Close central unrounded vowel

For the use of /ɨ/ on Wikipedia, see Help:IPA for English.

Close central unrounded vowel
ɨ
ï
IPA number	317
Encoding
Entity (decimal)	ɨ
Unicode (hex)	U+0268
X-SAMPA	1
Kirshenbaum	i"
Braille
Image
Sound
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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. In American tradition this symbol (and the name "barred i") denote a slightly different sound, that of the second syllable of roses when distinct from Rosa's; see also near-close central unrounded vowel.

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 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

/ɨ/ is uncommon as a phoneme in Indo-European languages, but does occur as an allophone in many Slavic languages. 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 (e.g. proto-Uto-Aztecan). Campbell, Kaufman & Smith-Stark (1986) identify the presence of this vowel phoneme as an areal feature of a Mesoamerican Sprachbund (although this 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]
Angor		hüfᵻ	[xɨβə]	'hot'
Czech	Some dialects	był	[bɨɫ]	'he was'	Found in some eastern Moravian, Lach and Silesian dialects. See Czech phonology
Chinese	Mandarin	日 rì	[ɻɨ̹˥˩]	'day'	See Mandarin phonology
English	Southeastern English	rude	[ɹɨ̹ːd]	'rude'	May be rounded [ʉː], or a diphthong [ʊʉ̯~əʉ̯] instead.
Guaraní		yvy	[ɨʋɨ]	'earth'
Hausa					Allophone of /i/.
Irish	Munster	caora	[kɨ̟ːɾˠə]	'sheep'	Somewhat fronted; allophone of /i/ between broad consonants. See Irish phonology
Kaingang		fy	[ɸɨ]	'seed'
Mongolian		хүчир	[xutʃʰɨɾɘ̆]	'difficult'
Muisca	Hycha	hycha	[hɨʂa]	'I'
Romanian		înot	[ɨˈn̪o̞t̪]	'I swim'	See Romanian phonology
Russian		ты	[t̪ɨ]	'you' (singular)	Occurs only after unpalatalized consonants. See Russian phonology
Sahaptin		[kʼsɨt]		'cold'	Epenthetic. No lengthened equivalent
Sema		sü	[ʃɨ̀]	'to hurt'	Also described as near-close [ɨ̞].
Sirionó		[eˈsɨ]		'dry wood'
Swedish		bi	[bɨː]	'bee'	Found in dialects in Närke and Bohuslän and in sociolects in Stockholm and Gothenburg. See Swedish phonology
Tamil		ஆனால்	[äːnäːlɨ]	'but'	Epenthetic vowel inserted in colloquial speech after word-final liquids; can be rounded [ʉ] instead. See Tamil phonology
Tera		zu	[zɨ]	'said'
Udmurt		ургетэ, ыргетэ	[ɨrgete]	'it growls'
Uzbek		qiz	[qɨz]	'girl'	Allophone of /i/.
Vietnamese		trưa	[ʈɨə˧]	'noon'	See Vietnamese phonology
Võro		sysar	[sɨsarʲ]	'sister'
Welsh	Northern dialects	llun	[ɬɨːn]	'picture'	See Welsh phonology
Zapotec	Tilquiapan	nɨ	[nɨ]	'be sour'

Polish ⟨y⟩ is often transcribed 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).

See also

• Index of phonetics articles

Bibliography

• Cruz-Ferreira, Madalena (1995), "European Portuguese", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 25 (2): 90–94, doi:10.1017/S0025100300005223
• Ball, Martin J. (1984), "Phonetics for phonology", in Ball, Martin J.; Jones, G.E (eds.), Welsh Phonology, Cardiff: University of Wales Press, ISBN 0-7083-0861-9
• Campbell, Lyle; Kaufman, Terrence; Smith-Stark, Thomas C (1986), "Meso-America as a linguistic area", Language, 62 (3): 530–570, doi:10.2307/415477, JSTOR 415477
• Firestone, Homer L. (1965), "Description and classification of Sirionó: A Tupí-Guaraní language.", Janua linguarum, Series Practica, London: Mouton & Co
• Hargus, Sharon; Beavert, Virginia (2002), "Predictable versus Underlying Vocalism in Yakima Sahaptin", International Journal of American Linguistics, 68 (3): 316–340, doi:10.1086/466492
• Iivonen, Antti; Harnud, Huhe (2005), "Acoustical comparison of the monophthong systems in Finnish, Mongolian and Udmurt", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 35 (1): 59–71, doi:10.1017/S002510030500191X
• Jassem, Wiktor (2003), "Polish", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 33 (1): 103–107, doi:10.1017/S0025100303001191
• Jones, Daniel; Ward, Dennis (1969), The Phonetics of Russian, Cambridge University Press
• Keane, Elinor (2004), "Tamil", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 34 (1): 111–116, doi:10.1017/S0025100304001549
• Lodge, Ken (2009), A Critical Introduction to Phonetics
• Merrill, Elizabeth (2008), "Tilquiapan Zapotec", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 38 (1): 107–114, doi:10.1017/S0025100308003344
• Ó Sé, Diarmuid (2000), Gaeilge Chorca Dhuibhne (in Gaeilge), Dublin: Institiúid Teangeolaíochta Éireann, ISBN 0-946452-97-0
• Schuh, Russell G.; Yalwa, Lawan D. (1999), "Hausa", Handbook of the International Phonetic Association, Cambridge University Press, pp. 90–95, ISBN 0-521-63751-1
• Tench, Paul (2007), "Tera", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 37 (1): 228–234, doi:10.1017/s0025100307002952
• Teo, Amos B. (2012), "Sumi (Sema)", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 42 (03): 365–373, doi:10.1017/S0025100312000254
• Teo, Amos B. (2014), A phonological and phonetic description of Sumi, a Tibeto-Burman language of Nagaland (PDF), Canberra: Asia-Pacific Linguistics, ISBN 978-1-922185-10-5