The háng reading means 'throat' and survives almost entirely in the set phrase 引吭高歌, literally 'draw out the throat and sing high', meaning to sing loudly and freely. For everyday 'to make a sound', the character is read kēng.
Left mouth radical, a small square for parted lips, here standing in for the throat behind them. It indexes 吭 in the throat-and-voice family: 喉 (throat), 咽 (swallow), 嗓 (voice). It names the act of letting a sound out of the throat.
Right side 亢 supplies the sound: kàng drifting to kēng, and háng in the other reading. Same phonetic powers 抗 (resist), 炕 (brick bed), 杭. It depicts a person with the neck stretched high, which lines up neatly with the throat sense.
