/ʃ/

The /ʃ/: the sound of asking for quiet

The /ʃ/ is a voiceless consonant: only air comes out, with no vibration of the vocal cords. It's the shhh you use to ask for quiet. Spanish has no such phoneme, which is why we tend to replace it with ch or s.

How it's made

• 👄 Mouth: lips slightly rounded and pushed forward.
• 👅 Tongue: close to the palate, leaving a narrow channel for the air.
• 🔊 Voice: voiceless — put a hand on your throat: it shouldn't vibrate.

You hear it in: she · shop · shoes · fish · nation

⚠️ The typical Spanish-speaker mistake: turning it into a ch. She pronounced chi is the most common error, because Spanish associates that area of the mouth with the affricate.

By the end you'll be able to: hold the /ʃ/ as a continuous stream of air, without the initial burst of a ch.