Palatal Approximant

Palatal Approximant

The voiced palatal approximant is a type of consonantal sound used in many spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ⟨j⟩. The equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is j, or equivalently, i_^, and in the Americanist phonetic notation it is ⟨y⟩. Because the name of the letter jay may be confusing when used to refer to this sound, the palatal approximant is sometimes called yod instead.

In the writing systems used for most of the languages of Central, Northern and Eastern Europe, the letter j denotes the palatal approximant, as in German Jahr 'year'. This is the IPA usage, and although it may be counter-intuitive for English speakers, it does occur with this sound in a few English words, such as hallelujah and Jägermeister.

In linguistics, the palatal approximant is sometimes called after the Semitic letter yod, as in the phonological history terms yod-dropping and yod-coalescence.

In Ancient Greek grammar, the palatal approximant, which was lost early in the history of Greek, is sometimes written as ι̯ (iota with the inverted breve below, the non-syllabic diacritic or marker of a semivowel).