Postalveolar consonants are
consonants articulated with the tongue near or touching the
back of the
alveolar ridge, placing them a bit further back in the mouth than the
alveolar consonants, which are at the ridge itself, but not as far back as the hard
palate (the place of articulation for
palatal consonants).
Among the fricatives and affricates, a subtype called palato-alveolar consonants (see below) are shown with examples in the table. The alveolo-palatal and retroflex consonants are also postalveolar in their point of articulation, but they are given separate columns in the IPA chart, and illustrated with examples in their own articles.
The palato-alveolar sibilants and postalveolar clicks identified by the International Phonetic Alphabet are
The difference between palato-alveolar, alveolo-palatal, retroflex, and several other articulations is in the shape of the tongue rather than the location of the contact with the roof of the mouth. All are postalveolar in that sense.
