Nenäänteet
Nenäänteet, or nasal consonants, are a class of speech sounds produced by allowing air to flow through the nasal cavity while the mouth is closed or nearly closed. In phonetics, they are characterized by nasalization—resonance in the nasal passage—distinct from oral consonants.
Nasal consonants are categorized by place of articulation:
- **Molkaisten nenäänteet** (soft palate nasal consonants): include bilabial /m/, alveolar /n/, and velar /ŋ/. These involve lowering
- **Häntänenenäänteet** (alveolar nasal consonants): such as /n/ and lateral nasal /l̃/.
- **Labial nenäänteet** (labial nasal consonants): e.g., /m/ and nasalized /w/.
Production requires simultaneous oral closure (or partial closure) and velar lowering, creating a unique nasal resonance.
Nasal consonants are vital to language structure: they affect stress, intonation, and word boundaries. In Finnish,
Overall, nenäänteet are key phonetic features that enrich the expressive and structural complexity of spoken languages.