CONSONANT GROUPS: WHAT THEY ARE AND EXAMPLES - LITERATURE - 2025

The consonant groups are coocurrences two or more consonants in the same position in a syllable. A consonant is a speech sound that occurs with some restriction or closure in the vocal tract. Now, the existence of these consonant groups is determined by each language in particular.

In fact, in some Asian languages ​​such as Cantonese or Korean this phenomenon does not occur. In other languages, such as English, the initial syllable can have up to three consonants, while at the end of the syllable there can be consonant groups of up to four units.

Some languages ​​have a greater number of consonant clusters (like Italian and Russian) than others (like Portuguese and Turkish). In the case of Turkish, it does not have consonant groups at the beginning of the syllable, but at the end.

On the other hand, some experts have calculated that most languages ​​have consonant clusters at the beginning and end of the syllable. 39% have only initial groups and 13% have only final groups.

What are the consonant groups?

In the Spanish language, consonant groups in syllabic initial position (called "attack" in phonology) are formed with stop consonants or sound + liquid sounds or.

Thus, in the case of possible sequences they are,,,,, and. With respect to, you have,,,, and.

Note that the sequence is not produced in this language. In fact, in the few cases when this combination occurs, they are pronounced in two different syllables (for example, ad-la-te-res).

As for, this group does not appear in words of Latin origin, but it is very common especially in the Spanish of Mexico. Many place names and common words taken from Nahuatl have this sequence.

For example, there are the words tlacuache (marsupial mammal), chahuistle (a fungus that damages corn, wheat and other grasses), tlacoyo (a kind of corn tortilla) and Tlaxcala (state of Mexico).

Throughout Latin America, the Canary Islands and the northwest of the peninsula, this sequence is part of the attack (a-tlas, a-tle-ta). However, in most of Spain it is pronounced in different syllables (at-las, at-le-ta).

Now, in the case of the coda (syllabic final position) the consonant clusters are quite unusual. Most occur in words that have been borrowed from other languages, including Latin.

Reductions

Several consonant groups that were in the Latin syllables were simplified in the passage from Latin to Castilian Romance. Especially it happened with those that contained, like that (ipse), but also with others: year (annu).

Later, in the Middle Ages, several words from Latin and Greek were incorporated into the Spanish lexicon. This resulted in unusual consonant clusters in both the attack and the coda: psyche, forceps.

At present there is a tendency to simplify the pronunciation of many of these words (called phonetic reduction), although many of the spellings are preserved.

Thus, we have the words psalms (psalmos), mnemonic (the spelling "mnemonic" is accepted), obscuro ("dark" is accepted), nostic (gnostic), psychic (accepted psychic), among others.

Examples

Below are some examples of the most common consonant clusters in Spanish. To illustrate each of these popular tongue twisters are used.

Sequence

"Let me first prepare paprica to papricate my first meal and being already papricada I get ready to begin to swallow this first papricada meal".

"Petronio Prieto Pretoriano mainly practices prestidigitation and boasts prestidigitator prestige."

Sequence

"The witch wanted to unbewitched the witch and the witch Maruja wanted to bewitch the witch, but the witch Maruja asked if the witch would not be bewitched and the witch asked if the witch would unbewitched."

"The free hare leaps overjoyed, overjoyed the free hare leaps, does the free hare leap overjoyed? The free hare jumps overjoyed.

Sequence

"Isidro Piedra with cider hydrates Alondra's ivy dramatically dramatist".

“The crocodile crocodile breeds crocodile crocodiles. The crocodile that does not breed crocodile crocodiles, breeds crocodile not crocodile ”.

Sequence

“A cacatrepa with four cacatrepitos, when the cacatrepa climbs, the four cacatrepitos climb”.

“Three sad tigers were swallowing wheat in a wheat field. Three sad tigers swallowed wheat in three sad junk ”.

Sequence

"The acrobat created an incredible crossword to the aristocrat about the cruel secret of the skull of the creature from Croatia."

"Don Pedro Pérez Crespo had a filly: the mane curled, the tail curled and the rump curled."

Sequence

“Gregorio, the farmer, groups the sandhill cranes with currant grains. And yell at the grumpy ogre crab. "

“Graciana Granada Crane growls and screams in a large grotto of grams of granite. In a large grotto of grams of granite, Graciana Granada Grulla growls and screams ”.

Sequence

“Fresh fruit like fresh strawberry refreshes me. What a delicious strawberry! What a fresh strawberry! How tasty the strawberry!

“Francisco Freire Frías frugally rubs fresh border friezes frantically fragmenting frigid gathered fronds.

Sequence

"Plauto Publio Pliego folds foldable, folding, pleasant, waterproof and reusable sheets".

"Pablo Pliego and Plácido Plazola, both banana trees, plant banana trees in the plantation."

Sequence

"On a block Pablo speaks to the population of the town of Puebla, and poor Pedro believes that Pablo is a plablador."

"Kind is terrible, with his saber he cuts an oak with a greatsword."

Sequence

Some Nahuatl loanwords include: teponaztli (musical instrument of Mesoamerican origin), Nahuatlato (who speaks the Nahuatl language), Nahuatlismos (words of Nahuatl origin) and Mazatlán (Mexico City).

In addition, there are other words in common use: Atlanta, athletics, pentathlon, Hitler, transatlantic, Atlantis, triathlons, among others.

Sequence

"The parrot's face clears up with chlorine, of course, with chlorine, the parrot's face clears up."

"Clara Clarisa claridosa clarifies clear and clarifies Claudia's harpsichord with chlorine, Claudia's harpsichord with chlorine clarifies clear and clarifies Clara Clarisa claridosa".

Sequence

“Many balloons Gloria inflated: a yellow balloon and a green balloon, a blue balloon and a brown balloon. Gloria inflated so many balloons that it finally deflated ”.

"The English gladiator with a ganglion that brought together the glory by the rule of the hieroglyph, fixed the church igloo."

Sequence

“The skinny girl from Florida who plays the flute wears bangs. And it flips when it floats fluently alongside lazy flamenco ”.

“The Flores family has a vase full of flowers. They live on Florida Street in the Flores district, they spend their days watering and watching the flowers bloom from their flower shop, which is the best in Florida ”.

References

1. Fromkin, V.; Rodman, R. and Hyams, N. (2018). An Introduction to Language. Boston: Cengage Learning.
2. McLeod, S. (2010). Laying the foundations for multilingual acquisition: an international overview of speech acquisition. In M. Cruz-Ferreira, (editor), Multilingual Norms, pp. 53 -72. Frankfurt: Peter Lang.
3. Vennemann, T. (2012). Structural complexity of consonant clusters: A phonologist's view. In P. Hoole, L. Bombien, M. Pouplier, C. Mooshammer and B. Kühnert (editors), Consonant Clusters and Structural Complexity, pp. 9-32. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter.
4. Martínez, JA (2004). Write without mistakes: basic spelling manual. Oviedo: EdiUno.
5. Hualde, JI (2005). The Sounds of Spanish. New York: Cambridge University Press.
6. Veciana, R. (2004). The Spanish accentuation: new manual of the accentual norms. Ed. Santander: University of Cantabria.