# Mechanics of speech: unvocalized mouth sounds
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mechanics-of-speech-unvocalized-mouth-sounds/696085
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [August 21, 2014, 12:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mechanics-of-speech-unvocalized-mouth-sounds/696085 "2014-08-21T12:42:16Z")
**Posts on this page:** 6
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2014, 12:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mechanics-of-speech-unvocalized-mouth-sounds/696085/1 "2014-08-21T12:42:16Z")
Some have names, some not quite or not at all, ASAIK
Whistle: constrict the lips and force air from the lung. But what about the whistle made with the larynx closed and the air forced only by the tongue (usually by rapidly waving it)?
“Tock!” made by a small vacuum by the tongue on the hard pallet, then pulling it off with the larynx closed
The opposite squelching sound made by pushing a cavity of air with the tongue into the hard pallet
A frog call made by trapping air under the tongue, pressing it forward
A slightly different frog call made by trapping air under the tongue, then pressing it backward while opening the jaw.
Pig grunt made with the mouth closed and larynx open, pulling down with the back of the tongue from the soft pallet.
The raspberry - at least there’s a name for this one.
Is there a name for a raspberry without the tongue, just the lips. Either a one-shot “pft!” or a vibrating horse exhalation.
Scientist who study the mechanics of speech are pretty thorough. Do they cover any of this, or was it the proprietary domain of bored kids ?
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### Author:  [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2014, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mechanics-of-speech-unvocalized-mouth-sounds/696085/2 "2014-08-21T14:16:40Z")
There are quite a few languages in which phonemes of the above types commonly occur. Such as Xhosa, the click-language of southern Africa. When Xhosa is transliterated into English, letters of the alphabet are assigned to each of the various click sounds, including the /xh/ in the name of the language. I met a Finnish woman in Swaziland, who had been married to a Swazi man for five years, and had not yet learned how to say her last name.
Even English speakers use them, as in the “tsk tsk” expression of admonishment. In some places, notably Newfoundland, a common assent is to whisper “yeah” while taking in breath.
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### Author:  [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2014, 2:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mechanics-of-speech-unvocalized-mouth-sounds/696085/3 "2014-08-21T14:28:03Z")
There are symbols in the IPA alphabet for all the sounds mentioned that can be done by human beings:
> **[International Phonetic Alphabet](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Phonetic_Alphabet)**
>
> The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is an alphabetic system of phonetic notation based primarily on the Latin script. It was devised by the International Phonetic Association in the late 19th century as a standardized representation of speech sounds in written form. The IPA is used by lexicographers, foreign language students and teachers, linguists, speech–language pathologists, singers, actors, constructed language creators, and translators.
> The IPA is designed to represent those quali...
For the ones that can only be done by other animals, we’ve decided to let them create their own alphabet.
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### Author:  [@Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Itself)
#### Post date: [August 21, 2014, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mechanics-of-speech-unvocalized-mouth-sounds/696085/4 "2014-08-21T21:51:29Z")
IPA covers pretty much any sort of sound used in speech, although it is only used for human language; things like whistles, etc. don’t fall under its ambit. I’m not sure what some of the sounds you describe are (which is pretty much the reason for IPA’s existence), but click sounds are phonemic in Khoisan and related langauges. (Although click sounds exist in other languages, including English, they seem to be an areal feature limited to Africa and specifically southern Africa, at least historically. One hypothesis is that they spread as borrowings from nearby languages to avoid taboo words or names, which would be native to the original language and thus not contain click sounds.) The raspberry sound seems close to a (longer) bilabial trill, and presumably the ‘tock’ sound you describe is some sort of click sound, though I can’t narrow it down based on your description. There are also IPA extensions used in speech pathology that might be applicable here.
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### Author:  [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)
#### Post date: [August 22, 2014, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mechanics-of-speech-unvocalized-mouth-sounds/696085/5 "2014-08-22T01:29:55Z")
Well, to clarify, for a “tock” sound, pull the tip of the tongue off the hard pallet. A deeper sound than “tsk” because the throat is opened for resonance. For a “click,” keep the tip touching the pallet, and release the sound over the side of the tongue.
A couple of other sounds I forgot was a muted squelching of air trapped between the tongue and the pallet, and the cartoon “glugg-glugg” from the glottis.
Basically every sound not a formal consonant but made either by cavitation or plosion, (so my “pft!” is disqualified as a “p”) but all made my mouth so we don’t drag clapping and armpit farts into the picture.
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### Author:  [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)
#### Post date: [August 22, 2014, 9:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mechanics-of-speech-unvocalized-mouth-sounds/696085/6 "2014-08-22T09:12:06Z")
There are various attempts at the equivalent of IPA for sign languages.