German Linguistics Lectures

11.11 Alveolar Plosives

• Alveolar sounds are made when the tongues makes contact with the alveolar ridge, i.e. the part of the mouth immediately above the teeth.
• The phoneme /d/ is voiced – i.e. your vocal cords vibrate when saying dein or dort.
• The phoneme /t/ is unvoiced - i.e. you don’t use your vocal cords to say Tisch or Torte.

11.12 Velar Plosives

• Velar sounds are articulated towards the back of the vocal tract in the velum or soft palate.
• The phoneme /g/ is voiced – i.e. your vocal cords vibrate on saying geht.
• The phoneme /k/ is unvoiced - i.e. you don’t use your vocal cords to say kaum or kommt.

11.13 Fricatives

• Fricatives are sounds produced by forcing air through a narrow gap in the vocal tract with audible friction.
• Try saying the following fricatives:
• fein, wein, singen, heiß, Schnee
• New for English-speakers: Loch, ich