Oral English for University Students:Plosives

What is a plosive? Why are plosives so called? A plosive consonant is the one whose pronunciation involves the blockage of air in some parts of the articulatory system.When the air is blocked there is also a release of the air before the sound is produced.For instance to pronounce a word like 'pat' which contains two plosive consonants /p/ and /t/,there is first of all a closing of the upper and lower lips which automatically blocks the air inside the mouth.Then there is a release of the air by the opening of the lips.This leads to the pronunciation of the consonant /p/ with a puff of air which is plosion.

This is the concept of air stream mechanism.In pronouncing the stop consonants there is always a stoppage of air movement at some parts of the articulatory system and consequent release of the air which leads to the production of the sound.For instance in the word 'pat' used as an example above we see that to finish up the pronunciation there will be another stoppage of air in some parts of the articulatory system in order to pronounce /t/. Here the tip of the tongue touches the upper palate at the teeth ridge to block the air flow.The tongue is then removed and the air is released leading to the production of the /t/ sound.This is the concept of air stream mechanism.