In phonetics, ingressive sounds are sounds by which the airstream flows inward through the mouth or nose. The three types of ingressive sounds are lingual ingressive or velaric ingressive (from the tongue and the soft palate), glottalic ingressive (from the glottis), and pulmonic ingressive (from the ).
The opposite of an ingressive sound is an egressive sound, by which the air stream is created by pushing air out through the mouth or nose. The majority of sounds in most languages, such as /b/, are both pulmonic and egressive.
Lingual ingressive
Lingual ingressive, or velaric ingressive, describes an airstream mechanism in which a sound is produced by closing the vocal tract at two places of articulation in the mouth, then
Rarefaction the air in the enclosed space by lowering the tongue, and then releasing either or both closures. Such sounds are called "
click consonant".
Glottalic ingressive
Glottal ingressive is the term generally applied to the implosive consonants, which actually use a mixed glottalic ingressive–pulmonic egressive airstream. True glottalic ingressives are quite rare and are called "voiceless implosives" or "reverse ejectives".
Pulmonic ingressive
Pulmonic ingressive describes ingressive sounds in which the airstream is created by the
. These are generally considered
paralanguage. They may be found as phonemes, words, and entire phrases on all continents and in genetically-unrelated languages, most frequently in sounds for agreement and backchanneling. Some pulmonic ingressive sounds do not have egressive counterparts. For example, the cell for a velar trill in the IPA chart is greyed out as not being possible, but an ingressive velar (or velic) trill is a snort; this has been jocularly transcribed , intended to resemble the
snout of a pig.
[University of Hawaii Working Papers in Linguistics, 1969, Volume 1, Parts 4–6, Page 115.]
Pulmonic ingressive sounds are extremely rare outside paralinguistics. A pulmonic ingressive phoneme was found in the ritual language Damin; its last speaker died in the 1990s. ǃXóõ has a series of nasalized in which the nasal airstream is pulmonic ingressive. Ladefoged & Maddieson (1996:268) state, "This ǃXóõ click is probably unique among the sounds of the world's languages that, even in the middle of a sentence, it may have ingressive pulmonic airflow."
In the extensions to the International Phonetic Alphabet, ingressive sounds are indicated with so the Norwegian backchanneling particles ja and nei would be transcribed and . A snore could be transcribed .
Laver[Laver (1994) Principles of Phonetics, p. 169] uses instead for and .[The diacritic is actually centered on the x-height, rather than resting on the baseline.]
Ingressive speech
Ingressive speech sounds are produced while the speaker breathes in, in contrast to most speech sounds, which are produced as the speaker breathes out. The air that is used to voice the speech is drawn in rather than pushed out. Ingressive speech can be glottalic, velaric, or pulmonic.
Occurrence
Ingressive sounds occur in many languages. Despite being a common phenomenon, they are frequently associated with Scandinavian languages. Most words that are subject to ingressive speech are feedback words ("yes, no") or very short or primal (a cry of pain or sobbing). It sometimes occurs in rapid counting to maintain a steady airflow throughout a long series of unbroken sounds. It is also very common in animals, frogs, dogs, and cats (purring). In
English language, ingressive sounds include when one says "Huh!" (a gasping sound) to express surprise or "Sss" (an inward hiss) to express empathy when another is hurt.
Tsou language and Damin have both been claimed to possess an ingressive phoneme. Neither claim has been validated to date however, and the Tsou claim has been nearly disproved. There are claims of Tohono Oʼodham women speaking entirely ingressively.
There are examples of ingressive sounds that belong to paralanguage. Japanese has what has been described an apicoprepalatal fricative approximant. This sound is similar to an inbreathed s. It is used as a response to statements that are upsetting or as a sign of deference. Japanese-speakers also use an ingressive bilateral bidental friction as a "pre-turn opening in conversation" or to begin a prayer.
Distribution
Speech technologist Robert Eklund has found reports of ingressive speech in around 50 languages worldwide, dating as far back as Cranz's (1765) "Historie von Grönland" which mentions it in female affirmations among the
Eskimo.
Inhaled affirmative 'yeah'
Several languages include an affirmative "yeah", "yah", "yuh", or "yes" that is made with inhaled breath, which sounds something like a gasp. That is an example of a pulmonic ingressive and is found as follows:
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Dialects of English spoken in Ireland (Hiberno-English) and the Scottish Highlands (Highland English),
[ Robert Eklund (2008): Pulmonic ingressive phonation: Diachronic and synchronic characteristics, distribution and function in animal and human sound production and in human speech, Journal of the International Phonetic Association, vol. 38, no. 3, pp. 235–324.] typically used to express agreement and show attentiveness.
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Dialects of English language spoken in Newfoundland and the Maritimes in Canada.
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Dialects of English spoken in the US state of Maine. The word is often transcribed as "ayup", and people attempting to imitate Maine accent rarely use the ingressive form. It is missing in most Maine-dialect television and Hollywood productions.
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Casual European French language ().
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In Faroese language and Icelandic, entire phrases are sometimes produced ingressively.
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In Danish language, Norwegian, and Swedish language, words like "ja", "jo" (yes), "nei/nej" (no) are often pronounced with inhaled breath. The main function of inhaled speech can be paralinguistic, showing agreement with a statement and encouraging a speaker to continue, but in northern Sweden, "Yes" can be replaced with an inhalation alone.
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In Low German and northern German varieties of standard German, an affirmative "ja" (yes) is sometimes pronounced ingressively, especially for backchanneling.
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In Finnish language joo or juu (yes).
[Cfr. http://www.suomienglantisanakirja.fi/niin third and fourth acceptions]
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In Estonian "jah" (yes) or informally also "jep" (yep).
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In Khalkha Mongolian, the words тийм ("that/yes"), үгүй ("no"), and мэдэхгүй know. ("I don't know") are often pronounced in daily conversation with pulmonic ingressive airflow.
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In Ewe language and other languages of Togo, as well as in parts of Mali and Cameroon and in the Hausa language of southern Niger and northern Nigeria.
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In Philippine languages such as Tagalog language and more forcefully in Waray language and softer in Borongan (Samar Province) or usually spelled in these countries oo and possibly stronger in Oras, Arteche, Dolores (all in Samar). The sound is almost guttural and the aspirant is inhaled, not exhaled, air. Thus, for an English-speaker exhaling the response, the exhaled sound is not understood by native Samar-speakers. The American English trouble expression "" does not approximate it. Eastern, Western, and Northern Samar have different accents in the same dialect.
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