The Japanese /u/ got unrounded and now its fronted closer to an [ Ι¨ ]
Although not the most common vowels in the world, the front rounded vowels /y ΓΈ Ε/ seem to occur much more frequently than their back unrounded /Ι― Ι€ Κ/ amongst world languages. Why is this?
Seems like all of these are rare, but why?
They are so rare that Wikipedia only lists one or two languages with /ΙΆ/ while there isnβt even an article on /ΙΜ/. Meanwhile, /Ι/ seems to be present in a larger segment of languages.
What makes the rounded βAβ vowels so rare?
Hi guys, can anyone give me some examples of words that have front rounded vowels in Mandarin. these are absent in english so im kind of confused. thanks :D
So I've been messing around with Gleb for a while, and I think I've found a couple of the absolute ugliest languages it can spit out, perfect for orc-like creatures. My first batch Uglang tests did not take practical considerations into account and I was left using huge phonologies or impossible clusters. Here's the one that lasted the longest in my notes, phonology stolen directly from Gleb:
| Labial | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Labial-Velar | Glottal | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m | n | ΕΝ‘mΚ² | Ε | ΕΝ‘m | |
| Plosive | p b | t d | kΝ‘pΚ² gΝ‘bΚ² | k g | kΝ‘p gΝ‘b | |
| Fricative | s | h | ||||
| Approximant | Ξ²Μ | ΙΎ | j | w |
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| High | i | u | |
| Mid | e ΙΛ ΕΛ | o | |
| Low | a | Ι |
Syllable Structure: (C)V
Once I realised I'd have trouble explaining to a layman how to pronounce some of these sounds, I gave up.
By the second round of testing I was consistently using the third randomly generated word as the name of the language. I give you my current project, GLEB 0.3.1a/5.0a seed:181634334 or Ragrgik:
| Labial | Alveolar | Velar | Glottal | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m | n | ||
| Plosive | p b | t d | k g | Κ |
| Affricate | dΝ‘z | gΝ‘Ι£ | ||
| Fricative | f | s | h | |
| Approximant | ΙΎ | w |
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| High | i | u | |
| Mid | e αΊ½ | o Γ΅ | |
| Low | a Γ£ |
Syllable Structure: (C)V(C)(F) Where F is non-stop, i.e. one of /m n f s h ΙΎ w/. The allophony listed is quite complex and I still haven't officially codified it:
| // | [] |
|---|---|
| /gΝ‘Ι£oΜwaΜ/ | [gΝ‘Ι£oΜΙΜ―ΙΜΛ] |
| /taΜga/ | [taΜga] |
| /ΙΎagΙΎgig/ | [ΙΎagΙΎgik] |
| /gΝ‘Ι£uh/ | [gΝ‘Ι£uh] |
| /gΝ‘Ι£etgΝ‘Ι£ek/ | [gΝ‘Ι£edgΝ‘Ι£ek] |
| /weΜkakh/ | [oΜ―ΓΈΜgakΚ°h] |
| /wigwaΜgh/ | [wygΙΜ―ΙΜΛkh] |
| /haΜgΝ‘Ι£eΚ/ | [haΜgΝ‘Ι£eΜ°Κ] |
| /gaΜbgeΜb/ | [gaΜbgeΜp] |
| /dΝ‘zeggΝ‘Ι£ag/ | [dΝ‘zeggΝ‘Ι£ak] |
I plan to make the language OSV and isolating. I plan to use a latin-based orthography so that the ugliness of the words can truly be appreciated, possibly written with a "low register" without allophony and a "high register" where I just go nuts and apply all 36 of the sound changes that Gleb demanded of me. As for lexicon, it will be entirely randomly assigned, except for oΜ―ΓΈΜgakΚ°h which obviously means coconut.
So what do you think? Is it sufficiently ugly on first appearances, even more so when the "local accent" is applied?
EDIT: /Κ/ was missing from the table.
After comparing vowel sounds with a Norwegian (speaking ESL RP), I've come to realise that our vowels differ in the NURSE lexical set. While she uses the standard RP /ΙΛ/, I have a rounded vowel that apparently sounds just like 'ΓΈ' in her native Norwegian β perhaps /ΕΛ/.
I came across a 1982 reference to front rounded vowels in this position in Cockney, but although my dialect is rather like Estuary English, I am not at all Cockney: I'm from Bristol. I also talked to some Estuary English speakers from the South East, and they didn't seem to share the trait.
tl;dr β What dialects of English feature front rounded vowels?
I notice when I pronounce [Ι] I round my lips much less than when I pronounce [o]. Is there any research on this?
not sure if its just me or but in rounded vowels does the forwardness and rounding of your lips (on how open or closed it is) matter more on the quality of the vowel than the height? i can pronounce a high vowel like [o] or [u] with my tongue pretty open but with my lips close to eachother and an [Ι] just by changing the shape of my lips while in a unrounded vowel like [a] or [i] i cant do that i need to change my tongue's height
is it just me or is it a thing?
(Also not sure which flair's best for this post as there are many)
I know there are a few words like kar/kΓ’r, that are distinguished by this feature, but l'm unsure about the pronounciation. Before front vowels I hear some speakers say [c, Ι] all the time, but others just straight up say [k, g]. I have no problem pronouncing these sounds since my native language also has them, l'm just curious about which one is the more common one. (And where.)
Is it βfront is always compressed, central and back are always protrudedβ?
My belts are pretty decent, healthy, and comfortable on all syllables up to A4. But once I get to Bb4-C#5 territory, I have a lot of trouble on pretty much all syllables other than "ah" and "ee" unless it's very short. Rounding it out helps a bit but it makes for a weird transition to the next word sometimes. For example, in Impossible year, I often try changing "bitter pill I swallow" to "bitter pell I swallow" but it always sounds weird and the transition from "ell" to "aye" sounds weird. How do I fix this? I know the shape in your throat should stay the same for different vowels and your mouth should be the only thing changing shape and I understand this in theory, but can't make it work in practice.
I was looking at the IPA phonology of english vowels, comparing the general American with the received pronunciation. It lists some of the vowels as rounded and unrounded, and I was wondering if that's the same as short/long (lax/tense).
