Close central unrounded vowel
Vowel sound represented by ⟨ɨ⟩ in IPA
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | i y | ɨ ʉ | ɯ u |
| Near-close | ɪ ʏ | ʊ | |
| Close-mid | e ø | ɘ ɵ | ɤ o |
| Mid | e̞ ø̞ | ə | ɤ̞ o̞ |
| Open-mid | ɛ œ | ɜ ɞ | ʌ ɔ |
| Near-open | æ | ɐ | |
| Open | a ɶ | ä | ɑ ɒ |
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Legend: unrounded • rounded
The close central unrounded vowel, or high central unrounded vowel, is a type of vowel sound used in some languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ⟨ɨ⟩, namely the lower-case letter i with a horizontal bar. Both the symbol and the sound are commonly referred to as barred i.
Occasionally, this vowel is transcribed ⟨ï⟩ (centralized ⟨i⟩) or ⟨ɯ̈⟩ (centralized ⟨ɯ⟩).
The close central unrounded vowel is the vocalic equivalent of the rare post-palatal approximant [ȷ̈].
01Features
- Its vowel height is close, also known as high, which means the tongue is positioned close to the roof of the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant.
- Its vowel backness is central, which means the tongue is positioned halfway between a front vowel and a back vowel.
- It is unrounded, which means that the lips are not rounded.
![Spectrogram of [ɨ]](https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/92/Spectrogram_of_close_central_unrounded_vowel_%28IPA_%C9%A8%29.png/960px-Spectrogram_of_close_central_unrounded_vowel_%28IPA_%C9%A8%29.png)
02Occurrence
/ɨ/ is uncommon as a phoneme in Indo-European languages, occurring most commonly in some Slavic languages, such as Belarusian and Russian (see ы). However, it is very common as a separate phoneme in the indigenous languages of the Americas and is often in phonemic contrast with other close vowels such as /i/ and /u/ both in modern living languages as well as reconstructed proto-languages (such as Proto-Uto-Aztecan). Campbell, Kaufman, and Smith-Stark identify the presence of this vowel phoneme as an areal feature of a Mesoamerican Sprachbund (although that is not a defining feature of the entire area).
| Language | Word | IPA | Meaning | Notes | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Acehnese | tupeue | [tupɨə] | 'to know' | Asyik and Al-Ahmadi Al-Harbi describe this sound as such while Durie describes it as closer to [ɯ] | |
| Aikanã | tɨi | [ˈtɨi] | 'aunt' | It also happens as allophone of /a/ before [i]. | |
| Angami | Khonoma | prü | [pɻɨ˨] | 'hail stone' | The height varies between close [ɨ] and mid [ə]. Typically transcribed in IPA with ⟨ə⟩. |
| Arhuaco | ikʉ | [ɪkʼɨ] | 'Arhuaco language' | ||
| Armenian | Meghri | ագարակ/agarak | [hɨˈgɛrak] | 'farm' | |
| Bantawa | Ilam, Nepal | küma | [kɨma] | 'afraid' | |
| Chinese | Hokkien | 豬/tir | [tɨ˥] | 'pig' | |
| Mandarin | 十/shí | [ʂɨ˧˥] | 'ten' | Typically transcribed in IPA with ⟨ʐ̩⟩ or ⟨ɻ̍⟩. | |
| English | Northern England | council | [ˈkaʊnsɨl] | 'council' | Especially encountered in fast and casual speech. May be encountered in the Midlands to a lesser degree as well. |
| Southeastern | rude | [ɹɨːd] | 'rude' | May be rounded [ʉː], or a diphthong [ʊʉ̯~əʉ̯] instead. | |
| Guaraní | yvy | [ɨʋɨ] | 'earth' | ||
| Hausa | cin abinci | [t̠ʃin abɨnt̠ʃi] | 'to eat' | Allophone of /i/. | |
| Irish | Munster | caora | [kɨːɾˠə] | 'sheep' | Allophone of /i/ between broad consonants. See Irish phonology |
| Kalagan | [pɨˈnɨt̪] | 'beard' | |||
| Kashmiri | ژٕنُن/cûnun | [t͡sɨnʊn] | 'peach' | ||
| Kera | [ɡɨ̀ɡɨ̀r] | 'knee' | |||
| Khmer | គិត/kīt | [kɨt] | 'to think' | See Khmer phonology | |
| Kurdish | Palewani (Southern) | کرماشان/kirmaşan | [cʰɨɾmäːʃäːn] | 'Kermanshah' | Equal to Kurmanji and Sorani [ɪ]. See Kurdish phonology |
| Latgalian | dyžan | [ˈd̪ɨʒän̪] | 'very much' | See Latgalian phonology | |
| Malay | Kelantan-Pattani | ngecat | [ŋɨ.caʔ] | 'to paint' | See Kelantan-Pattani Malay |
| Malayalam | ആട്/aadu | [aːɖɨ] | 'goat' | See Malayalam phonology | |
| Mongolian | хүчир/hučir | [xutʃʰɨɾɘ̆] | 'difficult' | ||
| Matis | [kɨˈnɨ] | 'wall' | |||
| Mono | dɨ | [dɨ] | 'count' | ||
| Mpade | sɨm | [sɨm] | 'to eat' | ||
| Norwegian | fin | [fɨ:n] | 'nice' | Only dialects in Meldal and Gudbrandsdalen | |
| Paicî | |||||
| Portuguese | Portugal | gente | [ʒẽtɨ] | 'people' | Realization of unstressed "e". |
| Angola | |||||
| Mozambique | |||||
| Romanian | înot | [ɨˈn̪o̞t̪] | 'I swim' | See Romanian phonology | |
| Russian | ты/ty | [t̪ɨ]ⓘ | 'you' (singular/informal) | Occurs only after unpalatalized consonants. Near-close when unstressed. See Russian phonology | |
| Sahaptin | kʼsit | [kʼsɨt] | 'cold' | Epenthetic. No lengthened equivalent | |
| Sanumá | [taˈaɨ] | 'to see' | The nasal version [ɨ̃] also occurs. | ||
| Scottish Gaelic | Lewis | tuilleadh | [ˈt̪ʰɨʎəɣ] | 'more' | Allophone of /ɯ/ when short and in proximity to slender consonants. |
| Shipibo | tenaitianronki | [ˈt̪ɨnɐi̞ti̞ɐ̃ɽõ̞ɣi̞] | Possible realization of /ɯ/ after coronal consonants. | ||
| Sirionó | [eˈsɨ] | 'dry wood' | |||
| Sundanese | anjeun | [and͡ʒɨn] | 'you' | May be close back [ɯ], close-mid central [ɘ], or close-mid back [ɤ] by younger speakers. | |
| Sümi | sü | [ʃɨ˩] | 'to hurt' | Described variously as close [ɨ] and near-close [ɨ̞]. | |
| Swedish | Bohuslän | bli | [blɨːᶻ] | 'to become' | A fricated vowel that corresponds to [iː] in Central Standard Swedish. See Swedish phonology |
| Närke | |||||
| Tajik | Bukharan | ғижғиж/cižciž | [ʁɨʑʁɨʑ] | 'the sound of wood sawing' | Allophone of /i/ in the environment of uvular consonants. |
| Tamil | vály (வால்) | [väːlɨ] | 'tail' | Epenthetic vowel inserted in colloquial speech after word-final liquids; can be rounded [ʉ] instead. See Tamil phonology | |
| Tera | zu̱ | [zɨ] | 'said' | ||
| Tsou | hahocngx, hahocngʉ | [ha.ˈho.t͡sŋɨ] | 'man' | /ɨ/, with free variant [ʉ]. Used to be written as ⟨ʉ⟩, but changed to ⟨x⟩ for more convenient typing. | |
| Tupi | ybytyra | [ɨβɨˈtɨɾa] | 'mountain' | See Tupian Phonology | |
| Turkish | Standard | sığ | [sɨː] | 'shallow' | Also described as close back [ɯ] and near-close near-back [ɯ̽]. Typically transcribed in IPA with ⟨ɯ⟩. See Turkish phonology |
| Balkans | eski | [es.'kɨ] | 'old' | Word-final merger of standard Turkish sounds /i/ and /ɯ/, shift of /y/ and /u/ into single phoneme due to interactions caused by Balkan sprachbund. Dombrowski transcribes this phoneme as /i/. | |
| Udmurt | yrgete/ыргетэ | [ɨrɡete] | 'it growls' | ||
| Vietnamese | bưng | [ʔɓɨŋ˧˧] | 'to carry' | ||
| Wayuu | paanüküin | [pa:nɨkɨinː] | 'your mouth' | ||
| Welsh | Northern dialects | llun | [ɬɨːn] | 'picture' | Close when long. /ɨː/ merges with /iː/ in southern dialects. See Welsh phonology |
| Yaeyama | pïtu | [pɨtu] | 'person' | ||
| Zapotec | Tilquiapan | nɨ | [nɨ] | 'be sour' | |
The sound of Polish ⟨y⟩ is often represented as /ɨ/, but actually it is a close-mid advanced central unrounded vowel, more narrowly transcribed [ɘ̟]. Similarly, European Portuguese unstressed ⟨e⟩, often represented as /ɨ/, is actually a near-close near-back unrounded vowel, more narrowly transcribed using ad hoc symbols such as [ɯ̽] (mid-centralized), [ɯ̟] (fronted) and [ʊ̜] (less rounded, i.e. unrounded).
03Near-close central unrounded vowel
| Near-close central unrounded vowel | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| ɨ̞ | |||
| ɘ̝ | |||
| ɪ̈ | |||
| Audio sample | |||
| source · help | |||
| |||
Some languages feature the near-close central unrounded vowel, which is slightly lower. It is most often transcribed in IPA with ⟨ɨ̞⟩ and ⟨ɪ̈⟩, but ⟨ɘ̝⟩ is also possible. In many British dictionaries, this vowel has been transcribed ⟨ɪ⟩, which captures its height; in the American tradition it is more often ⟨ɨ⟩, which captures its centrality, or ⟨ᵻ⟩, which captures both. ⟨ᵻ⟩ is also used in a number of other publications, such as Accents of English by John C. Wells. In the third edition of the Oxford English Dictionary, ⟨ᵻ⟩ represents variation between /ɪ/ and /ə/.
Features
- Its vowel height is near-close, also known as near-high, which means the tongue is not quite so constricted as a close vowel (high vowel).
- Its vowel backness is central, which means the tongue is positioned halfway between a front vowel and a back vowel.
- It is unrounded, which means that the lips are not rounded.
Occurrence
| Language | Word | IPA | Meaning | Notes | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Amharic | ሥር/sûr | [sɨ̞r] | 'root' | Near-close. | |
| Berber | Central Atlas Tamazight | ⵅⴷⵉⵎ/khdim | [χdɨ̞m] | 'to work' | Epenthetically inserted into consonant clusters before labial and coronal consonants. |
| English | Inland Southern American | good | [ɡɨ̞d] | 'good' | Corresponds to [ʊ] in other dialects. See English phonology |
| Southeastern English | [ɡɪ̈d] | May be rounded [ʊ̈] instead; it corresponds to [ʊ] in other dialects. See English phonology | |||
| London | lip | [lɪ̈ʔp] | 'lip' | Possible realization of /ɪ/. | |
| South African | [lɨ̞p] | For some speakers it can be equal to [ə]. General and Broad varieties of SAE have an allophonic variation, with [ɪ] ([i] in Broad) occurring near velar and palatal consonants, and [ɨ̞~ə] elsewhere. See South African English phonology | |||
| Southern American | [lɪ̈p] | Allophone of /ɪ/ before labial consonants, sometimes also in other environments. | |||
| Irish | goirt | [ɡɨ̞ɾˠtʲ] | 'salty' | Allophone of /i/ between broad consonants. See Irish phonology | |
| Ulster | saol | [sɨ̞l] | 'life' | Allophone of /ɪ/. Near-close. | |
| Mah Meri | [d͡ʑäbɨ̞ʔ͡k̚] | 'to be drunk' | |||
| Mapudungun | müṉa | [mɘ̝ˈn̪ɐ̝] | 'male cousin on father's side' | Unstressed allophone of /ɘ/. | |
| Tera | vu̱r | [vɨ̞r] | 'to give' | Allophone of /ɨ/ in closed syllables. | |
| Welsh | Northern dialects | pump | [pɨ̞mp] | 'five' | Near-close when short. /ɨ̞/ merges with /ɪ/ in southern dialects. See Welsh phonology |
Sources and credits
This article is adapted from the Wikipedia article “Close central unrounded vowel”, written by its contributors and licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Fathomly has changed the layout, removed citation markers, navigation and maintenance notices, and adjusted punctuation. This adapted version is shared under the same license. For references, see the original article.
Images, from Wikimedia Commons:
- IPA Unicode 0x0268.svg by No machine-readable author provided. Martin Kozák assumed (based on copyright claims)., Public domain
- Spectrogram of close central unrounded vowel (IPA ɨ).png by Lee Ball, CC0
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