Affricates: The Hybrid Consonant 🌋 + 🚰

Affricates are a combination of stops and fricatives - kinda like a mixing of paints or colours. A hybrid.

Affricates - the hybrids. Affricates are the literal combination of a stop and fricative.

A + B = AB

They start off like a stop, with air pressure built up and released. Then the air continues to be released through a narrow channel as a fricative, not all at once like a stop. The way you can imagine it is like a volcano erupting - lots of built-up pressure with lots of force at first, and then immediately after that initial release, like a narrowed hose that has a constant stream afterwards.

In English, there are two affricate sounds.

1. /tʃ/

/tʃ/ is the combination of /t/ (a stop) and /ʃ/ (a fricative). Now you won't yet recognize these symbols, but they are the symbol for the T-sound and the SH-sound.

• /t/ is the T-sound in tap, too, time. Nothing special about it.

• /ʃ/ is the SH-sound is shush, shoot**,** lash. This weird S shaped symbol is the symbol for the sound. The sound. Not the spelling.

💡 As we delve more into sounds, it's important to remember that we are paying attention to the sound and sometimes the sound doesn't always match the spelling. For example, in the word nation, you don't make a T-sound but instead a SH-sound

The combination of the T-sound and SH-sound gets you a TCH-sound. You can represent it with /tʃ/ symbol.

The TCH-sound appears in English:

• at the beginning of words like in “chick”;

• middle of words like in "catcher;

• and, at the end of words like “match”.

Air is blocked with the tongue when you start with the T-sound and then the pressure moves just behind the alveolar ridge or ridge behind the teeth into the post-alveolar space, then released as a fricative. You should feel the most tongue pressure move back slightly along the roof of your mouth.

2. /dʒ/

/dʒ/ is the combination of /d/ (a stop) and /ʒ/ (a fricative). Again, you won't yet recongize some of these symbols, but they are the symbol for the D-sound and the ZH-sound.

• /d/ is the D-sound in dog, dad and lead. Nothing special about it.

• /ʒ/ is the ZH-sound in measure and vision. This weird 3 shaped symbol is the symbol for the sound. Again. Just the sound. Not the spelling.

The combination of the D-sound and ZH-sound gets you the DG-sound. You can represent it with the /dʒ/ symbol.

The DG-sound appears in English:

• at the beginning of words like in “jam”;

• middle of words like in "badger";

• and, at the end of words like “judge”

💡 Although the spelling of words like "judge" have letters at the end following the DG-sound, they don't actually make a sound. The DG-sound is the last sound.

Air is blocked with tongue just beyond the alveolar ridge (post-alveolar), then released as a fricative just like the /tʃ/. In fact, everything about the position of the sound, the tongue placement is all the same. The key difference though, is the vocal cord vibrations or voicing is present in /dʒ/ (the DG-sound) and not /tʃ/ (TCH-sound).

And those are the 2 English affricates. Other languages have other affricates like a TS-sound in Mandarin Chinese. We just don't have those sounds in English.

Non-native English speakers will initially have difficulty combining these two separate sounds quickly - especially if your native language doesn't have affricates. You don't expect others to produce complex movements for the first time easily or quickly. So, be patient with yourself and don't place similar unreasonable expectations on yourself either!

Just think about juggling. You just throw a ball in the air and catch it, then toss it to your other hand. Then catch it, toss it back up in the air. and then catch it with the first hand. It's so simple with one ball at a time. Now you add 2 or 3 balls and the whole thing becomes exponentially harder.

You wouldn't expect someone to grasp the concept immediately.

Spending 10-15 minutes practicing the mouth movements slowly and precisely is important. The speed will come as you get more comfortable and familiar with the mouth movements!

Give it a try! And keep an ear out for hearing those TCH and DG sounds!