Open 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 | 305 |
| IPA – text | ɑ |
| IPA – image |  |
| Entity | ɑ |
| X-SAMPA | A |
| Kirshenbaum | A |
| Sound sample | |
The open 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 ɑ, and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is A. The symbol ɑ is called script a because it lacks the extra hook on top of a printed letter 'a', which corresponds to a different vowel, the open front unrounded vowel. Script a, which has its linear stroke on the bottom right, should not be confused with turned script a ɒ, which has its linear stroke on the top left and corresponds to a rounded version of this vowel, the open back rounded vowel.
Contents |
[edit] Features
- Its vowel height is open, which means the tongue is positioned as far as possible from the roof of the mouth.
- 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 not rounded.
[edit] Occurrence
| Language | Word | IPA | Meaning | Notes | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Angor | ape | [ɑpe] | 'father' | ||
| Arabic | Standard[1] | طويل | [tˤɑˈwiːl] | 'tall' | Allophone of long and short /a/ near emphatic consonants. See Arabic phonology |
| Dutch | bad | [bɑt] | 'bath' | Backness varies among dialects. See Dutch phonology | |
| English | GA | spa | [spɑː] | 'spa' | See English phonology |
| RP | |||||
| Finnish | kana | [kɑnɑ] | 'hen' | See Finnish phonology | |
| French[2] | pâte | [pɑt] | 'dough' | Only in dialects that distinguish pâte from patte. See French phonology | |
| Georgian[3] | გუდა | [gudɑ] | 'leather bag' | ||
| Hungarian | bal | [bɑ̽l] | 'left' | See Hungarian phonology | |
| Navajo | ashkii | [ɑʃkɪː] | 'boy' | ||
| Norwegian | hat | [hɑːt] | 'hate' | See Norwegian phonology | |
| Plautdietsch | Gott | [gɑ̽t] | 'God' | ||
| Russian[4] | палка | [ˈpɑɫkə] | 'stick' | Only occurs both before /ɫ/ and after an unpalatalized consonant. See Russian phonology | |
| Swedish | hаt | [ˈhɑːt] | 'hate' | See Swedish phonology | |
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ Thelwall (1990:39)
- ^ Fougeron & Smith (1993:73)
- ^ Shosted & Chikovani (2006:261-262)
- ^ Jones & Ward (1969:50)
[edit] Bibliography
- Fougeron, Cecile & Caroline L Smith (1993), "Illustrations of the IPA:French", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 23 (2): 73-76
- Jones, Daniel & Ward Dennis (1969), The Phonetics of Russian, Cambridge University Press
- Shosted, Ryan K. & Chikovani Vakhtang (2006), "Standard Georgian", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 36 (2): 255-264
- Thelwall, Robin (1990), "Illustrations of the IPA: Arabic", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 20 (2): 37-41
