Close central compressed vowel

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The close central compressed vowel is a type of vowel sound, used in some spoken languages. There is no symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound.

[edit] Features

• Its vowel height is close, which means the tongue is positioned as close as possible to the roof of the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant.
• Its vowel backness is central, which means the tongue is positioned halfway between a front vowel and a back vowel.
• Its vowel roundedness is compressed, which means the corners of the mouth are drawn slightly together and the lips may be compressed horizontally, but do not protrude.

[edit] Occurs in

There is no official diacritic for compression. An old diacritic for labialization, [  ̫], will be used here as an ad hoc symbol.

• Norwegian gul [gʉ̫ːl] "yellow"

This vowel is typically transcribed as [ʉ]. It also occurs in some dialects of Swedish, but see also close front compressed vowel. The back vowels of Norwegian and Swedish are also compressed. See close back compressed vowel.