Glottal consonants are
consonants using the
glottis as their primary articulation. Many phoneticians consider them, or at least the so-called
glottal fricative, to be transitional states of the glottis without a point of articulation as other consonants have, while some do not consider them to be consonants at all. However, glottal consonants behave as typical consonants in many languages. For example, in
Literary Arabic, most words are formed from a root
C-C-C consisting of three consonants, which are inserted into templates such as or . The glottal consonants and can occupy any of the three root consonant slots, just like "normal" consonants such as or .