Australia have a palatal lateral flap as well as alveolar and retroflex lateral flaps. However, the palatal flap has not been shown to be phonemic; it may instead be an underlying sequence /ɺj/.

Language	Word	IPA	Meaning	Notes
Ilgar	[miʎ̆arɡu]		Mildyagru	Likely an underlying sequence of /ɺj/. Contrasts /l, ɺ, ɭ, 𝼈 /.
Iwaidja	[example needed]			Contrasts /l, ɺ, ɭ, 𝼈 / and [ʎ, ʎ̆], though the latter are likely to be sequences /lj, ɺj/.
Oʼodham	leʼeje	[ʎ̆ɨʔɨd͡ʒɨ]	brat (misbehaving child)	Described as a palatal lateral flap in recent sources, as retroflex in older sources.

References