velaric

Velaric is an adjective used in linguistics to describe either something related to the velum or to the velaric airstream mechanism used to produce certain consonants. The velum, or soft palate, is the rear boundary of the oral cavity; sounds described as velar typically involve a constriction at the velum, as with k and g, though the term velaric is more often encountered in reference to air flow than to place of articulation.

In phonetics, the velaric airstream mechanism is a method of generating speech sounds by trapping air inside the oral cavity and releasing it through a closure, rather than exhaling from the lungs or using the glottis. Velaric sounds are most famous for their role in click consonants. In a typical velaric click, two closures are made—one at the velum and a front closure in the oral cavity—trapping a pocket of air. When the front closure is released, the compressed air moves inward, producing a distinct click. The mechanism is ingressive (air drawn into the mouth) rather than egressive.

Velaric clicks are most extensively documented in the languages of southern Africa, particularly the Khoisan language family, though click phenomena have been reported in some neighboring Bantu languages and other African languages through contact and loanwords. The term velaric thus designates the airstream mechanism rather than the tongue’s exact place of articulation for the click, which can be dental, alveolar, palatal, or lateral.