Affricates /ʧ/ and /ʤ/ 

/ʧ/ and /ʤ/ are the only affricates in English. An affricate is a phoneme which combines a plosive (or stop) with an immediately following fricative. In other words, an affricate begins like a stop, but ends like a fricative. So, to create /ʧ/, air is briefly prevented from leaving the vocal tract when the tip of the tongue presses against the back tooth ridge while the sides of the tongue press against the upper side teeth. In this way all air is blocked. Then the tongue pulls back to create friction, creating turbulence. /ʤ/ is voiced and is the counterpart to the unvoiced /ʧ/. So to say /dʒ/, additionally, voice the vocal cord. The voiceless affricate ‘ch’ is pronounced twice in the word ‘church’, and the voiced affricate ‘j’ is pronounced twice in the word ‘judge’.

/ʧ/, /ʤ/ minimal pairs

chain Jane

char jar

charred jarred

Chas jazz

cheer jeer

cheese G’s

cherry Jerry

chess Jess

chest jest

chested jested

Chester jester

chew Jew

chill Jill

chin gin

chip gyp

chive jive

choice Joyce

choke joke

choker joker

chug jug

chump jump

chunk junk

chunky junkie

etching edging

batch badge

beseech besiege

catch cadge

cinch singe

etch edge

H age

hotchpotch hodgepodge

Larch large

leach liege

leech liege

lunch lunge

March Marge

perch purge

perched purged

retch (or wretch) Reg

rich ridge

search surge

searches surges

splotch splodge

These are sentences with /ʧ/, /ʤ/ sounds.

The judge went to church, not to jail.

The catcher was joking with the pitcher.

John is chasing the pigeons away from the hedge.

The children were jumping and playing catch.

The Jeep is not cheap.

We moved the strange furniture to the garage. 

Sometimes they cheer; sometimes they jeer.

I wasn’t sure whether he was joking or choking.

She ate her jello while playing the cello.

They’re Jane’s chains.