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Glite Dictionary
stop consonant

stop consonant

6.3
A sound you make when you block air and then let it out quickly
  • noun
  • /stɑp ˈkɒn.sə.nənt/
  • Specialized
translation icon : consonante oclusiva
  • Children learning to speak often struggle with stop consonants, which require precise control of airflow.
  • voiced stop consonants

Examples

  • The authors tested the stability of phoneme percepts by analyzing participants' ability to identify voiced and voiceless stop consonants.

    Academic text (2012)

  • Differences in VOT are perceptually essential to discriminate between voiced and voiceless stop consonants.

    Academic text (2012)

  • Diminished Speech Perceptual Acuity for Stop Consonants in Stuttering

    Academic text (2012)

  • The error pattern of stopping occurs when a fricative or affricate is replaced by a stop consonant that shares the same place of articulation.

    Academic text (2015)

  • Only superior-inferior articulatory movements were analyzed because this is the primary dimension of movement for bilabial stop consonants.

    Academic text (2011)

  • Two foundational studies on this topic examined the gradual development of the voicing contrast in word-initial stop consonants.

    Academic text (2012)

  • Keating, P. A. (1984). Phonetic and phonological representation of stop consonant voicing. Language, 60, 286-319.

    Academic text (2012)

  • The four target words of the first group all had a CVC phonemic structure with a stop consonant (two voiced and two voiceless) preceding the schwa.

    Academic text (2013)

  • In English, stop consonants like 'p' and 't' are produced by completely blocking airflow before releasing it.

  • A classic example of a stop consonant is the 'k' sound in the word 'cat', where air is stopped before it is released.

Synonyms

stop
vsstop consonant
  • Specialized
4 6.0

A consonant sound made by blocking the air and then releasing it

is the two-word technical label for the same sound
occlusive
vsstop consonant
  • Specialized
8.8

A speech sound made by stopping the breath completely and then letting it out

is the common descriptive phrase for that same sound
plosive consonant
vsstop consonant
  • Specialized
6.3

A speech sound, like p or b, made by stopping the air and then letting it out quickly

is the general descriptive wording without example consonants
plosive
vsstop consonant
  • Specialized
7.7

A consonant sound made by stopping air in the mouth then letting it out suddenly, like p or b

is the fuller phrase describing the same articulatory process

Antonyms

continuant consonant
  • Specialized
7.4

A speech sound made by narrowing the mouth so air keeps flowing

How Prolongable

vowel
  • Specialized
23 1.0
fricative
  • Specialized
1 7.6
continuancy
  • Specialized
9.9
approximant
  • Specialized
8.4
affricate
  • Specialized
9.9
stop consonant
  • Specialized
6.3

Surface Forms

stop consonant singular
stop consonants plural

Morphology

stop + consonant

The meaning is directly compositional: a 'stop consonant' is a consonant that stops or blocks airflow. Even though it is a technical phonetics term, a learner who knows 'stop' (to block) and 'consonant' (a sound made by obstructing airflow) can derive the intended meaning.

Etymology

Stop consonant comes from the simple image of 'stopping' the flow of air in the mouth and then 'releasing' it. That's why sounds like p and t are called stop consonants: stop shows the brief block and consonant is the speech sound, so the sound is made by that quick block-and-release.