Glottal dynamics during Hindi bilabial plosives and the glottal fricative

The dynamics of glottal behavior during the production of bilabial plosives and the glottal fricative was investigated in Hindi, which possesses contrasts between aspirated and unaspirated plosives, both in voiced and unvoiced categories. Minimal pairs of meaningful and nonsense words with /p/, /ph/, /b/, /bh/, and /h/ occurring in prevocalic, intervocalic, and postvocalic positions were embedded in the sentence /didi‐bolIye/. Photoelectric glottograms together with audio signal were recorded and examined. The results indicate that (1) the opening gesture of the glottis is a necessary condition for the production of the glottal fricative and unaspirated plosives, both voiced and unvoiced; (2) unaspirated plosives, both voiced and unvoiced, may be produced with or without opening gesture of the glottis; (3) regardless of aspiration, voiced plosives are produced with uninterrupted vocal‐fold vibrations, whereas unvoiced plosives are not; (4) glottal fricative is produced without interruption of vocal‐fold v...