occludentes

Occludentes, also known as occlusives or stops, are consonants produced with a complete constriction of the vocal tract that momentarily blocks the airstream and is then released to create a burst of sound. The articulation involves a closure at a particular place of articulation, such as bilabial, labiodental, dental, alveolar, postalveolar, palatal, velar, or glottal. Most descriptions classify the main set as oral stops, which release air through the mouth, for example p, b, t, d, k, g, and the glottal stop ʔ. Some languages also include nasal stops (m, n, ŋ) in the broader occlusive category, since they involve an oral closure with air escaping through the nasal cavity, though nasal stops are often treated as a distinct subcategory.

Occlusives are distinguished by voicing and aspiration. They can be voiceless or voiced, and many languages feature aspirated, unaspirated, or variably aspirated realizations. The place of articulation and voicing together determine a wide range of phonemic contrast in languages worldwide.

In phonology, occlusives contrast with fricatives, which rely on a continuous channel of airflow that produces turbulence, and with approximants, where the constriction is not tight enough to cause turbulent airflow. The behavior of occlusives is central to many phonetic and phonological processes, including voice onset time, aspiration, lenition, and fortition, and they often participate in sound changes across languages.

Overall, occludentes form a core class of consonants used to structure syllables and words, contributing significantly to the phonemic inventory of languages.