z (Pinyin) ʦ (IPA)

Voiceless alveolar affricate
The voiceless alveolar sibilant affricate is a type of consonantal sound, used in some spoken languages. The sound is transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet with ⟨t͡s⟩ or ⟨t͜s⟩ (formerly with ⟨ʦ⟩). The voiceless alveolar affricate occurs in such languages as German, Cantonese, Russian, Japanese and Mandarin Chinese, among many others. International auxiliary languages, such as Esperanto, Ido and Interlingua also include this sound.

Features of the voiceless alveolar sibilant affricate:

• Its manner of articulation is sibilant affricate, which means it is produced by first stopping the air flow entirely, then directing it with the tongue to the sharp edge of the teeth, causing high-frequency turbulence.
• Its place of passive articulation is alveolar, which means it is articulated with the tongue at the alveolar ridge just behind the gums.
• Its place of active articulation is either apical, meaning that the tongue tip contacts the alveolar ridge, or, more often, laminal, meaning that the tongue blade (the part just behind the top) contacts the alveolar ridge, with the tongue tip resting behind the lower front teeth roots.
• Its phonation is voiceless, which means it is produced without vibrations of the vocal cords. In some languages the vocal cords are actively separated, so it is always voiceless; in others the cords are lax, so that it may take on the voicing of adjacent sounds.
• It is an oral consonant, which means air is allowed to escape through the mouth only.
• It is a central consonant, which means it is produced by directing the airstream along the center of the tongue, rather than to the sides.
• The airstream mechanism is pulmonic, which means it is articulated by pushing air solely with the lungs and diaphragm, as in most sounds.