Retracted tongue root, abbreviated RTR or −ATR, is either
- the neutral position of the tongue during the pronunciation of a vowel, contrasting with advanced tongue root, or
- the retraction of the base of the tongue in the pharynx during the pronunciation of a vowel, the opposite articulation of advanced tongue root. In this case it is in effect partial pharyngealization, although it may also contrast with full pharyngealization.
The diacritic for RTR in the International Phonetic Alphabet is the right tack, .
RTR vowels are often called "lax", but this is not consistent between languages or even between vowels in the same language.
Read more about this topic: Advanced And Retracted Tongue Root
Famous quotes containing the words retracted, tongue and/or root:
“For it is wretchedness that endures, shedding its cancerous light on all it approaches:
Words spoken in the heat of passion, that might have been retracted in good time,
All good intentions, all that was arguable.”
—John Ashbery (b. 1927)
“Why, what a wasp-stung and impatient fool
Are thou to break into this woman’s mood,
Tying thine ear to no tongue but thine own!”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“Flower in the crannied wall,
I pluck you out of the crannies,
I hold you here, root and all, in my hand,
Little flower—but if I could understand
What you are, root and all, and all in all,
I should know what God and man is.”
—Alfred Tennyson (1809–1892)