Alveolar flap

Alveolar tap
ɾ
IPA number	124
Encoding
Entity (decimal)	ɾ
Unicode (hex)	U+027E
X-SAMPA	4
Kirshenbaum	*
Braille
Image
Sound

The alveolar tap or flap is a type of consonantal sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents dental, alveolar, and postalveolar flaps is ⟨ɾ⟩.

The terms tap and flap may be used interchangeably.

Peter Ladefoged proposed for a while that it may be useful to distinguish between them; however, his usage has been inconsistent, contradicting itself even between different editions of the same text. The last proposed distinction was that a tap strikes its point of contact directly, as a very brief stop, whereas a flap strikes the point of contact tangentially: "Flaps are most typically made by retracting the tongue tip behind the alveolar ridge and moving it forward so that it strikes the ridge in passing." However, later on, he no longer felt this was a useful distinction to make, and preferred to use the word flap in all cases.^{[citation needed]}

For linguists who do make the distinction, the coronal tap is transcribed as a fish-hook "r", [ɾ], while the flap is transcribed as a small capital "d", [ᴅ], which is not recognized by the IPA. Otherwise, alveolars and dentals are typically called taps, and other articulations flaps. No language contrasts a tap and a flap at the same place of articulation.

This sound is often analyzed (and therefore transcribed) by native English speakers as an 'R-sound' in many foreign languages. For example, the 'Japanese R' in hara, akira, tora, etc. is actually an alveolar tap. In languages where this segment is present but not phonemic, it is often an allophone of either an alveolar stop ([t] or [d]) or a rhotic consonant like the alveolar trill or alveolar approximant.

Features

Features of the alveolar tap:

• Its manner of articulation is tap, which means it is produced with a single contraction of the muscles so that the tongue makes very brief contact.
• Its place of articulation is alveolar, which means it is articulated with either the tip or the blade of the tongue at the alveolar ridge, termed respectively apical and laminal.
• 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 central consonant, which means it is produced by directing the airstream along the center of the tongue, rather than to the sides.
• The airstream mechanism is pulmonic, which means it is articulated by pushing air solely with the lungs and diaphragm, as in most sounds.

Occurrence

Language		Word	IPA	Meaning	Notes
Albanian		emër	[ɛməɾ]	'name'	Contrasts with /r/ in all positions.
Arabic	Egyptian	رجل	[ɾeɡl]	'foot'	Contrasts with emphatic form. See Arabic phonology
Armenian	Eastern	րոպե	[ɾopɛ]	'minute'	Contrasts with /r/ in all positions.
Asturian		yera	[ˈʝe̞ɾa]	'I/it was'	Contrasts with /r/.
Austro-Bavarian		Rose	[ɾoːzə]	'rose'
Basque		lore	[lo̞ɾe̞]	'flower'	Contrasts with /r/.
Catalan		mira	[ˈmiɾə]	'look'	Contrasts with /r/. See Catalan phonology
Chechen		рагI / raġ	[ɾɑɣ]	'mountain range'
Dutch	Many dialects	Peru	[peˈɾu]	'Peru'	In free variation with [r]. Pronunciation of /r/ varies regionally. See Dutch phonology
English	RP	better	[ˈbe̞ɾə]	'better'	Intervocalic allophone of /t/ for some speakers. See English phonology and flapping
	Australian		[ˈbeɾə]		Intervocalic allophone of /t/, and also /d/ among few Australians. Used more often in Australia than in New Zealand. See Australian English phonology and flapping
	New Zealand		[ˈbeɾɘ]
	Cockney		[ˈbɛɾə]		Intervocalic allophone of /t/. In free variation with [ʔ ~ tʰ ~ tˢ]. See flapping
	Dublin		[ˈbɛɾɚ]		Intervocalic allophone of /t/ and /d/, present in many dialects. In Local Dublin it can be [ɹ] instead, unlike New and Mainstream. See English phonology and flapping
	North America
	Ulster
	West Country
	Irish	three	[θɾiː]	'three'	Conservative accents. Corresponds to [ɹ ~ ɻ ~ ʁ] in other accents.
	Scottish				Most speakers. Others use [ɹ ~ r].
	Older RP				Allophone of /ɹ/.
	Scouse
	South African				Broad speakers. Can be [ɹ ~ r] instead.
Galician		cordeiro	[koɾˈðejɾo]	'lamb'	Contrasts with /r/ in all positions.
Greek		μηρός mirós	[miˈɾo̞s]	'thigh'	Most common realization of /r/. See Modern Greek phonology
Hebrew	Mizrahi	רבע	['ɾevaʕ]	'quarter'	See Modern Hebrew phonology
	Sephardic
Ilokano		tumakder	[tʊmakˈdeɾ]	'to stand up'
Irish		carr tirim	[kaɾˠ] [tʲɪɾʲɪmʲ]	'car' 'dry' (adj.)	Exists in velarised ("broad") and palatalised ("slender") forms. See Irish phonology
Japanese		心 kokoro	[ko̥koɾo]	'heart'	May instead be an alveolar lateral flap. See Japanese phonology
Korean		바람 baram	[paɾam]	'wind'	See Korean phonology
Māori		reo	[ˈɾeo]	'language'
Norwegian		Norge	[ˈnɔɾɡə]	'Norway'	See Norwegian phonology
Persian		كشور	[keʃvæɾ]	'country'	See Persian phonology
Portuguese		prato	[ˈpɾatu]	'dish'	Dental to retroflex allophones, varying by dialect. Contrasts with /ʁ/, with its guttural allophones and, in all positions, with its archaic form [r]. See Portuguese phonology
Sicilian		corna	[ˈkɔɾna]	'horns'
Spanish		caro	[ˈkaɾo̞]	'expensive'	Contrasts with /r/. See Spanish phonology
Tagalog		bihira	[bɪˈhiɾɐ]	'rare'	See Tagalog phonology
Turkish		Türkiye	[ˈt̪yɾcijɛ]	'Turkey'	See Turkish phonology
Zapotec	Tilquiapan	ran	[ɾaŋ]	'to see'

See also

• Intervocalic alveolar flapping
• Index of phonetics articles

Bibliography

• Arvaniti, Amalia (2007), "Greek Phonetics: The State of the Art", Journal of Greek Linguistics 8: 97–208 
• Carbonell, Joan F.; Llisterri, Joaquim (1992), "Catalan", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 22 (1–2): 53–56, doi:10.1017/S0025100300004618 
• Cox, Felicity; Palethorpe, Sallyanne (2007), "Australian English", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 37 (3): 341–349, doi:10.1017/S0025100307003192 
• Cruz-Ferreira, Madalena (1995), "European Portuguese", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 25 (2): 90–94, doi:10.1017/S0025100300005223 
• Dum-Tragut, Jasmine (2009), Armenian: Modern Eastern Armenian, Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company 
• Ladefoged, Peter; Maddieson, Ian (1996), The Sounds of the World's Languages, Oxford: Blackwell, ISBN 0-631-19814-8 
• 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", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 38 (1): 107–114, doi:10.1017/S0025100308003344 
• Ogden, Richard (2009), An Introduction to English Phonetics, Edinburgh University Press 
• Trudgill, Peter; Hannah, Jean (2002), International English: A Guide to the Varieties of Standard English, 4th ed., p. 24 
• Watson, Janet (2002), The Phonology and Morphology of Arabic, New York: Oxford University Press 
• Watson, Kevin (2007), "Liverpool English", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 37 (3): 351–360 
• Wells, John (1982), Accents of English 2: The British Isles, pp. 324–325, ISBN 978-0521285407 
• Wise, Claude Merton (1957), Introduction to Phonetics, Englewood Cliffs