Voiced Alveopalatal Fricative in English

The voiced alveopalatal fricative is not so common in English. The voiceless counterpart is far more common. Let us look at a few words in which the voiced alveopalatal fricative occurs.

Here is a list of ten words:

Asia
beige
casual
decision
garage
massage
measure
pleasure
treasure
visual

The voiced alveopalatal fricative often occurs word-medially. Notice that the word-medial position is also intervocalic as in Asia and decision. In fewer cases the fricative occurs word-finally as in beige and massage. The fricative seldom occurs word-initially. One example is genre, a word borrowed from French.

The voiced alveopalatal fricative is less common than other English fricatives. Among Germanic languages, only English has the sound. It is also found in French. The voiced alveopalatal fricative is most common in word-medial position but rare in word-initial.