Consonant series

Consonant position sets

Consonants are in sets, related through a four-way contrast system.

w m pʰ b f v

l n tʰ d θ ð

s z

ʧ ʤ ʃ ʒ

ŋ k ɡ

These are related as such:

w m pʰ b f v

Notice that all six of these sounds are based on the lips.

f and v use only ONE lip, touching the top teeth.

w

w is a glide sound, made by closing the lips into a tight circle (without touching together) and then opening them again.

Glide

Glide is a continuous sound that is shaped by mouth movement into and out of a narrowest point.

m

m is a nasal sound.

Nasal

Nasal is a sound that exits through the nose.

pʰ and b

Both pʰ and b are plosive, bilabial sounds.

pʰ is unvoiced, and has breath (aspirated), while b is voiced, and has no breath.

Bilabial

Bilabial is a sound that you make by using two lips.

f and v

Both f and v are fricative, labiodental sounds.

f is unvoiced, and has breath, while v is voiced, and has no breath.

Labiodental

Labiodental is a sound that you make by using your top teeth pressed on your bottom lip.

Four-way contrast comparison table

As an experiment, I'll present this information laid out in two different ways. Please let me know which you find more easy to understand.

	vocal	breath	position	method
w	voiced	unaspirated	bilabial	glide
m	voiced	unaspirated	bilabial	nasal
pʰ	unvoiced	aspirated	bilabial	plosive
b	voiced	unaspirated	bilabial	plosive
f	unvoiced	aspirated	labiodental	fricative
v	voiced	unaspirated	labiodental	fricative

w	m	pʰ	b	f	v
voiced	voiced	unvoiced	voiced	unvoiced	voiced
unaspirated	unaspirated	aspirated	unaspirated	aspirated	unaspirated
bilabial	bilabial	bilabial	bilabial	labiodental	labiodental
glide	nasal	plosive	plosive	fricative	fricative

Note that both bilabial sounds pʰ and b are plosive, and both labiodental sounds f and v are fricatives.

This reinforces the contrast between them.

If you make the bilabial sounds into fricatives, we will hear the fricative counterparts, although we will be uncertain.

Swapping plosives with fricatives

you want to say	you say	we hear	reason
pʰ	ɸ	f?	You made the plosive into a fricative. We hear the airflow and recognise it as a fricative, which must be /f/ because we don't have /ɸ/.
b	β	v?	You made the plosive into a fricative. We hear the continuous vibration and recognise it as a fricative, which must be /v/ because we don't have /β/.
f	p̪	pʰ?	You made the fricative into a plosive. We can't hear the necessary airflow to recognise it as a fricative, and there is a sudden burst, so it sounds like a plosive. It must be /pʰ/ because we don't have /p̪/.
v	b̪	b?	You made the fricative into a plosive. We can't hear the necessary vibration to recognise it as a fricative, and there is a sudden burst, so it sounds like a plosive. It must be /b/ because we don't have /b̪/.

Some L1 languages cause English learners to mix these sounds up even further:

you want to say	you say	we hear	reason
f	p̚	p?	You made the fricative into an unreleased stop. We can't hear the necessary airflow to recognise it as a fricative, and there is a sudden stop, with no audible release. We don't use unreleased stops at the end of words, so not only does the final sound sound wrong, but we also can't be sure of what sound you said. Words with a final /f/ ⟨f⟩ & ⟨gh⟩ are common problems for Vietnamese speakers: if, laugh, wife, life, safe, etc.
v	p̚	p?	You made the fricative into an unreleased stop. We can't hear the necessary airflow to recognise it as a fricative, and there is a sudden stop, with no audible release. We don't use unreleased stops at the end of words, so not only does the final sound sound wrong, but we also can't be sure of what sound you said. Words with a final /v/ ⟨v⟩ are common problems for Vietnamese speakers: give, gave, live, five, have, etc.
p	p̚	p?	You made the plosive-stop into an unreleased stop. We can't hear the necessary tiny burst of air to recognise it as a plosive-stop. You, the speaker, can probably discern the final stop position, but this is because you hear the shape of how the vowel closes. We cannot hear this. Additionally, an unreleased stop is in English as the glottal stop, which is reserved for T (and K in rare cases). We don't use unreleased stops at the end of words, so not only does the final sound sound wrong, but we also can't be sure of what sound you said. Words with a final /p/ ⟨p⟩ are common problems for Vietnamese speakers: top, cup, tip, map, stop, etc.
b	p̚	p?	You made the plosive-stop into an unreleased stop. We can't hear the necessary tiny burst of air to recognise it as a plosive-stop. You, the speaker, can probably discern the final stop position, but this is because you hear the shape of how the vowel closes. We cannot hear this. Additionally, an unreleased stop is in English as the glottal stop, which is reserved for T (and K in rare cases). We don't use unreleased stops at the end of words, so not only does the final sound sound wrong, but we also can't be sure of what sound you said. Words with a final /b/ ⟨b⟩ are common problems for Vietnamese speakers: job, etc.

Consonant method sets

Consonants can also be grouped by method instead of by position, which adds a second dimension to your mental model to store & access the phonemes of a language.

pʰ b tʰ d ʧ ʤ kʰ ɡ

f v θ ð s z ʃ ʒ h

m n ŋ

w l ɹ j ɫ ʍ

plosives	pʰ	b	tʰ	d				ʧ	ʤ	kʰ	ɡ
fricatives	f	v	θ	ð	s	z		ʃ	ʒ			h
nasals		m		n							ŋ
approximants		w		l			ɹ		j		ɫ	ʍ

plosives	pʰ b	tʰ d			ʧ ʤ	kʰ ɡ
fricatives	f v	θ ð	s z		ʃ ʒ		h
nasals	m	n				ŋ
approximants	w	l		ɹ	j	ɫ	ʍ

Swapping aspirated and unaspirated

you want to say	you say	we hear
pʰ	p	b
tʰ	t	d
ʧ	c	ʤ
kʰ	k	ɡ