Close back unrounded vowel
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See also: IPA, Consonants
| Edit - 2× | Front | Near-front | Central | Near-back | Back |
| Close | |||||
| Near‑close | |||||
| Close‑mid | |||||
| Mid | |||||
| Open‑mid | |||||
| Near‑open | |||||
| Open | |||||
Where symbols appear in pairs, the one to the right
represents a rounded vowel.
represents a rounded vowel.
| IPA – number | 316 |
| IPA – text | ɯ |
| IPA – image |  |
| Entity | ɯ |
| X-SAMPA | M |
| Kirshenbaum | u- |
| Sound sample | |
|---|---|
The close back unrounded vowel is a type of vowel sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ɯ, and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is M. The IPA symbol is a turned letter m, although given its relation to the sound represented by the letter u, it can be considered a u with an extra "bowl". The sound is sometimes referred to as "unrounded u".
[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 back, which means the tongue is positioned as far back as possible in the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant.
- Its vowel roundedness is unrounded, which means that the lips are spread.
[edit] Occurrence
| Language | Word | IPA | Meaning | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Azeri | qırx | [ɡɯrx] | 'forty | |
| Korean | '음식' | [ˈɯːmɕik] | 'food' | |
| Scottish Gaelic | caol | [kɯːl] | 'strait' | |
| Turkish | ılık | [ɯˈɫɯk] | 'mild' | |
| Vietnamese | tư | [tɯ̄] | 'fourth' | See Vietnamese phonology |
[edit] See also
- The symbol /ɯ/ is often used to transcribe the close back compressed vowel found in Japanese listen , which is written as う or ウ.
- The same symbol with a mid-centralizing diacritic, /ɯ̽/, is sometimes used for the near-close near-back unrounded vowel.
