Alveolar nasal Information & Alveolar nasal Links at HealthHaven.com

The alveolar nasal is a type of consonantal sound used in numerous spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents dental, alveolar, and postalveolar nasals is n, and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is n.

There are few languages that lack this sound but have an m sound (e.g., Samoan). There are some languages (e.g., Rotokas) that lack both m and n.

[edit] Features

Features of the alveolar nasal:

Its manner of articulation is stop, which means it is produced by obstructing airflow in the vocal tract.
Its place of articulation is alveolar, which means it is articulated with either the tip or the blade of the tongue against the alveolar ridge, termed respectively apical and laminal.
Its phonation type is voiced, which means the vocal cords are vibrating during the articulation.
It is a nasal consonant, which means air is allowed to escape through the nose.
It is a central consonant, which means it is produced by allowing the airstream to flow over the middle of the tongue, rather than the sides.
The airstream mechanism is pulmonic egressive, which means it is articulated by pushing air out of the lungs and through the vocal tract, rather than from the glottis or the mouth.

Language		Word	IPA	Meaning	Notes
Catalan^[1]		innecessari	[innəsəˈsaɾi]	'unnecessary'	See Catalan phonology
Chinese	Mandarin	難/nán	[nan˧˥]	'difficult'	See Standard Mandarin
Czech		na	[na]	'on'	See Czech phonology
Dutch^[2]		nacht	[nɑxt]	'night'	See Dutch phonology
English		nice	[naɪs]	'nice'	See English phonology
Finnish		annan	[ɑnːɑn]	'I give'	See Finnish phonology
Georgian^[3]		კანი	[ˈkʼɑni]	'skin'
German		Lanze	[ˈlant͡sə]	'lance'	See German phonology
Greek		νάμα	[ˈnama]	'communion wine'	See Modern Greek phonology
Hawaiian^[4]		naka	[naka]	'to shake'	See Hawaiian phonology
Hindi		नया	[nəjaː]	'new'
Hungarian		nagyi	[nɒɟi]	'grandma'	See Hungarian phonology
Italian^[5]		nano	[ˈnano]	'dwarf'	See Italian phonology
Japanese^[6]		反対/hantai	[hantai]	'opposite'	See Japanese phonology
Korean		나/na	[na]	'I'	See Korean phonology
Malay		nasi	[nasi]	'cooked rice'
Malayalam^[7]		കന്നി	[kənni]	'virgin'
Maltese		lenbuba	[lenbuˈba]	'truncheon'
Ngwe	Mmockngie dialect	[nøɣə̀]		'sun'
Norwegian		mann	[mɑnː]	'man'	See Norwegian phonology
Pirahã		gíxai	[níˈʔàì̯]	'you'
Slovak		na	[na]	'on'
Spanish^[8]		nada	[ˈnað̞a]	'nothing'	See Spanish phonology
Tamil^[9]		நாடு	[naːɽɯ]	'country'	See Tamil phonology
Tsez		лъоIно	[ˈɬo̞ˤno̞]	'three'
Turkish		neden	[ned̪en]	'reason'	See Turkish phonology
Vietnamese		ne	[nɛ]	'drive sidewards'	See Vietnamese phonology
Zapotec	Tilquiapan^[10]	nanɨɨ	[nanɨˀɨ]	'lady'	contrasts with a fortis alveolar nasal that is not represented in the orthography.

^ Carbonell & Llisterri (1992:53)
^ Gussenhoven (1992:45)
^ Shosted & Chikovani (2006:255)
^ Ladefoged (2005:139)
^ Rogers & d'Arcangeli (2004:117)
^ Okada (1991:94)
^ Ladefoged (2005:165)
^ Martínez-Celdrán, Fernández-Planas & Carrera-Sabaté (2003:255)
^ Keane (2004:111)
^ Merrill (2008:108)

Carbonell, Joan F.; Llisterri, Joaquim (1992), "Catalan", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 22 (1-2): 53–56, doi:10.1017/S0025100300004618
Cruz-Ferreira, Madalena (1995), "European Portuguese", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 25 (2): 90–94, doi:10.1017/S0025100300005223
Gussenhoven, Carlos (1992), "Dutch", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 22 (2): 45–47, doi:10.1017/S002510030000459X
Keane, Elinor (2004), "Tamil", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 34 (1): 111–116, doi:10.1017/S0025100304001549
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), "Tilquipan Zapotec", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 38 (1): 107–114
Okada, Hideo (1991), "Phonetic Representation:Japanese", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 21 (2): 94–97
Rogers, Derek; d'Arcangeli, Luciana (2004), "Italian", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 34 (1): 117–121, doi:10.1017/S0025100304001628
Shosted, Ryan K.; Vakhtang, Chikovani (2006), "Standard Georgian", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 36 (2): 255–264, doi:10.1017/S0025100306002659