Consonant Clusters

Consonant clusters are sequences of adjacent consonants. They can be further divided by position within the syllable: Onset clusters occur at the beginning of the syllable (play), coda clusters occur at the end of the syllable (help), and heterosyllabic clusters occur when adjacent consonants appear on either side of a syllable boundary (al.pine). Such clusters can be defined and analyzed by their crosslinguistic occurrence and internal structure. The complexity of consonant clusters makes them vulnerable to errors in perception and production during language acquisition, in clinical populations, and in historical language change.