Linguolabial consonant

Linguolabials or apicolabials^[1] are consonants articulated by putting the tip of the tongue against the top-side of the lip. The lip then goes to the tongue.

Linguolabial consonants are not seen very often in languages, but they are not very hard to make with your mouth, unlike click consonants or ejectives. Some languages that do have lots of linguolabial consonants are Vanuatu, Bijago, in Umotína and as paralinguistic sounds. They can be sometimes seen in disordered speech.^[2][3][4]

They can be typed as U+033C  ̼ COMBINING SEAGULL BELOW to the alveolar consonant that fits it. You can also use the apical diacritic, U+033A  ̺ COMBINING INVERTED BRIDGE BELOW to the bilabial consonant that fits it.^[5]

1. ↑ The term apicolabial is older, but Ladefoged and Maddieson point out that often these sounds are not apical.
2. ↑ Everett 1982. sfn error: no target: CITEREFEverett1982 (help)
3. ↑ Maddieson 1988, p. 350.
4. ↑ Maddieson 1988, pp. 364–367.
5. ↑ Pullum & Ladusaw, Phonetic Symbol Guide, 1996:256. They note that the apical diacritic was added to the IPA after the linguolabial diacritic, and would have made the latter unnecessary.