Obstruant (definition)

An obstruent is a sound that is made with complete or considerable obstruction the the vocal tract. This term is used to describe stops (e.g. [t]), affricates (e.g. [tʃ]), and fricatives (e.g. [ʃ]). Obstruents stand in opposition to sonorants. Although they are sometimes considered 'nasal stops,' the continuous flow through the nose means that nasals qualify as sonorants.

See Also

• Stop (definition)
• Affricate (definition)
• Fricative (definition)
• Sonorant (definition)

External Links

The link below takes you away from the Gaelic Wiki to Wikipedia. Since wikipedia pages can be edited by anyone, they often contain inaccurate information. So be careful!

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obstruent

References

• Matthews, P. H. (1997) The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Linguistics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Crystal, David. (1997) A Dictionary of Linguistics and Phonetics. The language library. Oxford, UK: Blackwell,