Voiceless labiodental fricative

The voiceless labiodental fricative is a type of consonant. The letter for this sound in the International Phonetic Alphabet is ⟨f⟩. The X-SAMPA symbol for this sound is ⟨f⟩. The English language has this sound, and it is the sound represented by 'f' in fear and face.

Voiceless labiodental fricative
f
IPA number128
Encoding
Entity (decimal)f
Unicode (hex)U+0066
X-SAMPAf
Kirshenbaumf
Sound

 

Features

  • The airstream mechanism is pulmonic. It means that we produce this sound by pushing air solely with the lungs and diaphragm, as in most sounds.
  • Its phonation is voiceless. It means that we produce this sound without vibrations of the vocal cords. In some languages the vocal cords are actively separated, so it is always voiceless; in others the cords are lax, so that it may take on the voicing of adjacent sounds.
  • We produce it at labiodental. It means that we produce this sound with the lower lips and the upper teeth.
  • Its behavior is fricative. It means that we produce this sound by constricting air flow through a narrow channel at the place of articulation, to make turbulence.

Examples

Language Word IPA Meaning
Abkhaz фы/fy [fə] 'lightning'
Adyghe тфы/tfy [tfə] 'five'
Albanian faqe [facɛ] 'cheek'
Arabic Modern Standard[1] ظرف/th'arf [ðˤɑrf] 'envelope'
Armenian Eastern[2] ֆուտբոլ/futbol [fut̪bol] 'football'
Assyrian ܦܬܐ pata [fɔθɔ] 'face'
Assamese বৰ/borof [bɔɹɔf] 'snow/ice'
Azeri fəng [t̪y̆fæɲɟ] 'ɡun'
Basque fin [fin] 'thin'
Bengali ফু/ful [ful] 'flower'
Catalan[3] fort [ˈfɔɾt] 'strong'
Chechen факс / faks [faks] 'fax'
Chinese Cantonese / fēi [fei̯˥] 'to fly'
Mandarin (traditional) / (simplified) / fēi [feɪ̯˥]
Coptic ϥⲧⲟⲟⲩ/ftoow [ftow] 'four'
Czech foukat [ˈfoʊ̯kat] 'to blow'
Dutch[4] fiets [fits] 'bike'
English All dialects fill [fɪɫ] 'fill'
Cockney[5] think [fɪŋk] 'think'
Many British urban dialects[6]
Some younger New Zealanders[7][8]
Broad South African[9]
Indian South African[10] fair [ʋ̥eː] 'fair'
Esperanto fajro [ˈfajɾo] 'fire'
Ewe[11] eflen [éflé̃] 'he spit off'
French[12] fabuleuse [fäbyˈløːz̪] 'fabulous'
Galician faísca [faˈiska]
German fade [ˈfaːdə] 'bland'
Goemai f'at' [fat] 'to blow'
Greek φύση / fysī [ˈfisi]
Gujarati / faļ [fəɭ] 'fruit'
Hebrew סופר/sofer [so̞fe̞ʁ] 'writer'
Hindustani साफ़ / صاف/saaf [sɑːf] 'clean'
Hungarian figyel [ˈfiɟɛl] 'he/she pays attention'
Indonesian fajar [fadʒar] 'dawn'
Italian fantasma [fän̪ˈt̪äzmä] 'ghost'
Kabardian фыз/fyz [fəz] 'woman'
Kabyle afus [afus] 'hand'
Khmer កាហ្វេ / <span title="Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'Module:Language/data/ISO 639 override' not found. transliteration" class="Unicode" style="white-space:normal; text-decoration: none">kahvé [kaːfeː] 'coffee'
Macedonian фонетика/fonetika [fɔnetika] 'phonetics'
Māori whakapapa [fakapapa] 'genealogy'
Malay feri [feri] 'ferry'
Maltese fenek [fenek] 'rabbit'
Norwegian filter [filtɛɾ] 'filter'
Persian فکر/fekr [fekr] 'thought'
Polish[13] futro [ˈfut̪rɔ] 'fur'
Portuguese[14] fala [ˈfalɐ] 'speech'
Punjabi ਫ਼ੌਜੀ/faujī [fɔːd͡ʒi] 'soldier'
Romanian[15] foc [fo̞k] 'fire'
Russian[16] орфография/orfografiya [ɐrfɐˈɡrafʲɪjə] 'orthography'
Serbo-Croatian[17] фаза / faza [fǎːz̪ä] 'phase'
Slovak fúkať [ˈfu̞ːkätɕ] 'to blow'
Somali feex [fɛħ] 'wart'
Spanish[18] fantasma [fã̠n̪ˈt̪a̠zma̠] 'ghost'
Swahili kufa [kufɑ] 'to die'
Swedish fisk [ˈfɪsk] 'fish'
Thai /fon [fon˩˩˦] 'rain'
Turkish saf [säf] 'pure'
Ukrainian[19] Фастів/fastiv [ˈfɑsʲtʲiw] 'Fastiv'
Vietnamese[20] pháo [faːw˧ˀ˥] 'firecracker'
Welsh ffon [fɔn] 'stick'
West Frisian fol [foɫ] 'full'
Yi / fu [fu˧] 'roast'
Zapotec Tilquiapan[21] cafe [kafɘ] 'coffee'

Notes

References

  • Altendorf, Ulrike; Watt, Dominic (2004), "The dialects in the South of England: phonology", in Schneider, Edgar W.; Burridge, Kate; Kortmann, Bernd; Mesthrie, Rajend; Upton, Clive (eds.), A handbook of varieties of English, vol. 1: Phonology, Mouton de Gruyter, pp. 181–196, ISBN 3-11-017532-0
  • Bowerman, Sean (2004), "White South African English: phonology", in Schneider, Edgar W.; Burridge, Kate; Kortmann, Bernd; Mesthrie, Rajend; Upton, Clive (eds.), A handbook of varieties of English, vol. 1: Phonology, Mouton de Gruyter, pp. 931–942, ISBN 3-11-017532-0
  • Britain, David (2005), "Innovation diffusion: "Estuary English" and local dialect differentiation: The survival of Fenland Englishes", Linguistics, 43 (5): 995–1022, doi:10.1515/ling.2005.43.5.995, S2CID 144652354
  • Carbonell, Joan F.; Llisterri, Joaquim (1992), "Catalan", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 22 (1–2): 53–56, doi:10.1017/S0025100300004618, S2CID 249411809
  • Clark, Lynn; Trousdale, Graeme (2010), "A cognitive approach to quantitative sociolinguistic variation: Evidence from th-fronting in Central Scotland", in Geeraerts, Dirk; Kristiansen, Gitte; Peirsman, Yves (eds.), Advances in Cognitive Linguistics, Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, ISBN 978-3-11-022645-4
  • Cruz-Ferreira, Madalena (1995), "European Portuguese", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 25 (2): 90–94, doi:10.1017/S0025100300005223, S2CID 249414876
  • Danylenko, Andrii; Vakulenko, Serhii (1995), Ukrainian, Lincom Europa, ISBN 9783929075083
  • Dum-Tragut, Jasmine (2009), Armenian: Modern Eastern Armenian, Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company
  • Fougeron, Cecile; Smith, Caroline L (1993), "Illustrations of the IPA:French", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 23 (2): 73–76, doi:10.1017/S0025100300004874, S2CID 249404451
  • Gordon, Elizabeth; Maclagan, Margaret (2008), "Regional and social differences in New Zealand: Phonology", in Burridge, Kate; Kortmann, Bernd (eds.), Varieties of English, vol. 3: The Pacific and Australasia, Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, pp. 64–76, ISBN 978-3110208412
  • Gussenhoven, Carlos (1992), "Dutch", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 22 (2): 45–47, doi:10.1017/S002510030000459X, S2CID 243772965
  • Jassem, Wiktor (2003), "Polish", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 33 (1): 103–107, doi:10.1017/S0025100303001191
  • Ladefoged, Peter (2005), Vowels and Consonants (Second ed.), Blackwell
  • Martínez-Celdrán, Eugenio; Fernández-Planas, Ana Ma.; Carrera-Sabaté, Josefina (2003), "Castilian Spanish", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 33 (2): 255–259, doi:10.1017/S0025100303001373
  • Merrill, Elizabeth (2008), "Tilquiapan Zapotec" (PDF), Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 38 (1): 107–114, doi:10.1017/S0025100308003344
  • Mesthrie, Rajend (2004), "Indian South African English: phonology", in Schneider, Edgar W.; Burridge, Kate; Kortmann, Bernd; Mesthrie, Rajend; Upton, Clive (eds.), A handbook of varieties of English, vol. 1: Phonology, Mouton de Gruyter, pp. 953–963, ISBN 3-11-017532-0
  • Padgett, Jaye (2003), "Contrast and Post-Velar Fronting in Russian", Natural Language & Linguistic Theory, 21 (1): 39–87, doi:10.1023/A:1021879906505, S2CID 13470826
  • Rogers, Derek; d'Arcangeli, Luciana (2004), "Italian", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 34 (1): 117–121, doi:10.1017/S0025100304001628
  • Thompson, Laurence (1959), "Saigon phonemics", Language, 35 (3): 454–476, doi:10.2307/411232, JSTOR 411232
  • Thelwall, Robin (1990), "Illustrations of the IPA: Arabic", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 20 (2): 37–41, doi:10.1017/S0025100300004266, S2CID 243640727
  • Wells, John C. (1982), Accents of English, vol. 2: The British Isles, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, ISBN 0-521-24224-X
  • Wood, Elizabeth (2003), "TH-fronting: The substitution of f/v for θ/ð in New Zealand English", New Zealand English Journal, 17: 50–56
  • Landau, Ernestina; Lončarića, Mijo; Horga, Damir; Škarić, Ivo (1999), "Croatian", Handbook of the International Phonetic Association: A guide to the use of the International Phonetic Alphabet, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 66–69, ISBN 978-0-521-65236-0