Questions tagged [ipa]
The International Phonetic Alphabet: A Latin-based alphabet designed for transcribing all sounds of all languages.
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There are roughly 46 speech sounds in the English language, however only 26 letters. Why?
There are roughly 44-46 speech sounds in the English language. However, we just have 26 letters which denote some of those 44-46 sounds. Why is that? Why we don't represent each of those 44-46 sounds ...
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Is there any free API that can translate from French to IPA? [duplicate]
I have invented a language that actually is just French but each phoneme is replaced by another one. So to build an application that can translate from French to that language, I need the phonetics of ...
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Why are intervocalic coronal plosives apparently so unstable in English?
There are a plethora of words in the English language in which the phonemes /t/ and /d/ appear between two vowels, whether they be in adjacent syllables in the same word or in different words as a ...
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Is the rarity of dental sounds explained by babies not immediately having teeth?
Dental consonants, which involve the corona of the tongue contacting the teeth (typically the upper teeth) are known to be rare throughout the world’s languages. More specifically, phonemic ...
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Can someone explain the ambiguity of the vowel [ø] and null segment [∅]?
Typically the IPA avoids using the same glyph in different scales to represent similar ideas however it seems to me that the representation of the Close-mid Front Rounded Vowel [ø] and the null marker ...
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Is there a difference between /tʲ/ (palatalized t) and /kʲ/ (palatalized k)? [closed]
I've noticed that what some languages refer to as "soft k" and others as "soft t" seems to be the same sound. Is it so?
I was able to find a wiki page discussing the "soft g&...
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Why are the coronal approximants so different from the others?
I’m aware that there has been some criticism of the IPA’s classification of approximants, as well as debate over the merit of the term itself. However, my understanding is that approximants are the ...
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Tool for phonetic transcriptions of a specific list of words
Looking for a tool that will accept a file with a list of Basic English words as input and give the phonetic spellings/ transcriptions of the words in IPA as output.
If that's not available, any ...
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How do I represent SAMPA glottal stops in IPA?
I come from SAMPA world, and I am used to using a glottal stop.
In German language, glottal stops are quite common:
For example:
z i ts ? E k @
The "?" is the glottal stop and intrudes a ...
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What is unicode character turned AE ᴂ(U+1D02) used for?
The near-open front unrounded vowel is written as æ(U+00E6), commented as "Latin Small Letter Ae". But I found the character ᴂ(U+1D02) commented as "Latin Small Letter Turned Ae" ...
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Could the Midwestern (Wisconsin) L sound be described as a semivowel/glide?
In Midwestern accents, words like "love" (with the L in word initial) the L sounds close to the /j/ glide, but I wonder if anyone has noticed this or come across it.
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How does Rhymezone identify near rhymes?
Does it identify near rhymes by phonemes that are close to each other? What are they? If so, did they used an open-source database with IPA transcriptions?
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Voiceless Schwa after a plosive consonant
Take American English as an example, what is the difference in sounding between [pʰə̥ˈtʰeɪ̯ɾoʊ̯] and [pʰˈtʰeɪ̯ɾoʊ̯]?
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Difference between Cantonese /gw/ and Mandarin /gu/?
As a native speaker of both languages, Cantonese /gw/ like in 過gwo3 and Mandarin /gu/ like in 过guo4 sounds the same, but I've checked that the Cantonese one is [kʷɔː] while the Mandarin one is [kwo], ...
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The o-o-o-ol’ shakuh-shakuh: how can we describe this extended “o” sound?
Just after the 3-minute mark in this video, the chef tells us to give the pot “the o-o-o-ol’ shakuh-shakuh“. I think the pronunciation is in imitation of a stereotypical elderly man.
I would like to ...
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why pronunciations of cardinal vowel No.4 [a] are so different?
The cardinal vowel No.4 [a] pronounced by Daniel Jones and some other linguistics sounds more like /æ/ as in cat.
but this cardinal vowel pronounced in the IPA website(by 4 speakers) sounds more like ...
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Why the phonetic /ɔ/ is used in totally two different position?
Why the phonetic /ɔ/ is related to the phonetic /ɑ/ and the phonetic /oʊ/ at the same time even though they're totally different in pronunciation?
/ɔ/&/ɑ/
/ɔ/
Awesome, autumn, Australia, Talk, ...
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What is the difference between these three IPA phonetics in American pronunciation?
"ɔ" Like (awesome, autumn, Australia),
"ɒ" Like (octopus, October, occupy),
"ɑ" Like (arm, art, argument).
I know it's going to be hard to explain them in writing, but ...
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What does the superscript x in Finnish IPA mean?
IPA transcriptions like /muːtːuɑˣ/ from here show a superscripted x. The Finnish Phonology Wiki page says, in the Sandhi section:
Gemination of a morpheme-initial consonant occurs when the morpheme ...
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Does double tone mean long vowel?
After looking into the IPA for some words in tonal languages, I am starting to see things like ăn (Vietnamese), which are transcribed with two like tone marks, like ʔan˧˧. What does it mean when two ...
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Are there languages which have h following a consonant, that contrasts with aspiration?
I am working on a conscript and want to make sure I can handle all of Earth's languages. In some Indian languages they have the aspirated consonants like bh like bhavya. It is basically a breathy b. ...
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Does the IPA have a symbol to mark a letter that can be dropped in pronunciation?
I would like to mark a letter in a syllable with some kind of symbol that denotes that the letter can be dropped. Is there a symbol for that in the phonetic alphabet?
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In the IPA transcription do I need to show the global fall/rise before or after the stressed syllable?
I put the global fall symbol (down arrow) after the stressed syllable because it makes more sense to me. The last content word in a though group is where final inflection usually occurs, the syllable ...
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is this sound [ɾ] or [ɹ]?
Here
my native language is claimed to have alveolar tap or trill as its rhotic sound but recently I've wondering if it's actually a plain alveolar approximant [ɹ] instead since I noticed that my [ɾ] ...
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Is it more correct to use the minor and major foot groups in the IPA than commas and periods?
I transcribed some phrases from TV. This is casual American connected speech:
As you can notice I'm using the | and || symbols instead of the commas and periods. Also, I do not show the question mark,...
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Is there a database that lists all ways of spelling IPA phonemes?
I'm looking for a list, database, table, etc. of different ways that IPA phonemes (like /f/) can be represented (e.g normally just f, but also the gh in cough).
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Why do many languages analyse [e̞] as /ɛ/?
I experience that most analyses of many languages that I know, in particular Swedish, (Flemish) Dutch, Norwegian and Icelandic, analyse the languages' short ⟨e⟩ as /ɛ/, while they sound a lot more ...
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Is there an IPA symbol to represent both primary or secondary stress?
I was just wondering if there is an IPA symbol to represent stress in general, be that primary or secondary stress, just one symbol for both?
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Full stops to indicate a syllable boundary?
Without syllable boundary:
ˈwʌt̚ ˈhæp ənd ||
With syllable boundary:
ˈwʌt̚ ˈhæp.ənd ||
However I have words that are two syllables and both syllables are stressed:
ˈsʌmˌθɪŋz‿ˈaʊt̚ ˈðɛəɹ ||
As you ...
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Why do IPA pronunciations pronounce phones in two ways? 1st on their own. 2nd with a vowel /ɑ/ or schwa in front?
I use IPA and oral cavity videos (is this the correct term?) to master phonemes, while I learn second languages. Examples are
[ ʎ̝ ] voiced dorsal palatal lateral fricative, [ ʝ ] voiced dorsal ...
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What kind of stress is this?
I found the word "ice-free" is pronounced /ˈˌaɪsˈˌfri/ in Oxford English Dictionary, but what kind of stress is this? Should it be called 'there are two primary stresses and two secondary ...
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IPA symbol for a pause?
I started transcribing some phrases from TV and sometimes there are very short pauses between thoughts when longer phrases are pronounced, like the comma for instance. How can I represent the pauses ...
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The dark l sound followed by a vowel sound during linking
the dark L in English is at the end of a word such as "girl", "pencil" or when it is followed by a consonant sound such as "child".
I'm curious what is happening with the ...
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/ / vs [ ] - when to use which? [duplicate]
I'm a university student studying sound structure. It's a first-year course. No matter how many times it's explained to me in lectures, tutorials, help labs, or office hours -- I don't understand all ...
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Why is ʌ an open-mid back unrounded vowel?
Consider:
I've been studying the vowel chart recently and I don't understand why ʌ is an open-mid back unrounded vowel. Shouldn’t it be a short low central unrounded vowel like in the chart picture I ...
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Concise IPA dictionary
For decades I have used "A Pronouncing Dictionary of American English" by Kenyon and Knott as a concise and accessible tool in learning the IPA. The fact that it's still in print must mean ...
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Why is w not written as ʋ͡ɰ or ɰʷ in IPA? [closed]
For some reason w is used instead of ʋ͡+ɰ or ɰʷ I don't know why
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Is there any other Phonetic notation other than IPA? [duplicate]
I'm wondering is there any other Phonetic notation other than IPA — that is easy to understand by Native English speakers
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is this sound [j]? [closed]
is the sound in this recording [j]? or is it just [i]? I feel like all my post-vocalic /i/'s are Pronounced like [j] but I'm not sure.
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Does IPA characterize every discernable accent?
Can the IPA, or any other formal linguistic system, fully characterize every accent discernable by language speakers? By "accent" I mean regional variations in pronunciation – for example, ...
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What is the difference between <ᵊ> and <ə̆> in IPA?
what is the difference between the usage of these two symbols? aren't they basically the same thing?
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Transcription of Devanagari script
Indian languages have many similar sounds and Devanagari & IAST scripts uniquely distinguish these
For Example (not comprehensive) —
IAST (Devanagari)
t (त) and ṭ (ट)
th (थ) and ṭh (ठ)
d (द) and ...
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How does one transcribe a plosive that involves lip closure AND the velum sealing off the nasal cavity before releasing the air mostly thru the nose?
In the conlang I'm creating, I want the clusters /b/ + a nasal. When I say such a cluster, I find myself realizing the /b/ with simultaneous lip closure and the production of a stop consonant that ...
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What symbol, if any, signifies an audible nasal emission in the IPA?
I'm making a conlang and would like to include the consonant clusters /hm/ /hn/ /hɳ/ and /hŋ/ with /h/ realized as an audible nasal emission.
I don't have to worry about how these clusters would be ...
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What is the difference between [j w] and [i̯ u̯]?
The symbols [i̯] and [u̯] always confused me, like what makes them different from [j] and [w]?
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How did the j get the dʒ sound?
The j getting the dʒ is very weird, how did the letter j get the dʒ sound?
Why not a /j/ sound as in "yes"?
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is my Pronounciation of [ɤ] and french nasal vowels and [ɲ] correct?
Right now I'm trying to learn how to pronounce different vowel sounds in IPA and i wonder if I'm Pronouncing [ɤ] right.
ɤ
I've been trying to learning French for a long time and I wonder if my ...
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is this a schwa?
Today, out of interest I tried to unround the /o/ sound of my native language and I got this vowel sound, is this vowel a schwa?
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What is the phonetic transcription of the vowel sounds in these recordings?
I'm really interested what those vowels are phonetically, sorry if there's anything wrong with the audio, I recorded it with my phone.
recording 1:
https://voca.ro/1eAvg2BdKK0q
recording 2:
https://...
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What's the difference between a syllabic consonant and a schwa followed by a consonant?
I'm a native speaker of a language which has syllabic consonants, here are the examples
კლდე/k'lde, [kʼl̩dɛ] "cliff"
ქრთამი/krtami, [kʰɾ̩tʰami] "bribe"
ბრძენი/brdzeni, [bɾ̩d͡zɛni] &...