Close-mid back unrounded vowel

Close-mid back unrounded vowel
ɤ
IPA number 315
Encoding
Entity (decimal) ɤ
Unicode (hex) U+0264
X-SAMPA 7
Kirshenbaum o-
Braille ⠲ (braille pattern dots-256)⠕ (braille pattern dots-135)
Sound
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The close-mid back unrounded vowel, or high-mid back unrounded vowel, is a type of vowel sound, used in some spoken languages. Acoustically it is a close-mid back-central unrounded vowel.[1] Its symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet is ⟨ɤ⟩, called "ram's horns". It is distinct from the symbol for the voiced velar fricative, ⟨ɣ⟩, which has a descender.

The IPA prefers terms "close" and "open" for vowels, and the name of the article follows this. However, a large number of linguists, perhaps a majority, prefer the terms "high" and "low".

Before the 1989 IPA Convention, the symbol for the close-mid back unrounded vowel was ⟨⟩, sometimes called "baby gamma", which has a flat top. The symbol was revised to be ⟨⟩, "ram's horns", with a rounded top, in order to better differentiate it from the Latin gamma ⟨ɣ⟩.[2] Unicode provides only U+0264 ɤ LATIN SMALL LETTER RAMS HORN (HTML ɤ), but in some fonts this character may appear as a "baby gamma" instead.

Features

IPA vowel chart
Front Near-​front Central Near-​back Back
Close
•iy
•ɨʉ
•ɯu
•ɪʏ
•eø
•ɘɵ
•ɤo
•ɛœ
•ɜɞ
•ʌɔ
•æ
•aɶ
•ɑɒ
Near-close
Close-mid
Mid
Open-mid
Near-open
Open
Paired vowels are: unrounded • rounded
This table contains phonetic symbols, which may not display correctly in some browsers. [Help]

IPA help • IPA key • chart •  chart with audio • view

Occurrence

Language Word IPA Meaning Notes
Alekano gamó [ɣɑmɤʔ] 'cucumber'
Chinese Mandarin 喝/hē  [xɤ˥]  'to drink' See Standard Chinese phonology
Taiwanese Hokkien 蚵/ô [ɤ˧] 'oyster' Mostly southern Taiwanese speech
English Cape Flats dialect[3] foot [fɤt] 'foot' Possible realization of /ʊ/; may be [u] or [ʉ] instead.[3]
Indian South African[4] Possible realization of /ʊ/; may be a weakly rounded [ʊ] instead.[4]
Received Pronunciation[5] long ago [lɒŋ ɤ̟ˈɡəʊ̯] 'long ago' Near-back; allophone of /ə/ between velar consonants.[5] See English phonology
White South African[6] pill [pʰɤ̟ɫ] 'pill' Near-back; allophone of /ɪ/ before the velarised allophone of /l/.[6] Also described as close [ɯ̟].[7]
Irish Ulster[8] Uladh [ɤ̟l̪ˠu] 'Ulster' Near-back.[9] See Irish phonology
Kaingang[10] [ˈᵐbɤ] 'tail' Varies between back [ɤ] and central [ɘ][11]
Korean Gyeongsang dialect 거기/geogi [ˈkɤ̘ɡɪ] 'there' See Korean phonology
Northern Tiwa Taos dialect [ˌmã̀ˑˈpɤ̄u̯mã̄] 'it was squeezed' May be central [ɘ] instead. See Taos phonology
Önge önge [ˈɤŋe] 'man'
Scottish Gaelic doirbh [d̪̊ɤrʲɤv] 'difficult' See Scottish Gaelic phonology
Sundanese ieu [iɤ] 'this'
Thai[12] เธอ/thoe [tʰɤ̟ː] 'you' Near-back[12]
Xumi Upper[13] [Htsɤ] 'crown of a head' Occasional realization of /o/.[13]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Geoff Lindsey (2013) The vowel space, Speech Talk
  2. ↑ Nicholas, Nick (2003). "Greek-derived IPA symbols". Greek Unicode Issues. University of California, Irvine.
  3. 1 2 Finn (2004), p. 970.
  4. 1 2 Mesthrie (2004), p. 956.
  5. 1 2 Gimson (2014), p. 138.
  6. 1 2 Wells (1982), p. 617.
  7. ↑ Bowerman (2004), p. 936.
  8. ↑ Ní Chasaide (1999:114–115)
  9. ↑ Ní Chasaide (1999:114)
  10. ↑ Jolkesky (2009), pp. 676–677 and 682.
  11. ↑ Jolkesky (2009), pp. 676 and 682.
  12. 1 2 Tingsabadh & Abramson (1993), p. 25.
  13. 1 2 Chirkova, Chen & Kocjančič Antolík (2013), p. 389.

Bibliography

  • Bowerman, Sean (2004), "White South African English: phonology", in Schneider, Edgar W.; Burridge, Kate; Kortmann, Bernd; Mesthrie, Rajend; Upton, Clive, A handbook of varieties of English, 1: Phonology, Mouton de Gruyter, pp. 931–942, ISBN 3-11-017532-0 
  • Chirkova, Katia; Chen, Yiya; Kocjančič Antolík, Tanja (2013), "Xumi, Part 2: Upper Xumi, the Variety of the Upper Reaches of the Shuiluo River" (PDF), Journal of the International Phonetic Association 43 (3): 381–396, doi:10.1017/S0025100313000169 
  • Finn, Peter (2004), "Cape Flats English: phonology", in Schneider, Edgar W.; Burridge, Kate; Kortmann, Bernd; Mesthrie, Rajend; Upton, Clive, A handbook of varieties of English, 1: Phonology, Mouton de Gruyter, pp. 934–984, ISBN 3-11-017532-0 
  • Gimson, Alfred Charles (2014), Cruttenden, Alan, ed., Gimson's Pronunciation of English (8th ed.), Routledge, ISBN 9781444183092 
  • Jolkesky, Marcelo Pinho de Valhery (2009), "Fonologia e prosódia do Kaingáng falado em Cacique Doble", Anais do SETA (Campinas: Editora do IEL-UNICAMP) 3: 675–685 
  • Mesthrie, Rajend (2004), "Indian South African English: phonology", in Schneider, Edgar W.; Burridge, Kate; Kortmann, Bernd; Mesthrie, Rajend; Upton, Clive, A handbook of varieties of English, 1: Phonology, Mouton de Gruyter, pp. 953–963, ISBN 3-11-017532-0 
  • Ní Chasaide, Ailbhe (1999), "Irish", Handbook of the International Phonetic Association, Cambridge University Press, pp. 111–16, ISBN 0-521-63751-1 
  • Tingsabadh, M. R. Kalaya; Abramson, Arthur S. (1993), "Thai", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 23 (1): 24–28, doi:10.1017/S0025100300004746 
  • Wells, John C. (1982), Accents of English 3: Beyond The British Isles, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, ISBN 0-521-28541-0 
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