A voiced bilabial flap is an uncommon non-rhotic flap. It is usually, and perhaps always, an allophone of the labiodental flap, though it is the preferred allophone in a minority of languages such as Banda and some of its neighbors.

In Mono, the sound has been described as follows:

And, for allophony between the bilabial and labiodental flap,

In the literature, this sound has most often been transcribed with , a modified by an extra-short diacritic. A less frequently used alternative transcription is , a labiodental flap modified by an

advanced diacritic. In addition, the symbol , a W with hook, is supported by SIL Global as a para-IPA transcription for this sound.

Features

Features of a voiced bilabial flap:

  • Its manner of articulation is flap, which normally means it is produced with a single contraction of the muscles so that the tongue makes very brief contact. In this case, being a non-rhotic consonant, the flap is made with the lower lip.

Occurrence

{| class="wikitable"

!colspan=2| Language

! Word

! IPA

! Meaning

! Notes

|-

|Chinese

|Taiwanese Hakka Sixian

|𤸁苶苶仔

|

|'tired'

|

|-

|colspan=2| Mambay

| vbwah

|

| 'fog'

| Phonemic.

|-

|colspan=2| Mangbetu

| colspan=2 style="text-align:center;" |

| 'to refrain'

| In free variation with labiodental flap

|-

|colspan=2| Mono

| vwa

|

| 'send'

| Contrasts with and . In free variation with labiodental flap

|}

Notes

References

Further reading

  • Olson and Hajek, 2001. 'The Geographic and Genetic Distribution of the Labial Flap'