The voiceless retroflex sibilant affricate is a type of consonantal sound, used in some spokenlanguages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ⟨t̠͡ʂ⟩, sometimes simplified to ⟨tʂ⟩ or ⟨ꭧ⟩, and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is ts`. Its apical variant is ⟨ʈ̺͡ʂ̺⟩ and laminal variant ⟨ʈ̻͡ʂ̻⟩.
Its manner of articulation is sibilantaffricate, 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 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.
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Ladefoged, Peter; Wu, Zongji (1984), "Places of Articulation: An Investigation of Pekingese Fricatives and Affricates", Journal of Phonetics, 11 (3): 267–278, doi:10.1016/S0095-4470(19)30883-6