Stops and Continuants

Mastering the American Accent » Stops and Continuants

Stops and Continuants

There is another important way that consonants are categorized, besides whether they are voiced or voiceless. Consonants can either be “stops” or “continuants,” depending on whether the airflow is stopped or if it is continued. For example, when we say the /s/ sound we can prolong it by saying “yessssssss.” The /s/ sound is considered a continuant because the air flow can continue as long as we have air in our lungs. But if we say a word like “job,” we cannot continue the final consonant, /b/. We stop the airflow by closing our lips. Therefore, /b/ is a stop. If we quickly open our lips, we can then “release” the stop and say job.

Holding Final Stops

Americans generally do not release many of the final stops. For example, when they say the sound /p/ in the word stop, the lips stay closed. No air comes out. This creates almost a silent version of the sound /p/, or a half p. We know the p is there, but we don’t hear all of it. If the lips were released, there would be a slight puff of air.

Let’s try another stop: the sound /g/. When you say the word big, don’t release the /g/. Make sure that your tongue remains up in the back of your mouth when you are done saying the word.

Words for Practice

Pay special attention to the final consonants as you pronounce the words in each column.

	final p	final b	final d	final t
1.	stop	club	married	that
2.	cup	job	played	sat
3.	up	sub	sad	it
4.	shop	tub	dad	cut

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