Palatal nasal

Palatal nasal
ɲ
Image
IPA number	118
Encoding
Entity (decimal)	ɲ
Unicode (hex)	U+0272
X-SAMPA	J
Kirshenbaum	n^
Sound

The palatal nasal is a type of consonant, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ⟨ ɲ⟩, a lowercase letter n with a leftward-pointing tail protruding from the bottom of the left stem of the letter. The equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is J. The IPA symbol ⟨ ɲ⟩ is similar to ⟨ɳ ⟩, the symbol for the retroflex nasal, which has a rightward-pointing hook extending from the bottom of the right stem, and to ⟨ŋ⟩, the symbol for the velar nasal, which has a leftward-pointing hook extending from the bottom of the right stem.

Palatal nasals are more common than palatal plosives ([c] or [ɟ]). In Spanish and languages whose writing systems are influenced by Spanish orthography, this sound is represented with the letter eñe (ñ).

The symbol ɲ is used to represent an alveolo-palatal nasal in some languages, since there is no IPA symbol with the latter meaning.

Features

Features of the palatal nasal:

• Its manner of articulation is stop, which means it is produced by obstructing airflow in the vocal tract. Since the consonant is also nasal, the blocked airflow is redirected through the nose.
• 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 a nasal consonant, which means air is allowed to escape through the nose, either exclusively (nasal stops) or in addition to through the mouth.
• Because the sound is not produced with airflow over the tongue, the central–lateral dichotomy does not apply.
• 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		një	[ɲə]	'one'
Basque		andereño	[an̪d̪eɾeɲo]	'teacher (f)'
Catalan		any	[ˈaɲ]	'year'	Alveolo-palatal. See Catalan phonology
Chinese	Wu	女人/gniugnin	[ɲy˩˧ɲiɲ˥˨]	'woman'
Czech		kůň	[kuːɲ]	'horse'	See Czech phonology
Dinka		nyɔt	[ɲɔt]	'very'
Dutch		oranje	[oˈrɑɲə]	'orange'	Not all dialects. See Dutch phonology
French		agneau	[aɲo]	'lamb'	See French phonology
Galician		leña	[ˈleɲa]	'firewood'
Greek		πρωτοχρονιά/prōtochronia	[pro̞to̞xro̞ˈɲa]	'New Year's Day'	See Modern Greek phonology
Hindi		ज्ञान/gñaan	[]	'Knowledge'	See Hindi phonology
Hungarian		anya	[ɒɲɒ]	'mother'	See Hungarian phonology
Indonesian		banyak	[ˈbaɲaʔ]	'a lot'
Italian		bagno	[baɲɲo]	'bath'	See Italian phonology
Japanese		庭/niwa	[n̠ʲiw͍a]	'garden'	Alveolo-palatal. See Japanese phonology
Korean		고니/goni	[ɡ̊on̠ʲi]	'swan'	Alveolo-palatal. See Korean phonology
Latvian		mākoņains	[maːkoɲains]	'cloudy'
Malay		banyak	[baɲaʔ]	'a lot'
Macedonian		чешање/češanje	[ t͡ʃɛʃaɲə]	'itch'
Malayalam		ഞ	[ɲäːn]	'I'
North Frisian	Mooring	fliinj	[fliːɲ]	'to fly'
Norwegian	Northern and central dialects	mann	[mɑɲː]	'man'	See Norwegian phonology
Occitan	Northern and Southern	Polonha	[puˈluɲo]	'Poland'
	Gascon	banh	[baɲ]	'bath'
Polish		koń	[kɔɲ]	'horse'	Usually alveolo-palatal. See Polish phonology
Portuguese		arranhar	[ɐʁɐˈɲaɾ]	'to scratch'	Often replaced by a nasal glide in Brazil. See Portuguese phonology
Quechua		ñuqa	[ˈɲɔqɑ]	'I'
Scottish Gaelic		seinn	[ʃeiɲ]	'sing'
Serbo-Croatian		коњ/konj	[koɲ]	'horse'	See Serbo-Croatian phonology
Slovak		pečeň	[ˈpɛtʃɛɲ]	'liver'
Spanish		enseñar	[ẽ̞nse̞ˈɲar]	'to teach'	See Spanish phonology
Ukrainian		тінь	[tiɲ]	'shadow'	See Ukrainian phonology
Vietnamese		nhíp	[ɲip˧ˀ˥]	'tweezers'	See Vietnamese phonology
West Frisian	Standard	njonken	[ɲoŋkən]	'next to'
	Aasters

See also

• Nasal palatal approximant
• List of phonetics topics

Bibliography

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• Cruz-Ferreira, Madalena (1995), "European Portuguese", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 25 (2): 90–94, doi:10.1017/S0025100300005223 
• 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 
• Gussenhoven, Carlos (1992), "Dutch", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 22 (2): 45–47, doi:10.1017/S002510030000459X 
• 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 
• Rogers, Derek; d'Arcangeli, Luciana (2004), "Italian", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 34 (1): 117–121, doi:10.1017/S0025100304001628 
• Skjekkeland, Martin (1997), Dei norske dialektane: Tradisjonelle særdrag i jamføring med skriftmåla, Høyskoleforlaget (Norwegian Academic Press) 
• Thompson, Laurence (1959), "Saigon phonemics", Language 35 (3): 454–476, doi:10.2307/411232, JSTOR 411232