dental
dental — adjective
1. connected with the hard white structures in the mouth that people use for biting
connected with the hard white structures in the mouth that people use for biting and chewing, or with the medical care of these structures.
Nala brushes her teeth every morning and night for good dental health.
collocation: dental health
The dental clinic on Main Street is open on Saturdays for emergencies.
collocation: dental clinic
Lan's dental insurance covers two professional cleanings per year.
After the cycling accident, Tanvi needed emergency dental treatment.
- oral
broader — covers the whole mouth, not just teeth (oral hygiene vs. dental hygiene)
文法句型
dental + noun
用法筆記
Dental in this sense is almost always used before a noun. You can say dental care or dental appointment, but it is not used after a linking verb (*This care is dental).
常見錯誤
2. describes a type of spoken sound for which the tongue presses against or nearly
describes a type of spoken sound for which the tongue presses against or nearly touches the top front row of teeth.
Bilal mastered the dental /θ/ sound by practising in front of the mirror every day.
dental + /θ/ sound
A phonetics tutor showed Noa how to tell dental consonants apart from alveolar ones.
collocation: dental consonant
Ife's Cantonese teacher explained that neither /θ/ nor /ð/ are dental sounds in Chinese.
Harper noticed that the /t/ in Italian sounds softer because it is a dental stop.
文法句型
dental + noun (consonant, sound, fricative, stop)
用法筆記
This is a technical term used in phonetics and language teaching. It appears before the noun it modifies: dental consonant, dental fricative, dental stop. A dental sound contrasts with sounds made at other places of articulation, such as bilabial (lips) or alveolar (gum ridge).
常見錯誤
dental — noun
1. a consonant that belongs to the phonological class of speech sounds produced wit
a consonant that belongs to the phonological class of speech sounds produced with the tongue against the upper front teeth.
Otis labelled all the dentals in the phonetic transcription of the Turkish sentence.
plural: dentals
During a Spanish tutoring session, Ignacio learned that /t/ is a dental, not an alveolar.
Hyun transcribed the dentals from the recording for his linguistics assignment.
Élise was surprised that Hindi has four different dentals in its consonant system.
- dental consonant
the full technical term; clearer for beginners than dental alone
文法句型
a dental / the dental / dentals
用法筆記
This countable noun is mainly used in phonetics textbooks and linguistics courses. The plural form dentals refers to the whole class of such sounds. Do not use it to mean 'a dentist' or 'dental treatment.'