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Demolin & Teston note an average length of contact of 14 ms. This contact is denoted by
a brief interruption of the formant structure and a decrease in signal amplitude during the
closure period. These properties are evident during the time period indicated by the
arrows in Figure 8.1, which shows a spectrogram of the possible word =M= =M=. =M=
Figure 8.1: Waveform and spectrogram of the possible word =M= =M= (Speaker K). The
period of closure is indicated by the arrows.
Note, however, that the closure of the labial flap is not always complete, and so
this acoustic property is not always visible. Sixty percent of the tokens I examined exhibit
an obvious closure. Consider the spectrogram of the word =(M=(H=( =(M=(H=( ‘fierceness’ in Figure
8.2. The general movement of the formant transitions is essentially identical to those of
Figure 8.1 during the onset and release of the flap. However, there is no clear break in the
formant structure nor a drop in signal amplitude. In this case, other acoustic correlates
must be present to identify the flap, which we will turn to now.
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