⟨ccs⟩ is used for [tʃː] in Hungarian for germinated ⟨cs⟩. It is collated as ⟨cs⟩ rather than as ⟨c⟩. It is only used within roots; when two ⟨cs⟩ are brought together in a compound word, they form the regular sequence ⟨cscs⟩.
⟨chd⟩ is used for /dʒ/ in Eskayan romanised orthography.
⟨chw⟩ is used for /w/ in southern dialects of Welsh
⟨cci⟩ is used for /tʃː/ in Italian.
D
⟨dch⟩ is used for the prevoiced aspirated affricate /d͡tʃʰ/ in Juǀʼhoan.
⟨ddh⟩ is used for the dental affricate /tθ/ in Chipewyan.
⟨ddz⟩ is a long Hungarian ⟨dz⟩, [dːz]. It is collated as ⟨dz⟩ rather than as ⟨d⟩. It is not used within roots, where ⟨dz⟩ may be either long or short; but when an assimilated suffix is added to the stem, it may form the trigraph rather than the regular sequence *⟨dzdz⟩. Examples are eddze, lopóddzon.
⟨djx⟩ is used for the prevoiced uvularized affricate /d͡tʃᵡ/ in Juǀʼhoan.
⟨drz⟩ is used for /dʒ/ in English transcriptions of the Polish digraph ⟨dż⟩.
⟨dsh⟩ is used for the foreign sound /dʒ/ in German. A common variant is the tetragraph ⟨dsch⟩. It is used in Juǀʼhoan for the prevoiced aspirated affricate /d͡tsʰ/.
⟨dsj⟩ is used for foreign loan words with /dʒ/Norwegian. Sometimes the digraph dj is used.
⟨dzh⟩ is used for /dʒ/ in English transcriptions of the Russian digraph ⟨дж⟩. In the practical orthography of Taa, where it represents the prevoiced affricate /dtsʰ/.
⟨dzi⟩ is used for /dʑ/ when it precedes a vowel and /dʑi/ otherwise in Polish, and is considered a variant of the digraphdź appearing in other situations.
⟨ein⟩ is used for /ɛ̃/ (/ɛn/ before a vowel) in French.
⟨eoi⟩ is used for /oː/ in Irish, between slender consonants.
⟨eqh⟩ is used for the strident vowel/e᷽/ in the practical orthography of Taa (If this symbol does not display properly, it is an ⟨e⟩ with a double tilde ⟨≈⟩ underneath).
⟨ggy⟩ is used for [ɟː] in Hungarian as a geminated ⟨gy⟩. It is collated as ⟨gy⟩ rather than as ⟨g⟩. It is only used within roots; when two ⟨gy⟩ are brought together in a compound
⟨gni⟩ is used for /ɲ/ in a few French words such as châtaignier/ʃɑtɛɲe/.
⟨guë⟩ and ⟨güe⟩ are used for /ɡy/ at the ends of words that end in the feminine suffix -e in French. E.g. aiguë "sharp" and ambiguë "ambiguous". In the French spelling reform of 1990, it was recommended that traditional ⟨guë⟩ be changed to ⟨güe⟩.
⟨gqh⟩ is used for the prevoiced affricate /ɢqʰ/ in the practical orthography of Taa.
⟨gǃh⟩⟨gǀh⟩⟨gǁh⟩⟨gǂh⟩ are used in Juǀʼhoan for its four prevoiced aspirated clicks, /ᶢᵏǃʰ,ᶢᵏǀʰ,ᶢᵏǁʰ,ᶢᵏǂʰ/.
⟨gǃk⟩⟨gǀk⟩⟨gǁk⟩⟨gǂk⟩ are used in Juǀʼhoan for its four prevoiced affricate ejective-contour clicks, /ᶢᵏǃ͡χʼ,ᶢᵏǀ͡χʼ,ᶢᵏǁ͡χʼ,ᶢᵏǂ͡χʼ/.
⟨gǃx⟩⟨gǀx⟩⟨gǁx⟩⟨gǂx⟩ are used in Juǀʼhoan for its four prevoiced affricate pulmonic-contour clicks, /ᶢᵏǃ͡χ,ᶢᵏǀ͡χ,ᶢᵏǁ͡χ,ᶢᵏǂ͡χ/.
H–I
⟨hhw⟩ is used for a labialized velar/uvular /χʷ/ in Chipewyan.
⟨igh⟩ is used for an unstressed word-final /əj/ in Irish, which is realised as /iː/, /ə/ and /əɟ/ depending on dialect. In English it may be used for /aɪ/, e.g. light/laɪt/.
⟨ign⟩ is used for /ɲ/ in a few French words such as oignon/ɔɲɔ̃/ "onion" and encoignure "corner". It was eliminated in the French spelling reform of 1990, but continues to be used.
⟨ije⟩ is used for /je/ or /jeː/ in the ijekavian reflex of Serbo-Croatian.
⟨ill⟩ is used for /j/ in French, as in épouiller/epuje/.
⟨iqh⟩ is used for the strident vowel/i᷽/ in the practical orthography of Taa. (If IPA does not display properly, it is an ⟨i⟩ with a double tilde ⟨≈⟩ underneath.)
⟨iúi⟩ is used for /uː/ in Irish, between slender consonants.
⟨lli⟩ is used for /j/ after /i/ in a few French words, such as coquillier.
⟨lly⟩ is used for [jː~ʎː] in Hungarian as a geminated ⟨ly⟩. It is collated as ⟨ly⟩ rather than as ⟨l⟩. It is only used within roots; when two ⟨ly⟩ are brought together in a compound word, they form the regular sequence ⟨lyly⟩.
⟨nkx⟩ is used for the prenasalized lateral click/ŋ.ǁ/ in Xhosa.
⟨nng⟩ is used in Inuktitut and Greenlandic to write a long (geminate) velar nasal, /ŋː/.
⟨nny⟩ is a long Hungarian ⟨ny⟩, [ɲː]. It is collated as ⟨ny⟩ rather than as ⟨n⟩. It is only used within roots; when two ⟨ny⟩ are brought together in a compound word, they form the regular sequence ⟨nyny⟩.
⟨oqh⟩ is used for the strident vowel/o᷽/ in the practical orthography of Taa. (If this symbol does not display properly, it is an ⟨o⟩ with a double tilde ⟨≈⟩ underneath.)
⟨qxʼ⟩ is used for the affricate /qχʼ/ in the practical orthography of Taa.
⟨rds⟩ is used for the sje sound/ɧ/ in Swedish in the word gärdsgård/'jæɧgo:ɖ/ "roundpole fence".
⟨rlw⟩ is used for /ɭʷ/ in Arrernte.
⟨rnd⟩ is used for a retroflex stop /ɳʈ~ɳɖ/ in Yanyuwa.
⟨rng⟩ is used for [ɴŋ], a uvular nasal followed by velar nasal, in Inuktitut.
⟨rnw⟩ is used for /ɳʷ/ in Arrernte.
⟨rrh⟩ is used for /r/ in words of Greek derivation such as diarrhea.
⟨rrw⟩ is used for /rʷ/ in Arrernte.
⟨rsk⟩ is used for the sje sound/ɧ/ in Swedish as in the word marskalk/'maɧalk/ "marshal".
⟨rtn⟩ is used for /ʈɳ/ in Arrernte.
⟨rtw⟩ is used for /ʈʷ/ in Arrernte.
S
⟨sch⟩ is used for [ʃ] in German and other languages influenced by it such as Low German and Romansh. It is used for the sje sound/ɧ/ in Swedish at the end of a French loanword, e.g. marsch (fr. marche), or in Greek loanwords, such as schema (schedule) and ischias. In Walloon it represents a consonant that is variously /h/, /ʃ/, /ç/ or /sk/, depending on the dialect. In English, ⟨sch⟩ is usually used for /sk/, but the word schedule (from the Late Latinschedula) can be /sk/ or /ʃ/ depending on dialect. In Dutch it may represent word-final [s], as in the common suffix -isch and in some (sur)names, like Bosch and Den Bosch. In the Rheinische Dokumenta, ⟨sch⟩ is used to denote the sounds [ʃ], [ɕ] and [ʂ], while ⟨sch⟩ with an arc below denotes [ʒ].
⟨sci⟩ is used in Italian for /ʃː/ before ⟨a⟩, ⟨o⟩, ⟨u⟩.
⟨skj⟩ represents a fricative phoneme /ʃ/ in some Scandinavian languages. In Faroese (e.g. at skjóta "to shoot") and in Norwegian (e.g. kanskje "maybe") it is a usually the voiceless postalveolar fricative [ʃ]. In Swedish (e.g. skjorta "shirt") it is often realised as the sje sound[ɧ].
⟨ssi⟩ is used for /ʃ/ in English such as in mission. It is used in a few French loanwords in Swedish for the sje sound/ɧ/, e.g. assiett "dessert plate".
⟨ssj⟩ is used for the sje sound /ɧ/ in a few Swedish words between two short vowels, such as hässja "hayrack".
⟨sth⟩ is found in words of Greek origin. In French, it is pronounced /s/ before a consonant, as in isthme and asthme; in American English, it is pronounced /s/ in isthmus and /z/ in asthma.
⟨stj⟩ is used for the sje sound /ɧ/ in 5 native Swedish words, it can also represent the voiceless postalveolar fricative /ʃ/ or the consonant cluster /stʲ/ in Norwegian depending on dialect.
⟨ssz⟩ is a long Hungarian ⟨sz⟩, [sː]. It is collated as ⟨sz⟩ rather than as ⟨s⟩. It is only used within roots; when two ⟨sz⟩ are brought together in a compound word, they form the regular sequence ⟨szsz⟩.
⟨tch⟩ is used for the aspirated click /ǂʰ/ in Naro, the aspirated affricate /tʃʰ/ in Sandawe, Hadza and Juǀʼhoan, and the affricate /tʃ/ in French and Portuguese. In modern Walloon it is /tʃ/, which used to be written ch. In Swedish it is used for the affricate /tʃ/ in a small number of English loanwords, such as match and batch. In English it is a variant of the digraph ⟨ch⟩, used in situations similar to those that trigger the digraph ⟨ck⟩ for ⟨k⟩.
⟨tcx⟩ is used for the uvularized affricate /tʃᵡ/ in Juǀʼhoan.
⟨tsh⟩ is used in various languages, such as Juǀʼhoan, for the aspirated affricate /tsʰ/. In the Romanized Popular Alphabet used to write Hmong, it represents the sound /tʂʰ/. In Xhosa, it may be used to write /tsʰ/, /tʃʼ/, or /tʃʰ/, though it is sometimes limited to /tʃʼ/, with /tsʰ/ and /tʃʰ/ distinguished as ⟨ths⟩ and ⟨thsh⟩.
⟨tth⟩ is used for dental affricate /tθʰ/ in Chipewyan.
⟨ttl⟩ is used for ejective /tɬʼ/ in Haida (Bringhurst orthography).
⟨tts⟩ is used for ejective /tsʼ/ in Haida (Bringhurst orthography).
⟨tty⟩ is used for [cː] in Hungarian as a geminated ⟨ty⟩. It is collated as ⟨ty⟩ rather than as ⟨t⟩. It is only used within roots; when two ⟨ty⟩ are brought together in a compound word, they form the regular sequence ⟨tyty⟩.
⟨uío⟩ is used for /iː/ in Irish, between broad consonants.
⟨uqh⟩ is used for the strident vowel/u᷽/ in the practical orthography of Taa. (If this symbol does not display properly, it is an ⟨u⟩ with a double tilde ⟨≈⟩ underneath.)
⟨xhw⟩ is used for /χʷ/ in Canadian Tlingit, which is written ⟨xw⟩ in Alaska.
⟨zzs⟩ is used for [ʒː] in Hungarian as a geminated ⟨zs⟩. It is collated as ⟨zs⟩ rather than as ⟨z⟩. It is only used within roots; when two ⟨zs⟩ are brought together in a compound word, they form the regular sequence ⟨zszs⟩.
Other
⟨ŋgb⟩ (capital ⟨Ŋgb⟩) is used for [ŋ͡mɡ͡b] in Kabiye, a pre-nasalized ⟨gb⟩.
⟨ǃʼh⟩⟨ǀʼh⟩⟨ǁʼh⟩⟨ǂʼh⟩ are used in Juǀʼhoan for its four aspirated nasal clicks, /ᵑ̊ǃʰ,ᵑ̊ǀʰ,ᵑ̊ǁʰ,ᵑ̊ǂʰ/.
⟨ǃkx⟩⟨ǀkh⟩⟨ǁkx⟩⟨ǂkx⟩ are used in Khoekhoe for its four plain aspirated clicks, /ǃʰ,ǀʰ,ǁʰ,ǂʰ/.
Breathy voice is a phonation in which the vocal folds vibrate, as they do in normal (modal) voicing, but are adjusted to let more air escape which produces a sighing-like sound. A simple breathy phonation,, can sometimes be heard as an allophone of English between vowels, such as in the word behind, for some speakers.
Click consonants, or clicks, are speech sounds that occur as consonants in many languages of Southern Africa and in three languages of East Africa. Examples familiar to English-speakers are the tut-tut or tsk! tsk! used to express disapproval or pity, the tchick! used to spur on a horse, and the clip-clop! sound children make with their tongue to imitate a horse trotting. However, these paralinguistic sounds in English are not full click consonants, as they only involve the front of the tongue, without the release of the back of the tongue that is required for clicks to combine with vowels and form syllables.
A fricative is a consonant produced by forcing air through a narrow channel made by placing two articulators close together. These may be the lower lip against the upper teeth, in the case of ; the back of the tongue against the soft palate in the case of German ; or the side of the tongue against the molars, in the case of Welsh. This turbulent airflow is called frication.
Velars are consonants articulated with the back part of the tongue against the soft palate, the back part of the roof of the mouth.
Xhosa, formerly spelled Xosa and also known by its local name isiXhosa, is a Nguni language and one of the official languages of South Africa and Zimbabwe. Xhosa is spoken as a first language by approximately 10 million people and as a second language by another 10 million, mostly in South Africa, particularly in Eastern Cape, Western Cape, Northern Cape and Gauteng, and also in parts of Zimbabwe and Lesotho. It has perhaps the heaviest functional load of click consonants in a Bantu language, with one count finding that 10% of basic vocabulary items contained a click.
The African Reference Alphabet is a largely defunct continent-wide guideline for the creation of Latin alphabets for African languages. Two variants of the initial proposal were made at a 1978 UNESCO-organized conference held in Niamey, Niger. They were based on the results of several earlier conferences on the harmonization of established Latin alphabets of individual languages. The 1978 conference recommended the use of single letters for speech sounds rather than of letter sequences or of letters with diacritics. A substantial overhaul was proposed in 1982 but was rejected in a follow-up conference held in Niamey in 1984. Since then, continent-wide harmonization has been largely abandoned, because regional needs, practices and thus preferences differ greatly across Africa.
A digraph or digram is a pair of characters used in the orthography of a language to write either a single phoneme, or a sequence of phonemes that does not correspond to the normal values of the two characters combined.
When used as a diacritic mark, the term dot refers to the glyphs "combining dot above", and "combining dot below" which may be combined with some letters of the extended Latin alphabets in use in a variety of languages. Similar marks are used with other scripts.
The palatal or palato-alveolar clicks are a family of click consonants found, as components of words, only in southern Africa. The tongue is nearly flat, and is pulled back rather than down as in the postalveolar clicks, making a sharper sound than those consonants. The tongue makes an extremely broad contact across the roof of the mouth, making correlation with the places of articulation of non-clicks difficult, but Ladefoged & Traill (1984:18) find that the primary place of articulation is the palate, and say that "there is no doubt that should be described as a palatal sound".
Juǀʼhoan, also known as Southern or Southeastern ǃKung or ǃXun, is the southern variety of the ǃKung dialect continuum, spoken in northeastern Namibia and the Northwest District of Botswana by San Bushmen who largely identify themselves as Juǀʼhoansi. Several regional dialects are distinguished: Epukiro, Tsumǃkwe, Rundu, Omatako and ǂKxʼauǁʼein, with Tsumǃkwe being the best described and often taken as representative.
The phonology of Catalan, a Romance language, has a certain degree of dialectal variation. Although there are two standard varieties, one based on Central Eastern dialect and another one based on South-Western or Valencian dialect, this article deals with features of all or most dialects, as well as regional pronunciation differences.
The sj-sound is a voiceless fricative phoneme found in the sound system of most dialects of Swedish. It has a variety of realisations, whose precise phonetic characterisation is a matter of debate, but which usually feature distinct labialization. The sound is represented in Swedish orthography by a number of spellings, including the digraph ⟨sj⟩ from which the common Swedish name for the sound is derived, as well as ⟨stj⟩, ⟨skj⟩, and ⟨sk⟩. The sound should not be confused with the Swedish tj-sound, often spelled ⟨tj⟩, ⟨kj⟩, or ⟨k⟩.
Ch is a digraph in the Latin script. It is treated as a letter of its own in the Chamorro, Old Spanish, Czech, Slovak, Igbo, Uzbek, Quechua, Ladino, Guarani, Welsh, Cornish, Breton, Ukrainian Latynka and Belarusian Łacinka alphabets. Formerly ch was also considered a separate letter for collation purposes in Modern Spanish, Vietnamese, and sometimes in Polish; now the digraph ch in these languages continues to be used, but it is considered as a sequence of letters and sorted as such.
C, or c, is the third letter in the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is cee. Cees is the plural form for this letter.
The phonology of Sesotho and those of the other Sotho–Tswana languages are radically different from those of "older" or more "stereotypical" Bantu languages. Modern Sesotho in particular has very mixed origins inheriting many words and idioms from non-Sotho–Tswana languages.
In Hebrew orthography the rafe or raphe is a diacritic, a subtle horizontal overbar placed above certain letters to indicate that they are to be pronounced as fricatives.
The Cyrillic script family contains many specially treated two-letter combinations, or digraphs, but few of these are used in Slavic languages. In a few alphabets, trigraphs and even the occasional tetragraph or pentagraph are used.
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