Close back unrounded vowel

Not to be confused with the Armenian letter ա or the Cyrillic letter ш.

Close back unrounded vowel
ɯ
IPA number	316
Encoding
Entity (decimal)	ɯ
Unicode (hex)	U+026F
X-SAMPA	M
Kirshenbaum	u-
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Sound
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The close back unrounded vowel, or high back unrounded vowel, is a type of vowel sound used in some spoken languages. Acoustically it is a close back-central unrounded vowel. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ⟨ɯ⟩. Typographically a turned letter m, given its relation to the sound represented by the letter u it can be considered a u with an extra "bowl". The sound is sometimes referred to as "unrounded u".

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

Features

IPA vowel chart
Front Near-​front Central Near-​back Back Close •iy •ɨʉ •ɯu •ɪʏ •ɪ̈ʊ̈ •ɯ̽ʊ •eø •ɘɵ •ɤo •e̞ø̞ •əɵ̞ •ɤ̞o̞ •ɛœ •ɜɞ •ʌɔ •æ •ɐɞ̞ •aɶ •äɒ̈ •ɑɒ Near-close Close-mid Mid Open-mid Near-open Open
Paired vowels are: unrounded • rounded
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• Its vowel height is close, also known as high, which means the tongue is positioned as close as possible to the roof of the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant.
• Its vowel backness is back, which means the tongue is positioned as far back as possible in the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant. Note that unrounded back vowels tend to be centralized, which means that often they are in fact near-back.
• It is unrounded, which means that the lips are not rounded.

Occurrence

Language		Word	IPA	Meaning	Notes
Acehnese		eu	[ɯ]	'see'	Also described as closer to [ɨ].
Alekano		hanuva	[hɑnɯβɑ]	'nothing'
Azeri		qırx	[gɯɾx]	'forty'
Bashkir		ҡыҙ	[qɯð]	'girl'
Chinese	Some Min Nan dialects	豬	[tɯ]	'pig'
	Some Wu dialects	父	[vɯ]	'father'
	Xiang	火	[xɯ]	'fire'
Crimean Tatar		canım	[dʒanɯm]	'please'
English	California	goose	[ɡɯ̟ˑs]	'goose'	Near-back; corresponds to [uː] in other dialects.
	South African	pill	[pʰɯ̟ɫ]	'pill'	Near-back; possible allophone of /ɪ/ before the velarised allophone of /l/. Also described as close-mid [ɤ̟].
Estonian		kõrv	[kɯrv]	'ear'	Typically transcribed in IPA as ⟨ɤ⟩; can be mid central [ə] or mid back [ɤ̞] instead, depending on the speaker. See Estonian phonology
Garifuna		gürûgua	[ɡɯˈɹɯɡwə]	'bite'
Irish	Ulster	caol	[kʰɯːl̪ˠ]	'narrow'	See Irish phonology
Korean		음식/eumsik	[ɯːmɕik̚]	'food'	See Korean phonology
Kyrgyz		кыз	[qɯz]	'girl'	See Kyrgyz phonology
Ongota		[kuˈbuːɯ]		'dry'
Sakha		тыл	[tɯl]	'tongue'
Scottish Gaelic		caol	[kʰɯːl̪ˠ]	'thin'	See Scottish Gaelic phonology
Sundanese		meunang	[mɯnaŋ]	'get'
Thai		ขึ้น	[kʰɯ̟n˥˩]	'to go up'	Near-back.
Turkish		sığ	[sɯ̟ː]	'shallow'	Near-back. See Turkish phonology
Turkmen		ýaşyl	[jäːˈʃɯl]	'green'
Vietnamese		tư	[tɯ]	'fourth'	See Vietnamese phonology
Xumi	Upper	[Hkɯ]		'to bake'	Allophone of /ʉ/ after velar consonants.

The symbol ⟨ɯ⟩ is sometimes used for Japanese /u/, but that sound is rounded, albeit with labial compression rather than protrusion. It is more accurately described as an exolabial close back vowel.

See also

• Index of phonetics articles