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The charts below show the way in which the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) represents pronunciations of most Australian Aboriginal languages in Wikipedia articles. Only a few languages on the continent have sounds not in the tables below. For a guide to adding IPA characters to Wikipedia articles, see Template:IPA and Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Pronunciation § Entering IPA characters.
IPA | English approximation |
---|---|
b̥, b | spy, by[1] |
d̥, d | stool, do[1][2] |
d̪̥, d̪ | width[1][2] |
ɖ̥, ɖ | strudle, drew[1][3] |
ɡ̊, ɡ | sky, guy[1] |
ɟ̊, ɟ | skew, argue[1][4] |
j | yes |
l[2] | lose |
l̪[2] | wealth |
ɭ | heirloom[3] |
ʎ | million, (UK) lewd[4] |
m | mother |
n[2] | noose |
n̪[2] | tenth |
ɳ | Arnold[3] |
ɲ | canyon, (UK) new[4] |
ŋ | sing |
r | Spanish Río |
ɾ | atom (US) |
ɹ | red |
ɽ | barter (US)[3] |
ɻ | red (some Irish or West Country dialects; pronounced with rounded lips) |
w | water |
IPA | English approximation |
---|---|
a | father |
e | bade[5] |
ə | sofa |
i, ɪ | see, sit[5] |
o | bore[5] |
u, ʊ | food, foot[5] |
ː | (long vowel); influence (short) vs. food (long) |
Notes
- ^ a b c d e f The sounds [b̥ d̪̥ d̥ ɖ̥ ɟ̊ ɡ̊] are often pronounced tenuis, like spy, sty, stew/chew, sky (like French or Spanish p, t, tch/ch, k) at the beginnings of words, and voiced, like buy, die, dew/Jew, guy between vowels, but that is variable, and the distinction is not meaningful in almost all Australian languages.
- ^ a b c d e f The plain consonants [d̥ l n] are like English sty, noose, lose, with the tip of the tongue touching the gums, and the consonants with the 'bridge' under them, [d̪̥ l̪ n̪], are like t n l in French or Spanish, with the tip of the tongue touching the teeth and its upper surface touching the gums, giving them a light sound. The alveolar–dental distinction is very important in most Australian languages.
- ^ a b c d The consonants with a 'tail', [ɖ̥ ɭ ɳ ɽ], are pronounced with the tonɡue curled back, which gives them a dark "r"-like retroflex quality
- ^ a b c The consonants [ɟ̊ ʎ ɲ] are pronounced with a y-like quality. English dy, ly, ny are similar.
- ^ a b c d The vowels i and u typically vary across [i] ~ [ɪ] ~ [e] and [u] ~ [ʊ] ~ [o], respectively. However, a few Australian languages distinguish both sounds.
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