International Phonetic Alphabet

The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is an alphabetic system of phonetic notation based primarily on the Latin alphabet. It was devised by the International Phonetic Association in the late 19th century as a standardized representation of the sounds of spoken language.[1] The IPA is used by lexicographers, foreign language students and teachers, linguists, speech-language pathologists, singers, actors, constructed language creators and translators.[2][3]

International Phonetic Alphabet
IPA in IPA ([aɪ pʰiː eɪ])
Type
Alphabet – partially featural
LanguagesUsed for phonetic and phonemic transcription of any language
Time period
since 1888
Parent systems
DirectionLeft-to-right
ISO 15924Latn, 215
Unicode alias
Latin
The official chart of the IPA, revised in 2020

The IPA is designed to represent only those qualities of speech that are part of oral language: phones, phonemes, intonation and the separation of words and syllables.[1] To represent additional qualities of speech, such as tooth gnashing, lisping, and sounds made with a cleft lip and cleft palate, an extended set of symbols, the extensions to the International Phonetic Alphabet, may be used.[2]

IPA symbols are composed of one or more elements of two basic types, letters and diacritics. For example, the sound of the English letter ⟨t⟩ may be transcribed in IPA with a single letter, [t], or with a letter plus diacritics, [t̺ʰ], depending on how precise one wishes to be.[note 1] Often, slashes are used to signal broad or phonemic transcription; thus, /t/ is less specific than, and could refer to, either [t̺ʰ] or [t], depending on the context and language.

Occasionally letters or diacritics are added, removed or modified by the International Phonetic Association. As of the most recent change in 2005,[4] there are 107 letters, 52 diacritics and four prosodic marks in the IPA. These are shown in the current IPA chart, also posted below in this article and at the website of the IPA.[5]

History
Main article: History of the International Phonetic Alphabet

In 1886, a group of French and British language teachers, led by the French linguist Paul Passy, formed what would come to be known from 1897 onwards as the International Phonetic Association (in French, l'Association phonétique internationale).[6] Their original alphabet was based on a spelling reform for English known as the Romic alphabet, but in order to make it usable for other languages, the values of the symbols were allowed to vary from language to language.[7] For example, the sound [ʃ] (the sh in shoe) was originally represented with the letter ⟨c⟩ in English, but with the digraph ⟨ch⟩ in French.[6] However, in 1888, the alphabet was revised so as to be uniform across languages, thus providing the base for all future revisions.[6][8] The idea of making the IPA was first suggested by Otto Jespersen in a letter to Paul Passy. It was developed by Alexander John Ellis, Henry Sweet, Daniel Jones, and Passy.[9]

Since its creation, the IPA has undergone a number of revisions. After revisions and expansions from the 1890s to the 1940s, the IPA remained primarily unchanged until the Kiel Convention in 1989. A minor revision took place in 1993 with the addition of four letters for mid central vowels[2] and the removal of letters for voiceless implosives.[10] The alphabet was last revised in May 2005 with the addition of a letter for a labiodental flap.[11] Apart from the addition and removal of symbols, changes to the IPA have consisted largely of renaming symbols and categories and in modifying typefaces.[2]

Extensions to the International Phonetic Alphabet for speech pathology were created in 1990 and officially adopted by the International Clinical Phonetics and Linguistics Association in 1994.[12]

Description

The general principle of the IPA is to provide one letter for each distinctive sound (speech segment), although this practice is not followed if the sound itself is complex.[13] This means that:

  • It does not normally use combinations of letters to represent single sounds, the way English does with ⟨sh⟩, ⟨th⟩ and ⟨ng⟩, or single letters to represent multiple sounds the way ⟨x⟩ represents /ks/ or /ɡz/ in English.
  • There are no letters that have context-dependent sound values, as do "hard" and "soft" ⟨c⟩ or ⟨g⟩ in several European languages.
  • The IPA does not usually have separate letters for two sounds if no known language makes a distinction between them, a property known as "selectiveness".[2][note 2]

The alphabet is designed for transcribing sounds (phones), not phonemes, though it is used for phonemic transcription as well. A few letters that did not indicate specific sounds have been retired (⟨ˇ⟩, once used for the 'compound' tone of Swedish and Norwegian, and ⟨ƞ⟩, once used for the moraic nasal of Japanese), though one remains: ⟨ɧ⟩, used for the sj-sound of Swedish. When the IPA is used for phonemic transcription, the letter–sound correspondence can be rather loose. For example, ⟨c⟩ and ⟨ɟ⟩ are used in the IPA Handbook for /t͡ʃ/ and /d͡ʒ/.

Among the symbols of the IPA, 107 letters represent consonants and vowels, 31 diacritics are used to modify these, and 19 additional signs indicate suprasegmental qualities such as length, tone, stress, and intonation.[note 3] These are organized into a chart; the chart displayed here is the official chart as posted at the website of the IPA.

Letter forms

The letters chosen for the IPA are meant to harmonize with the Latin alphabet.[note 4] For this reason, most letters are either Latin or Greek, or modifications thereof. Some letters are neither: for example, the letter denoting the glottal stop, ⟨ʔ⟩, has the form of a dotless question mark, and derives originally from an apostrophe. A few letters, such as that of the voiced pharyngeal fricative, ⟨ʕ⟩, were inspired by other writing systems (in this case, the Arabic letter ﻉ‎ ʿayn).[10]

Despite its preference for harmonizing with the Latin script, the International Phonetic Association has occasionally admitted other letters. For example, before 1989, the IPA letters for click consonants were ⟨ʘ⟩, ⟨ʇ⟩, ⟨ʗ⟩, and ⟨ʖ⟩, all of which were derived either from existing IPA letters, or from Latin and Greek letters. However, except for ⟨ʘ⟩, none of these letters were widely used among Khoisanists or Bantuists, and as a result they were replaced by the more widespread symbols ⟨ʘ⟩, ⟨ǀ⟩, ⟨ǃ⟩, ⟨ǂ⟩, and ⟨ǁ⟩ at the IPA Kiel Convention in 1989.[14]

Although the IPA diacritics are fully featural, there is little systemicity in the letter forms. A retroflex articulation is consistently indicated with a right-swinging tail, as in ⟨ɖ ɳ ʂ⟩, and implosion by a top hook, ⟨ɠ ɗ ɓ⟩, but other pseudo-featural elements are due to haphazard derivation and coincidence. For example, all nasal consonants but uvular ⟨ɴ⟩ are based on the form ⟨n⟩: ⟨m ɱ n ɳ ɲ ŋ⟩. However, the similarity between ⟨m⟩ and ⟨n⟩ is a historical accident; ⟨ɲ⟩ and ⟨ŋ⟩ are derived from ligatures of gn and ng, and ⟨ɱ⟩ is an ad hoc imitation of ⟨ŋ⟩.

Some of the new letters were ordinary Latin letters turned 180 degrees, such as ɐ ɔ ə ɟ ɥ ɯ ɹ ʇ ʌ ʍ ʎ (turned a c e f h m r t v w y). This was easily done in the era of mechanical typesetting, and had the advantage of not requiring the casting of special type for IPA symbols.

Capital letters

Full capital letters are not used as IPA symbols. They are, however, often used for archiphonemes and for natural classes of phonemes (that is, as wildcards). Such usage is not part of the IPA or even standardized, and may be ambiguous between authors, but it is commonly used in conjunction with the IPA. (The extIPA chart, for example, uses wildcards in its illustrations.) Capital letters are also basic to the Voice Quality Symbols sometimes used in conjunction with the IPA.

As wildcards, ⟨C⟩ for {consonant} and ⟨V⟩ for {vowel} are ubiquitous. Other common capital-letter symbols are ⟨T⟩ for {tone/accent} (tonicity), ⟨N⟩ for {nasal}, ⟨P⟩ for {plosive}, ⟨F⟩ for {fricative}, ⟨S⟩ for {sibilant},[15] ⟨G⟩ for {glide/approximant}, ⟨L⟩ for {liquid}, ⟨R⟩ for {rhotic} or {resonant} (sonorant), ⟨Ʞ⟩ for {click}, ⟨A, E, O, Ʉ⟩ for {open, front, back, close vowel} and ⟨B, D, J (or Ɉ), K, Q, Φ, H⟩ for {labial, alveolar, post-alveolar/palatal, velar, uvular, pharyngeal, glottal consonant}, respectively, and ⟨X⟩ for any sound. For example, the possible syllable shapes of Mandarin can be abstracted as ranging from /V/ (an atonic vowel) to /CGVNᵀ/ (a consonant-glide-vowel-nasal syllable with tone). The letters can be modified with IPA diacritics, for example ⟨Cʼ⟩ for {ejective}, ⟨Ƈ⟩ for {implosive}, ⟨N͡C⟩ or ⟨ᴺC⟩ for {prenasalized consonant}, ⟨Ṽ⟩ for {nasal vowel}, ⟨S̬⟩ for {voiced sibilant}, ⟨N̥⟩ for {voiceless nasal}, ⟨P͡F⟩ or ⟨PF⟩ for {affricate}, ⟨Cʲ⟩ for {palatalized consonant} and ⟨D̪⟩ for {dental consonant}. In speech pathology, capital letters represent indeterminate sounds, and may be superscripted to indicate they are weakly articulated: e.g. [ᴰ] is a weak indeterminate alveolar, [ᴷ] a weak indeterminate velar.[16]

Typical examples of archiphonemic use of capital letters are ⟨I⟩ for the Turkish harmonic vowel set {i y ɯ u}[17] ⟨D⟩ for the conflated flapped middle consonant of American English writer and rider, and ⟨N⟩ for the homorganic syllable-coda nasal of languages such as Spanish (essentially equivalent to the wild-card usage of the letter).

⟨V⟩, ⟨F⟩ and ⟨C⟩ have different meanings as Voice Quality Symbols, where they stand for "voice" (generally meaning secondary articulation rather than phonetic voicing), "falsetto" and "creak". They may take diacritics that indicate what kind of voice quality an utterance has, and may be used to extract a suprasegmental feature that occurs on all susceptible segments in a stretch of IPA. For instance, the transcription of Scottish Gaelic [kʷʰuˣʷt̪ʷs̟ʷ] 'cat' and [kʷʰʉˣʷt͜ʃʷ] 'cats' (Islay dialect) can be made more economical by extracting the suprasegmental labialization of the words: Vʷ[kʰuˣt̪s̟] and Vʷ[kʰʉˣt͜ʃ].[18]

Typography and iconicity

The International Phonetic Alphabet is based on the Latin alphabet, using as few non-Latin forms as possible.[6] The Association created the IPA so that the sound values of most consonant letters taken from the Latin alphabet would correspond to "international usage".[6] Hence, the letters ⟨b⟩, ⟨d⟩, ⟨f⟩, (hard) ⟨ɡ⟩, (non-silent) ⟨h⟩, (unaspirated) ⟨k⟩, ⟨l⟩, ⟨m⟩, ⟨n⟩, (unaspirated) ⟨p⟩, (voiceless) ⟨s⟩, (unaspirated) ⟨t⟩, ⟨v⟩, ⟨w⟩, and ⟨z⟩ have the values used in English; and the vowel letters from the Latin alphabet (⟨a⟩, ⟨e⟩, ⟨i⟩, ⟨o⟩, ⟨u⟩) correspond to the (long) sound values of Latin: [i] is like the vowel in machine, [u] is as in rule, etc. Other letters may differ from English, but are used with these values in other European languages, such as ⟨j⟩, ⟨r⟩, and ⟨y⟩.

This inventory was extended by using small-capital and cursive forms, diacritics and rotation. There are also several symbols derived or taken from the Greek alphabet, though the sound values may differ. For example, ⟨ʋ⟩ is a vowel in Greek, but an only indirectly related consonant in the IPA. For most of these, subtly different glyph shapes have been devised for the IPA, namely ⟨ɑ⟩, ⟨ꞵ⟩, ⟨ɣ⟩, ⟨ɛ⟩, ⟨ɸ⟩, ⟨ꭓ⟩, and ⟨ʋ⟩, which are encoded in Unicode separately from their parent Greek letters, though one of them – ⟨θ⟩ – is not, while Greek ⟨β⟩ and ⟨χ⟩ are generally used for Latin ⟨ꞵ⟩ and ⟨ꭓ⟩.[19]

The sound values of modified Latin letters can often be derived from those of the original letters.[20] For example, letters with a rightward-facing hook at the bottom represent retroflex consonants; and small capital letters usually represent uvular consonants. Apart from the fact that certain kinds of modification to the shape of a letter generally correspond to certain kinds of modification to the sound represented, there is no way to deduce the sound represented by a symbol from its shape (as for example in Visible Speech) nor even any systematic relation between signs and the sounds they represent (as in Hangul).

Beyond the letters themselves, there are a variety of secondary symbols which aid in transcription. Diacritic marks can be combined with IPA letters to transcribe modified phonetic values or secondary articulations. There are also special symbols for suprasegmental features such as stress and tone that are often employed.

Brackets and transcription delimiters

There are two principal types of brackets used to set off IPA transcriptions:

  • [square brackets] are used with phonetic notation[21] – that is, for actual pronunciation, possibly including details of the pronunciation that may not be used for distinguishing words in the language being transcribed, but which the author nonetheless wishes to document. Such phonetic notation is the primary function of the IPA.
  • /slashes/ are used for abstract phonemic notation,[21] which note only features that are distinctive in the language, without any extraneous detail. For example, while the /p/ sounds of pin and spin are pronounced slightly differently in English (and this difference would be meaningful in some languages), the difference is not meaningful in English. Thus phonemically the words are /pɪn/ and /spɪn/, with the same /p/ phoneme. However, to capture the difference between them (the allophones of /p/), they can be transcribed phonetically as [pʰɪn] and [spɪn]. Phonemic notation may use IPA symbols for something other than their defined values, such as /c, ɟ/ for affricates, as found in the Handbook, or /r/ for English r.

Other conventions are less commonly seen:

  • {Braces} are used for prosodic notation.[22] See Extensions to the International Phonetic Alphabet for examples in this system.
  • (Parentheses) are used for indistinguishable[21] or unidentified utterances. They are also seen for silent articulation (mouthing),[23] where the expected phonetic transcription is derived from lip-reading, and with periods to indicate silent pauses, for example (…) or (2 sec). The latter usage is made official in the extIPA, with unidentified segments circled.[24]
  • Double parentheses indicate an obscured sound,[22] as in ⸨2σ⸩, two audible syllables obscured by another noise. The extIPA specifies double parentheses for extraneous noise (as a knock on a door), but the IPA Handbook identifies IPA and extIPA usage as equivalent.[25]

All three of the above are provided by the IPA Handbook. The following are not, but may be seen in IPA transcription:

  • Double square brackets ⟦...⟧ are used for extra-precise (especially narrow) transcription. This is consistent with the IPA convention of doubling a symbol to indicate greater degree. Double brackets indicate that a letter has its cardinal IPA value. For example, ⟦a⟧ is an open front vowel, rather than the perhaps slightly different value (such as open central) that "[a]" may be used to transcribe in a particular language. Thus two vowels transcribed for easy legibility as ⟨[e]⟩ and ⟨[ɛ]⟩ may be clarified as actually being ⟦e̝⟧ and ⟦e⟧; ⟨[ð]⟩ may be more precisely ⟦ð̠̞ˠ⟧.[26]
  • Double slashes ⫽...⫽ are used for morphophonemic transcription. This is also consistent with the IPA convention of doubling a symbol to indicate greater degree (in this case, more abstract than phonemic transcription). Other symbols sometimes seen for morphophonemic transcription are pipes |...|, double pipes ‖...‖ (as in Americanist phonetic notation) and braces {...} (from set theory, especially when enclosing a set of member phonemes rather than a single letter), but all of these conflict with IPA indications of prosody.[27]
    See morphophonology for examples.
  • Angle brackets[28] are used to mark orthography and transliteration. Within the IPA, they are used to indicate that the letters stand for themselves and not for the sound values that they carry. For example, ⟨cot⟩ would be used for the orthography of the English word cot, as opposed to its pronunciation [ˈkʰɒt]. Italics are more commonly used for this purpose when full words are being written (as "cot" just above), but italics may not be sufficiently clear when demarcating individual letters and digraphs. It may occasionally be useful to distinguish original orthography from transliteration with double angle brackets ⟪...⟫.

Cursive forms
Main article: Cursive forms of the International Phonetic Alphabet

IPA letters have cursive forms designed for use in manuscripts and when taking field notes.

Letter g
Typographic variants include a double-story and single-story g.

In the early stages of the alphabet, the typographic variants of g, opentail ⟨ɡ⟩ () and looptail ⟨g⟩ (), represented different values, but are now regarded as equivalents. Opentail ⟨ɡ⟩ has always represented a voiced velar plosive, while ⟨⟩ was distinguished from ⟨ɡ⟩ and represented a voiced velar fricative from 1895 to 1900.[29][30] Subsequently, ⟨ǥ⟩ represented the fricative, until 1931 when it was replaced again by ⟨ɣ⟩.[31]

In 1948, the Council of the Association recognized ⟨ɡ⟩ and ⟨⟩ as typographic equivalents,[32] and this decision was reaffirmed in 1993.[33] While the 1949 Principles of the International Phonetic Association recommended the use of ⟨⟩ for a velar plosive and ⟨ɡ⟩ for an advanced one for languages where it is preferable to distinguish the two, such as Russian,[34] this practice never caught on.[35] The 1999 Handbook of the International Phonetic Association, the successor to the Principles, abandoned the recommendation and acknowledged both shapes as acceptable variants.[36]

Modifying the IPA chart
The authors of textbooks or similar publications often create revised versions of the IPA chart to express their own preferences or needs. The image displays one such version. Only the black symbols are part of the IPA; common additional symbols are in grey. Some of these are in the extIPA.

The International Phonetic Alphabet is occasionally modified by the Association. After each modification, the Association provides an updated simplified presentation of the alphabet in the form of a chart. (See History of the IPA.) Not all aspects of the alphabet can be accommodated in a chart of the size published by the IPA. The alveolo-palatal and epiglottal consonants, for example, are not included in the consonant chart for reasons of space rather than of theory (two additional columns would be required, one between the retroflex and palatal columns and the other between the pharyngeal and glottal columns), and the lateral flap would require an additional row for that single consonant, so they are listed instead under the catchall block of "other symbols".[37] The indefinitely large number of tone letters would make a full accounting impractical even on a larger page, and only a few examples are shown.

The procedure for modifying the alphabet or the chart is to propose the change in the Journal of the IPA. (See, for example, August 2008 on an open central unrounded vowel and August 2011 on central approximants.)[38] Reactions to the proposal may be published in the same or subsequent issues of the Journal (as in August 2009 on the open central vowel).[39] A formal proposal is then put to the Council of the IPA[40] – which is elected by the membership[41] – for further discussion and a formal vote.[42][43]

Only changes to the alphabet or chart that have been approved by the Council can be considered part of the official IPA. Nonetheless, many users of the alphabet, including the leadership of the Association itself, make personal changes or additions in their own practice, either for convenience in the broad phonetic or phonemic transcription of a particular language (see "Illustrations of the IPA" for individual languages in the Handbook, which for example may use ⟨/c/⟩ as a phonemic symbol for what is phonetically realized as [tʃ]),[44] or because they object to some aspect of the official version.

Usage
Further information: Phonetic transcription

Of more than 160 IPA symbols, relatively few will be used to transcribe speech in any one language, with various levels of precision. A precise phonetic transcription, in which sounds are specified in detail, is known as a narrow transcription. A coarser transcription with less detail is called a broad transcription. Both are relative terms, and both are generally enclosed in square brackets.[1] Broad phonetic transcriptions may restrict themselves to easily heard details, or only to details that are relevant to the discussion at hand, and may differ little if at all from phonemic transcriptions, but they make no theoretical claim that all the distinctions transcribed are necessarily meaningful in the language.

Phonetic transcriptions of the word international in two English dialects

For example, the English word little may be transcribed broadly as /ˈlɪtəl/, approximately describing many pronunciations. A narrower transcription may focus on individual or dialectical details: [ˈɫɪɾɫ] in General American, [ˈlɪʔo] in Cockney, or [ˈɫɪːɫ] in Southern US English.

Phonemic transcriptions, which express the conceptual counterparts of spoken sounds, are usually enclosed in slashes (/ /) and tend to use simpler letters with few diacritics. The choice of IPA letters may reflect theoretical claims of how speakers conceptualize sounds as phonemes, or they may be merely a convenience for typesetting. Phonemic approximations between slashes do not have absolute sound values. For instance, in English, either the vowel of pick or the vowel of peak may be transcribed as /i/, so that pick, peak would be transcribed as /pik, piːk/ or as /pɪk, pik/; and neither is identical to the vowel of the French pique which is also generally transcribed /i/. By contrast, a narrow phonetic transcription of pick, peak, pique could be: [pʰɪk], [pʰiːk], [pikʲ].

Linguists

Although IPA is popular for transcription by linguists, American linguists often alternate use of the IPA with Americanist phonetic notation or use the IPA together with some nonstandard symbols, for reasons including reducing the error rate on reading handwritten transcriptions or avoiding perceived awkwardness of IPA in some situations. The exact practice may vary somewhat between languages and even individual researchers, so authors are generally encouraged to include a chart or other explanation of their choices.[45]

Language study
A page from an English language textbook used in Russia. The IPA is used to teach the different pronunciations of the digraph ⟨th⟩ (/θ/, /ð/) and to show the pronunciation of newly introduced words polite, everything, always, forget.

Some language study programs use the IPA to teach pronunciation. For example, in Russia (and earlier in the Soviet Union) and mainland China, textbooks for children[46] and adults[47] for studying English and French consistently use the IPA. English teachers and textbooks in Taiwan tend to use the Kenyon and Knott system, a slight typographical variant of the IPA first used in the 1944 Pronouncing Dictionary of American English.

Dictionaries

English

Many British dictionaries, including the Oxford English Dictionary and some learner's dictionaries such as the Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary and the Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary, now use the International Phonetic Alphabet to represent the pronunciation of words.[48] However, most American (and some British) volumes use one of a variety of pronunciation respelling systems, intended to be more comfortable for readers of English. For example, the respelling systems in many American dictionaries (such as Merriam-Webster) use ⟨y⟩ for IPA [j] and ⟨sh⟩ for IPA [ʃ], reflecting common representations of those sounds in written English,[49] using only letters of the English Roman alphabet and variations of them. (In IPA, [y] represents the sound of the French ⟨u⟩ (as in tu), and [sh] represents the pair of sounds in grasshopper.)

Other languages

The IPA is also not universal among dictionaries in languages other than English. Monolingual dictionaries of languages with generally phonemic orthographies generally do not bother with indicating the pronunciation of most words, and tend to use respelling systems for words with unexpected pronunciations. Dictionaries produced in Israel use the IPA rarely and sometimes use the Hebrew alphabet for transcription of foreign words. Monolingual Hebrew dictionaries use pronunciation respelling for words with unusual spelling; for example, the Even-Shoshan Dictionary respells תָּכְנִית‎ as תּוֹכְנִית‎ because this word uses kamatz katan. Bilingual dictionaries that translate from foreign languages into Russian usually employ the IPA, but monolingual Russian dictionaries occasionally use pronunciation respelling for foreign words; for example, Sergey Ozhegov's dictionary adds нэ́ in brackets for the French word пенсне (pince-nez) to indicate that the final е does not iotate the preceding н.

The IPA is more common in bilingual dictionaries, but there are exceptions here too. Mass-market bilingual Czech dictionaries, for instance, tend to use the IPA only for sounds not found in the Czech language.[50]

Standard orthographies and case variants
Main article: Case variants of IPA letters

IPA letters have been incorporated into the alphabets of various languages, notably via the Africa Alphabet in many sub-Saharan languages such as Hausa, Fula, Akan, Gbe languages, Manding languages, Lingala, etc. This has created the need for capital variants. For example, Kabiyè of northern Togo has Ɖ ɖ, Ŋ ŋ, Ɣ ɣ, Ɔ ɔ, Ɛ ɛ, Ʋ ʋ. These, and others, are supported by Unicode, but appear in Latin ranges other than the IPA extensions.

In the IPA itself, however, only lower-case letters are used. The 1949 edition of the IPA handbook indicated that an asterisk ⟨*⟩ may be prefixed to indicate that a word is a proper name,[51] but this convention was not included in the 1999 Handbook.

Classical singing

IPA has widespread use among classical singers during preparation as they are frequently required to sing in a variety of foreign languages, in addition to being taught by vocal coach in order to perfect the diction of their students and to globally improve tone quality and tuning.[52] Opera librettos are authoritatively transcribed in IPA, such as Nico Castel's volumes[53] and Timothy Cheek's book Singing in Czech.[54] Opera singers' ability to read IPA was used by the site Visual Thesaurus, which employed several opera singers "to make recordings for the 150,000 words and phrases in VT's lexical database ... for their vocal stamina, attention to the details of enunciation, and most of all, knowledge of IPA".[55]

Letters
See also: International Phonetic Alphabet chart

The International Phonetic Association organizes the letters of the IPA into three categories: pulmonic consonants, non-pulmonic consonants, and vowels.[56][57]

Pulmonic consonant letters are arranged singly or in pairs of voiceless (tenuis) and voiced sounds, with these then grouped in columns from front (labial) sounds on the left to back (glottal) sounds on the right. In official publications by the IPA, two columns are omitted to save space, with the letters listed among 'other symbols',[58] and with the remaining consonants arranged in rows from full closure (occlusives: stops and nasals), to brief closure (vibrants: trills and taps), to partial closure (fricatives) and minimal closure (approximants), again with a row left out to save space. In the table below, a slightly different arrangement is made: All pulmonic consonants are included in the pulmonic-consonant table, and the vibrants and laterals are separated out so that the rows reflect the common lenition pathway of stop → fricative → approximant, as well as the fact that several letters pull double duty as both fricative and approximant; affricates may be created by joining stops and fricatives from adjacent cells. Shaded cells represent articulations that are judged to be impossible.

Vowel letters are also grouped in pairs—of unrounded and rounded vowel sounds—with these pairs also arranged from front on the left to back on the right, and from maximal closure at top to minimal closure at bottom. No vowel letters are omitted from the chart, though in the past some of the mid central vowels were listed among the 'other symbols'.

IPA number

Each character is assigned a number, to prevent confusion between similar characters (such as ɵ and θ, ɤ and ɣ, or ʃ and ʄ) in such situations as the printing of manuscripts. The categories of sounds are assigned different ranges of numbers.[59]

The numbers are assigned to sounds and to symbols, e.g. 304 is the open front unrounded vowel, 415 is the centralization diacritic. Together, they form a symbol that represents the open central unrounded vowel, [ä].

Consonants
Main article: Consonant

Pulmonic consonants
See also: IPA pulmonic consonant chart with audio

A pulmonic consonant is a consonant made by obstructing the glottis (the space between the vocal cords) or oral cavity (the mouth) and either simultaneously or subsequently letting out air from the lungs. Pulmonic consonants make up the majority of consonants in the IPA, as well as in human language. All consonants in the English language fall into this category.[60]

The pulmonic consonant table, which includes most consonants, is arranged in rows that designate manner of articulation, meaning how the consonant is produced, and columns that designate place of articulation, meaning where in the vocal tract the consonant is produced. The main chart includes only consonants with a single place of articulation.

Notes

  • In rows where some letters appear in pairs (the obstruents), the letter to the right represents a voiced consonant (except breathy-voiced [ɦ]). However, [ʔ] cannot be voiced, and the voicing of [ʡ] is ambiguous.[61] In the other rows (the sonorants), the single letter represents a voiced consonant.
  • Although there is a single letter for the coronal places of articulation for all consonants but fricatives, when dealing with a particular language, the letters may be treated as specifically dental, alveolar, or post-alveolar, as appropriate for that language, without diacritics.
  • Shaded areas indicate articulations judged to be impossible.
  • The letters [ʁ, ʕ, ʢ] represent either voiced fricatives or approximants.
  • In many languages, such as English, [h] and [ɦ] are not actually glottal, fricatives, or approximants. Rather, they are bare phonation.[62]
  • It is primarily the shape of the tongue rather than its position that distinguishes the fricatives [ʃ ʒ], [ɕ ʑ], and [ʂ ʐ].
  • Some listed phones are not known to exist as phonemes in any language.

Non-pulmonic consonants

Non-pulmonic consonants are sounds whose airflow is not dependent on the lungs. These include clicks (found in the Khoisan languages and some neighboring Bantu languages of Africa), implosives (found in languages such as Sindhi, Hausa, Swahili and Vietnamese), and ejectives (found in many Amerindian and Caucasian languages).

Notes

  • Clicks have traditionally been described as consisting of a forward place of articulation, commonly called the click 'type' or historically the 'influx', and a rear place of articulation, which when combined with the voicing, aspiration, nasalization, affrication, ejection, timing etc. of the click is commonly called the click 'accompaniment' or historically the 'efflux'. The IPA click letters indicate only the click type (forward articulation and release). Therefore all clicks require two letters for proper notation: ⟨k͡ǂ, ɡ͡ǂ, ŋ͡ǂ, q͡ǂ, ɢ͡ǂ, ɴ͡ǂ⟩ etc., or with the order reversed if both the forward and rear releases are audible. The letter for the rear articulation is frequently omitted, in which case a ⟨k⟩ may usually be assumed. However, some researcher dispute the idea that clicks should be analyzed as doubly articulated, as the traditional transcription implies, and analyze the rear occlusion as solely a part of the airstream mechanism.[63] In transcriptions of such approaches, the click letter represents both places of articulation, with the different letters representing the different click types, and diacritics are used for the elements of the accompaniment: ⟨ǂ, ǂ̬, ǂ̃⟩ etc.
  • Letters for the voiceless implosives ⟨ƥ, ƭ, ƈ, ƙ, ʠ⟩ are no longer supported by the IPA, though they remain in Unicode. Instead, the IPA typically uses the voiced equivalent with a voiceless diacritic: ⟨ɓ̥, ʛ̥⟩, etc..
  • Although not confirmed as contrastive in any language, and therefore not officially recognized by the IPA, a letter for the retroflex implosive, ⟨ᶑ⟩, has been assigned an IPA number.
  • The ejective diacritic often stands in for a superscript glottal stop in glottalized but pulmonic sonorants, such as [mˀ], [lˀ], [wˀ], [aˀ]. These may also be transcribed as creaky [m̰], [l̰], [w̰], [a̰].

Affricates

Affricates and co-articulated stops are represented by two letters joined by a tie bar, either above or below the letters.[64] The six most common affricates are optionally represented by ligatures, though this is no longer official IPA usage,[1] because a great number of ligatures would be required to represent all affricates this way. Alternatively, a superscript notation for a consonant release is sometimes used to transcribe affricates, for example tˢ for t͡s, paralleling kˣ ~ k͡x. The letters for the palatal plosives c and ɟ are often used as a convenience for t͡ʃ and d͡ʒ or similar affricates, even in official IPA publications, so they must be interpreted with care.

Note

  • On browsers that use Arial Unicode MS to display IPA characters, the following incorrectly formed sequences may look better due to a bug in that font: ts͡, tʃ͡, tɕ͡, dz͡, dʒ͡, dʑ͡, tɬ͡, dɮ͡.

Co-articulated consonants

Co-articulated consonants are sounds that involve two simultaneous places of articulation (are pronounced using two parts of the vocal tract). In English, the [w] in "went" is a coarticulated consonant, being pronounced by rounding the lips and raising the back of the tongue. Similar sounds are [ʍ] and [ɥ]. In some languages, plosives can be double-articulated, for example in the name of Laurent Gbagbo.

Notes

  • [ɧ] is described as a "simultaneous [ʃ] and [x]".[65] However, this analysis is disputed. (See voiceless palatal-velar fricative for discussion.)
  • Multiple tie bars can be used: ⟨a͡b͡c⟩ or ⟨a͜b͜c⟩. For instance, if a prenasalized stop is transcribed ⟨m͡b⟩, and a doubly articulated stop ⟨ɡ͡b⟩, then a prenasalized doubly articulated stop would be ⟨ŋ͡m͡ɡ͡b⟩
  • On browsers that use Arial Unicode MS to display IPA characters, the following incorrectly formed sequences may look better due to a bug in that font: kp͡, ɡb͡, ŋm͡.

Vowels
Main article: Vowel
See also: IPA vowel chart with audio
Tongue positions of cardinal front vowels, with highest point indicated. The position of the highest point is used to determine vowel height and backness.
X-ray photos show the sounds [i, u, a, ɑ].

The IPA defines a vowel as a sound which occurs at a syllable center.[66] Below is a chart depicting the vowels of the IPA. The IPA maps the vowels according to the position of the tongue.

The vertical axis of the chart is mapped by vowel height. Vowels pronounced with the tongue lowered are at the bottom, and vowels pronounced with the tongue raised are at the top. For example, [ɑ] (the first vowel in father) is at the bottom because the tongue is lowered in this position. However, [i] (the vowel in "meet") is at the top because the sound is said with the tongue raised to the roof of the mouth.

In a similar fashion, the horizontal axis of the chart is determined by vowel backness. Vowels with the tongue moved towards the front of the mouth (such as [ɛ], the vowel in "met") are to the left in the chart, while those in which it is moved to the back (such as [ʌ], the vowel in "but") are placed to the right in the chart.

In places where vowels are paired, the right represents a rounded vowel (in which the lips are rounded) while the left is its unrounded counterpart.

Diphthongs

Diphthongs are typically specified with a non-syllabic diacritic, as in ⟨uɪ̯⟩ or ⟨u̯ɪ⟩, or with a superscript for the on- or off-glide, as in ⟨uᶦ⟩ or ⟨ᵘɪ⟩. Sometimes a tie bar is used, especially if it is difficult to tell if the diphthong is characterized by an on-glide, an off-glide or is variable: ⟨u͡ɪ⟩.

Notes

  • ⟨a⟩ officially represents a front vowel, but there is little distinction between front and central open vowels, and ⟨a⟩ is frequently used for an open central vowel.[45] However, if disambiguation is required, the retraction diacritic or the centralized diacritic may be added to indicate an open central vowel, as in ⟨a̠⟩ or ⟨ä⟩.

Diacritics and prosodic notation

Diacritics are used for phonetic detail. They are added to IPA letters to indicate a modification or specification of that letter's normal pronunciation.[67]

By being made superscript, any IPA letter may function as a diacritic, conferring elements of its articulation to the base letter. (See secondary articulation for a list of superscript IPA letters supported by Unicode.) Those superscript letters listed below are specifically provided for by the IPA; others include ⟨tˢ⟩ ([t] with fricative release), ⟨ᵗs⟩ ([s] with affricate onset), ⟨ⁿd⟩ (prenasalized [d]), ⟨bʱ⟩ ([b] with breathy voice), ⟨mˀ⟩ (glottalized [m]), ⟨sᶴ⟩ ([s] with a flavor of [ʃ]), ⟨oᶷ⟩ ([o] with diphthongization), ⟨ɯᵝ⟩ (compressed [ɯ]). Superscript diacritics placed after a letter are ambiguous between simultaneous modification of the sound and phonetic detail at the end of the sound. For example, labialized ⟨kʷ⟩ may mean either simultaneous [k] and [w] or else [k] with a labialized release. Superscript diacritics placed before a letter, on the other hand, normally indicate a modification of the onset of the sound (⟨mˀ⟩ glottalized [m], ⟨ˀm⟩ [m] with a glottal onset).

Syllabicity diacritics
◌̩ ɹ̩ n̩ Syllabic ◌̯ ɪ̯ ʊ̯ Non-syllabic
◌̍ ɻ̍ ŋ̍ ◌̑ y̑
Consonant-release diacritics
◌ʰ tʰ Aspirated[a] ◌̚ p̚ No audible release
◌ⁿ dⁿ Nasal release ◌ˡ dˡ Lateral release
◌ᶿ tᶿ Voiceless dental fricative release ◌ˣ tˣ Voiceless velar fricative release
◌ᵊ dᵊ Mid central vowel release
Phonation diacritics
◌̥ n̥ d̥ Voiceless ◌̬ s̬ t̬ Voiced
◌̊ ɻ̊ ŋ̊
◌̤ b̤ a̤ Breathy voiced[a] ◌̰ b̰ a̰ Creaky voiced
Articulation diacritics
◌̪ t̪ d̪ Dental ◌̼ t̼ d̼ Linguolabial
◌͆ ɮ͆
◌̺ t̺ d̺ Apical ◌̻ t̻ d̻ Laminal
◌̟ u̟ t̟ Advanced ◌̠ i̠ t̠ Retracted
◌˖ ɡ˖ ◌˗ y˗ ŋ˗
◌̈ ë ä Centralized ◌̽ e̽ ɯ̽ Mid-centralized
◌̝ e̝ r̝ Raised ◌̞ e̞ β̞ Lowered
◌˔ ɭ˔ ◌˕ y˕ ɣ˕
Co-articulation diacritics
◌̹ ɔ̹ x̹ More rounded
(over-rounding)		 ◌̜ ɔ̜ xʷ̜ Less rounded
(under-rounding)[l]
◌͗ y͗ χ͗ ◌͑ y͑ χ͑ʷ
◌ʷ tʷ dʷ Labialized ◌ʲ tʲ dʲ Palatalized
◌ˠ tˠ dˠ Velarized ◌̴ ɫ ᵶ Velarized or pharyngealized
◌ˤ tˤ aˤ Pharyngealized
◌̘ e̘ o̘ Advanced tongue root ◌̙ e̙ o̙ Retracted tongue root
◌̃ ẽ z̃ Nasalized ◌˞ ɚ ɝ Rhoticity

Notes

^a With aspirated voiced consonants, the aspiration is usually also voiced (voiced aspirated – but see aspirated voiced). Many linguists prefer one of the diacritics dedicated to breathy voice over simple aspiration, such as ⟨b̤⟩. Some linguists restrict this diacritic to sonorants, and transcribe obstruents as ⟨bʱ⟩.
^l These are relative to the cardinal value of the letter. They can also apply to unrounded vowels: [ɛ̜] is more spread (less rounded) than cardinal [ɛ], and [ɯ̹] is less spread than cardinal [ɯ].[68]
Since ⟨xʷ⟩ can mean that the [x] is labialized (rounded) throughout its articulation, and ⟨x̜⟩ makes no sense ([x] is already completely unrounded), ⟨x̜ʷ⟩ can only mean a less-labialized/rounded [xʷ]. However, readers might mistake ⟨x̜ʷ⟩ for "[x̜]" with a labialized off-glide, or might wonder if the two diacritics cancel each other out. Placing the 'less rounded' diacritic under the labialization diacritic, ⟨xʷ̜⟩, makes it clear that it is the labialization that is 'less rounded' than its cardinal IPA value.

Subdiacritics (diacritics normally placed below a letter) may be moved above a letter to avoid conflict with a descender, as in voiceless ⟨ŋ̊⟩.[67] The raising and lowering diacritics have optional forms ⟨˔⟩, ⟨˕⟩ that avoid descenders.

The state of the glottis can be finely transcribed with diacritics. A series of alveolar plosives ranging from an open to a closed glottis phonation are:

Open glottis [t] voiceless
[d̤] breathy voice, also called murmured
[d̥] slack voice
Sweet spot [d] modal voice
[d̬] stiff voice
[d̰] creaky voice
Closed glottis [ʔ͡t] glottal closure

Additional diacritics are provided by the Extensions to the IPA for speech pathology.

Suprasegmentals

These symbols describe the features of a language above the level of individual consonants and vowels, such as prosody, pitch, length and stress, which often operate at the syllable, word or phrase level: that is, elements such as the intensity, tone and gemination of the sounds of a language, as well as the rhythm and intonation of speech.[69] Although most of these symbols indicate distinctions that are phonemic at the word level, symbols also exist for intonation on a level greater than that of the word.[69] Various ligatures of pitch/tone letters and diacritics are provided for by the Kiel convention and used in the IPA Handbook despite not being found in the summary of the IPA alphabet found on the one-page chart.

Length, stress, and rhythm
ˈke Primary stress (appears
before stressed syllable)		 ˌke Secondary stress (appears
before stressed syllable)
eː kː Long (long vowel or
geminate consonant)		 eˑ Half-long
ə̆ ɢ̆ Extra-short
ek.ste eks.te Syllable break
(internal boundary)		 es‿e Linking (absence of a
syllable break)
Intonation
| Minor or foot break ‖ Major or intonation break
↗︎ [70] Global rise ↘︎ [70] Global fall
Pitch diacritics and letters
ŋ̋ e̋˥e e˥ e꜒ Extra high / top ꜛke Upstep
ŋ́ é ˦e e˦ e꜓ High ŋ̌ ě Rising (low to high or generic)
ŋ̄ ē ˧e e˧ e꜔ Mid
ŋ̀ è ˨e e˨ e꜕ Low ŋ̂ ê Falling (high to low or generic)
ŋ̏ ȅ ˩e e˩ e꜖ Extra low / bottom ꜜke Downstep

Officially, the stress marks ⟨ˈ ˌ⟩ appear before the stressed syllable, and thus mark the syllable boundary as well as stress (though the syllable boundary may still be explicitly marked with a period).[71] Occasionally the stress mark is placed immediately before the nucleus of the syllable, after any consonantal onset.[72] In such transcriptions, the stress mark does not mark a syllable boundary. The primary stress mark may be doubled ⟨ˈˈ⟩ for extra stress (such as prosodic stress). The secondary stress mark is sometimes seen doubled ⟨ˌˌ⟩ for extra-weak stress, but this convention has not been adopted by the IPA.[71]

There are three boundary markers: ⟨.⟩ for a syllable break, ⟨|⟩ for a minor prosodic break and ⟨‖⟩ for a major prosodic break. The tags 'minor' and 'major' are intentionally ambiguous. Depending on need, 'minor' may vary from a foot break to a break in list-intonation to a continuing–prosodic-unit boundary (equivalent to a comma), and while 'major' is often any intonation break, it may be restricted to a final–prosodic-unit boundary (equivalent to a period). The 'major' symbol may also be doubled, ⟨‖‖⟩, for a stronger break.

Although not part of the IPA, the following additional boundary markers are often used in conjunction with the IPA: ⟨μ⟩ for a mora or mora boundary, ⟨σ⟩ for a syllable or syllable boundary, ⟨#⟩ for a word boundary, ⟨$⟩ for a phrase or intermediate boundary and ⟨%⟩ for a prosodic boundary. For example, C# is a word-final consonant, %V a post-pausa vowel, and T% an IU-final tone (edge tone).

Phonetic pitch and phonemic tone may be indicated by either diacritics placed over the nucleus of the syllable or by Chao tone letters placed before or after the word or syllable. There are three graphic variants of the tone letters: with or without a stave, and facing left or facing right from a stave. Theoretically therefore there are seven ways to transcribe pitch/tone in the IPA, though in practice only ⟨é⟩, ⟨˦e⟩, ⟨e˦⟩, ⟨e꜓⟩ and obsolete ⟨¯e⟩ (for high pitch/tone) are seen.[71][73] Only left-facing staved letters and a few representative combinations are shown in the summary on the Chart, and in practice it is currently more common for tone letters to occur after the syllable/word than before, as in the Chao tradition. Placement before the word is a carry-over from the pre-Kiel IPA convention, as is still the case for the stress and upstep/downstep marks. The IPA endorses the Chao tradition of using the left-facing tone letters, ⟨˥ ˦ ˧ ˨ ˩⟩, for broad or underlying tone, and the right-facing letters, ⟨꜒ ꜓ ꜔ ꜕ ꜖⟩, for surface tone or phonetic detail, as in tone sandhi. In the Portuguese illustration in the 1999 Handbook, tone letters are placed before a word or syllable to indicate prosodic pitch, and in the Cantonese illustration they are after a word/syllable for lexical tone, so theoretically prosodic pitch and lexical tone could both be transcribed in a text, though this is not a formalized distinction. The staveless letters are effectively obsolete and are not supported by Unicode. They were not widely accepted even before 1989 when they were the sole option for indicating pitch in the IPA, and they only ever supported three pitch levels and a few contours.

Rising and falling pitch, as in contour tones, are indicated by combining the pitch diacritics and letters in the table, such as grave plus acute for rising [ě] and acute plus grave for falling [ê]. Only a four other combinations of diacritics are supported, and only across three levels (high, mid, low), despite the diacritics supporting five levels of pitch. The four additional explicitly approved rising and falling diacritic combinations are high/mid rising [e᷄], low rising [e᷅], high falling [e᷇], and low/mid falling [e᷆]

The Chao tone letters, on the other hand, may be combined in any pattern, and are therefore used for more complex contours and finer distinctions than the diacritics allow, such as mid-rising [e˨˦], extra-high falling [e˥˦], etc. There are 25 such possibilities.[74]

For more complex, peaking and dipping tones, one may combine three or four tone diacritics in any permutation,[71] though in practice only generic peaking e᷈ and dipping e᷉ combinations are used. For finer detail, Chao tone letters are again required (e˧˥˧, e˩˨˩, e˦˩˧, e˨˩˦, etc., for 120 possible pitch contours) The correspondence between tone diacritics and tone letters therefore breaks down once they start combining.

A work-around for diacritics sometimes seen when a language has more than one phonemic rising or falling tone, and the author wishes to avoid the poorly legible diacritics e᷄, e᷅, e᷇, e᷆ but does not wish to employ tone letters, is to restrict generic rising ě and falling ê to the higher-pitched of the rising and falling tones, say e˥˧ and e˧˥, and to resurrect retired IPA subscript diacritics e̗ and e̖ for the lower-pitched rising and falling tones, say e˩˧ and e˧˩. When a language has four or six level tones, the two mid tones are sometimes transcribed as high-mid e̍ (non-standard) and low-mid ē. Non-standard e̍ is occasionally seen combined with acute and grave diacritcs or the macron.

Chao tone letters generally appear after each syllable, for a language with syllable tone (⟨a˧vɔ˥˩⟩), or after the phonological word, for a language with word tone (⟨avɔ˧˥˩⟩). Placement before the word or syllable (⟨˧a˥˩vɔ⟩, ⟨˧˥˩avɔ⟩) is officially supported but less common.

Comparative degree

IPA diacritics may be doubled to indicate an extra degree of the feature indicated. This is a productive process, but apart from extra-high and extra-low tones ⟨ə̋, ə̏⟩ being marked by doubled high- and low-tone diacritics, and the major prosodic break ⟨‖⟩ being marked as a double minor break ⟨|⟩, it is not specifically regulated by the IPA. (Note that transcription marks are similar: double slashes indicate extra (morpho)-phonemic, double square brackets especially precise, and double parentheses especially unintelligible.)

For example, the stress mark may be doubled to indicate an extra degree of stress, such as prosodic stress in English.[75] An example in French, with a single stress mark for normal prosodic stress at the end of each prosodic unit (marked as a minor prosodic break), and a double stress mark for contrastive/emphatic stress:
[ˈˈɑ̃ːˈtre | məˈsjø ‖ ˈˈvwala maˈdam ‖] Entrez monsieur, voilà madame. [76] Similarly, a doubled secondary stress mark ⟨ˌˌ⟩ is commonly used for tertiary (extra-light) stress.[77]

Length is commonly extended by repeating the length mark, as in English shhh! [ʃːːː], or for "overlong" segments in Estonian:

  • vere /vere/ 'blood [gen.sg.]', veere /veːre/ 'edge [gen.sg.]', veere /veːːre/ 'roll [imp. 2nd sg.]'
  • lina /linɑ/ 'sheet', linna /linːɑ/ 'town [gen. sg.]', linna /linːːɑ/ 'town [ine. sg.]'

(Normally additional degrees of length are handled by the extra-short or half-long diacritics, but in the Estonian examples, the first two cases are analyzed as simply short and long.)

Occasionally other diacritics are doubled:

  • Rhoticity in Badaga /be/ "mouth", /be˞/ "bangle", and /be˞˞/ "crop".[78]
  • Mild and strong aspirations, [kʰ], [kʰʰ].[79]
  • Nasalization, as in Palantla Chinantec /ẽ/ vs /e͌/.[80]
  • Weak vs strong ejectives, [kʼ], [kˮ].[81]
  • Especially lowered, e.g. [t̞̞] (or [t̞˕], if the former symbol does not display properly) for /t/ as a weak fricative in some pronunciations of register.[82]
  • Especially retracted (at least on a vowel), e.g. [ø̠̠],[83] though, depending on the font, on a consonant this could be confused with alveolar or alveolarized notation from the extIPA, though such an issue can be easily avoided by placing the second diacritic to the right of the letter ([ø̠˗]), rather than below the first diacritic.
  • The transcription of strident and harsh voice as extra-creaky /a᷽/ may be motivated by the similarities of these phonations.

Obsolete and nonstandard symbols
Main articles: Obsolete and nonstandard symbols in the International Phonetic Alphabet and Click letter

The IPA once had parallel symbols from alternative proposals, but in most cases eventually settled on one for each sound. The rejected symbols are now considered obsolete. An example is the vowel letter ⟨ɷ⟩, rejected in favor of ⟨ʊ⟩. Letters for affricates and sounds with inherent secondary articulation have also been mostly rejected, with the idea that such features should be indicated with tie bars or diacritics: ⟨ƍ⟩ for [zʷ] is one. In addition, the rare voiceless implosives, ⟨ƥ ƭ ƈ ƙ ʠ⟩, have been dropped and are now usually written ⟨ɓ̥ ɗ̥ ʄ̊ ɠ̊ ʛ̥⟩. A retired set of click letters, ⟨ʇ, ʗ, ʖ⟩, is still sometimes seen, as the official pipe letters ⟨ǀ, ǃ, ǁ⟩ may cause problems with legibility, especially when used with brackets ([ ] or / /), the letter ⟨l⟩, or the prosodic marks ⟨|, ‖⟩ (for this reason, some publications which use the current IPA pipe letters disallow IPA brackets).[84]

Individual non-IPA letters may find their way into publications that otherwise use the standard IPA. This is especially common with:

  • Affricates, such as the Americanist barred lambda ⟨ƛ⟩ for [t͜ɬ] or ⟨č⟩ for [t͡ʃ]. Some authors find the tie bars displeasing but the lack of tie bars confusing (i.e. ⟨č⟩ for /t͡ʃ/ as distinct from /tʃ/), while others simply prefer to have one letter for each segmental phoneme in a language.
  • Digits for tonal phonemes that have conventional numbers in a local tradition, such as the four tones of Standard Chinese. This may be more convenient for comparison between languages and dialects than a phonetic transcription because tones often vary more than segmental phonemes do.
  • Digits for tone levels, which may improve readability and avoid confusion among similar tone values, though the lack of standardization can cause confusion (with e.g. "1" for high tone in some languages but for low tone in others).
  • Iconic extensions of standard IPA letters that can be readily understood, such as retroflex ⟨ᶑ ⟩ and ⟨ꞎ⟩.

In addition, there are typewriter substitutions for when IPA support is not available, such as capital ⟨I, E, U, O, A⟩ for [ɪ, ɛ, ʊ, ɔ, ɑ].

Extensions
Chart of the Extensions to the International Phonetic Alphabet (extIPA), as of 2015
Main article: Extensions to the International Phonetic Alphabet

The "Extensions to the IPA", often abbreviated as "extIPA" and sometimes called "Extended IPA", are symbols whose original purpose was to accurately transcribe disordered speech. At the Kiel Convention in 1989, a group of linguists drew up the initial extensions,[85] which were based on the previous work of the PRDS (Phonetic Representation of Disordered Speech) Group in the early 1980s.[86] The extensions were first published in 1990, then modified, and published again in 1994 in the Journal of the International Phonetic Association, when they were officially adopted by the ICPLA.[87] While the original purpose was to transcribe disordered speech, linguists have used the extensions to designate a number of unique sounds within standard communication, such as hushing, gnashing teeth, and smacking lips.[2]

In addition to the Extensions to the IPA there are the conventions of the Voice Quality Symbols, which besides the concept of voice quality in phonetics include a number of symbols for additional airstream mechanisms and secondary articulations.

Segments without letters

The blank cells on the IPA chart can be filled without too much difficulty if the need arises. Some ad hoc letters have appeared in the literature for the retroflex lateral flap and the retroflex clicks (having the expected forms of ⟨ɺ⟩ and ⟨ǃ⟩ plus a retroflex tail; the analogous ⟨ᶑ⟩ for a retroflex implosive is even mentioned in the IPA Handbook), the voiceless lateral fricatives (now provided for by the extIPA), the epiglottal trill (arguably covered by the generally-trilled epiglottal "fricatives" ⟨ʜ ʢ⟩), the labiodental plosives (⟨ȹ ȸ⟩ in some old Bantuist texts) and the near-close central vowels (⟨ᵻ ᵿ⟩ in some publications). Diacritics can duplicate some of those, such as ⟨ɭ̆⟩ for the lateral flap, ⟨p̪ b̪⟩ for the labiodental plosives and ⟨ɪ̈ ʊ̈⟩ for the central vowels, and are able to fill in most of the remainder of the charts.[88] If a sound cannot be transcribed, an asterisk ⟨*⟩ may be used, either as a letter or as a diacritic (as in ⟨k*⟩ sometimes seen for the Korean "fortis" velar).

Consonants

Representations of consonant sounds outside of the core set are created by adding diacritics to letters with similar sound values. The Spanish bilabial and dental approximants are commonly written as lowered fricatives, [β̞] and [ð̞] respectively.[89] Similarly, voiced lateral fricatives would be written as raised lateral approximants, [ɭ˔ ʎ̝ ʟ̝]. A few languages such as Banda have a bilabial flap as the preferred allophone of what is elsewhere a labiodental flap. It has been suggested that this be written with the labiodental flap letter and the advanced diacritic, [ⱱ̟].[90]

Similarly, a labiodental trill would be written [ʙ̪] (bilabial trill and the dental sign), and labiodental stops [p̪ b̪] rather than with the ad hoc letters sometimes found in the literature. Other taps can be written as extra-short plosives or laterals, e.g. [ɟ̆ ɢ̆ ʟ̆], though in some cases the diacritic would need to be written below the letter. A retroflex trill can be written as a retracted [r̠], just as non-subapical retroflex fricatives sometimes are. The remaining consonants, the uvular laterals (ʟ̠ etc.) and the palatal trill, while not strictly impossible, are very difficult to pronounce and are unlikely to occur even as allophones in the world's languages.

Vowels

The vowels are similarly manageable by using diacritics for raising, lowering, fronting, backing, centering, and mid-centering.[91] For example, the unrounded equivalent of [ʊ] can be transcribed as mid-centered [ɯ̽], and the rounded equivalent of [æ] as raised [ɶ̝] or lowered [œ̞] (though for those who conceive of vowel space as a triangle, simple [ɶ] already is the rounded equivalent of [æ]). True mid vowels are lowered [e̞ ø̞ ɘ̞ ɵ̞ ɤ̞ o̞] or raised [ɛ̝ œ̝ ɜ̝ ɞ̝ ʌ̝ ɔ̝], while centered [ɪ̈ ʊ̈] and [ä] (or, less commonly, [ɑ̈]) are near-close and open central vowels, respectively. The only known vowels that cannot be represented in this scheme are vowels with unexpected roundedness, which would require a dedicated diacritic, such as protruded ⟨ʏʷ⟩ and compressed ⟨uᵝ⟩ (or ⟨ɪʷ⟩ and ⟨ɯᶹ⟩).

Symbol names
Main article: Naming conventions of the International Phonetic Alphabet

An IPA symbol is often distinguished from the sound it is intended to represent, since there is not necessarily a one-to-one correspondence between letter and sound in broad transcription, making articulatory descriptions such as "mid front rounded vowel" or "voiced velar stop" unreliable. While the Handbook of the International Phonetic Association states that no official names exist for its symbols, it admits the presence of one or two common names for each.[92] The symbols also have nonce names in the Unicode standard. In some cases, the Unicode names and the IPA names do not agree. For example, IPA calls ɛ "epsilon", but Unicode calls it "small letter open E".

The traditional names of the Latin and Greek letters are usually used for unmodified letters.[note 5] Letters which are not directly derived from these alphabets, such as [ʕ], may have a variety of names, sometimes based on the appearance of the symbol or on the sound that it represents. In Unicode, some of the letters of Greek origin have Latin forms for use in IPA; the others use the letters from the Greek section.

For diacritics, there are two methods of naming. For traditional diacritics, the IPA notes the name in a well known language; for example, é is acute, based on the name of the diacritic in English and French. Non-traditional diacritics are often named after objects they resemble, so d̪ is called bridge.

Geoffrey Pullum and William Ladusaw list a variety of names in use for IPA symbols, both current and retired, in addition to names of many other non-IPA phonetic symbols in their Phonetic Symbol Guide.[10]

Typefaces

IPA typeface support is increasing, and nearly complete IPA support with good diacritic rendering is provided by a few typefaces that come pre-installed with various computer operating systems, such as Calibri, as well as some freely available but commercial fonts such as Brill, but most pre-installed fonts, such as the ubiquitous Arial, Noto Sans and Times New Roman, are neither complete nor render many diacritics properly.

Typefaces that provide full IPA support, properly render diacritics and are freely available include:

Web browsers generally do not need any configuration to display IPA characters, provided that a typeface capable of doing so is available to the operating system.

ASCII and keyboard transliterations
Further information: Comparison of ASCII encodings of the International Phonetic Alphabet

Several systems have been developed that map the IPA symbols to ASCII characters. Notable systems include SAMPA and X-SAMPA. The usage of mapping systems in on-line text has to some extent been adopted in the context input methods, allowing convenient keying of IPA characters that would be otherwise unavailable on standard keyboard layouts.

Computer input using on-screen keyboard

Online IPA keyboard utilities[93] are available, and they cover the complete range of IPA symbols and diacritics. In April 2019, Google's Gboard for Android and iOS added an IPA keyboard to its platform.[94][95]

gollark: I borrowed it from the esolαngs server, blame them.
gollark: Too bad. If it was entirely symmetrical it would be head on or something and look bad.
gollark: <:dodecahedron:724658257305534515> <:crowofjudgement:724658449174233169> <:bees:724658256605085840>
gollark: <:bees:724658256605085840>
gollark: Maybe I should pointlessly rerewrite part of minoteaur again.

See also

Notes
  1. The inverted bridge under the ⟨t⟩ specifies it as apical (pronounced with the tip of the tongue), and the superscript h shows that it is aspirated (breathy). Both these qualities cause the English [t] to sound different from the French or Spanish [t], which is a laminal (pronounced with the blade of the tongue) and unaspirated [t̻]. ⟨t̺ʰ⟩ and ⟨t̻⟩ are thus two different IPA symbols for two different, though similar, sounds.
  2. For instance, flaps and taps are two different kinds of articulation, but since no language has (yet) been found to make a distinction between, say, an alveolar flap and an alveolar tap, the IPA does not provide such sounds with dedicated letters. Instead, it provides a single letter (in this case, [ɾ]) for both. Strictly speaking, this makes the IPA a partially phonemic alphabet, not a purely phonetic one.
  3. There are five basic tone diacritics and five basic tone letters, both sets of which are compounded for contour tones.
  4. "The non-roman letters of the International Phonetic Alphabet have been designed as far as possible to harmonize well with the roman letters. The Association does not recognize makeshift letters; It recognizes only letters which have been carefully cut so as to be in harmony with the other letters." (IPA 1949)
  5. For example, [p] is called "Lower-case P" and [χ] is "Chi." (International Phonetic Association, Handbook, p. 171)

References
  1. International Phonetic Association (IPA), Handbook.
  2. MacMahon, Michael K. C. (1996). "Phonetic Notation". In P. T. Daniels; W. Bright (eds.). The World's Writing Systems. New York: Oxford University Press. pp. 821–846. ISBN 0-19-507993-0.
  3. Wall, Joan (1989). International Phonetic Alphabet for Singers: A Manual for English and Foreign Language Diction. Pst. ISBN 1-877761-50-8.
  4. "IPA: Alphabet". Langsci.ucl.ac.uk. Archived from the original on 10 October 2012. Retrieved 20 November 2012.
  5. "Full IPA Chart". International Phonetic Association. Retrieved 24 April 2017.
  6. International Phonetic Association, Handbook, pp. 194–196
  7. "Originally, the aim was to make available a set of phonetic symbols which would be given different articulatory values, if necessary, in different languages." (International Phonetic Association, Handbook, pp. 195–196)
  8. Passy, Paul (1888). "Our revised alphabet". The Phonetic Teacher: 57–60.
  9. IPA in the Encyclopædia Britannica
  10. Pullum and Ladusaw, Phonetic Symbol Guide, pp. 152, 209
  11. Nicolaidis, Katerina (September 2005). "Approval of New IPA Sound: The Labiodental Flap". International Phonetic Association. Archived from the original on 2 September 2006. Retrieved 17 September 2006.
  12. International Phonetic Association, Handbook, p. 186
  13. "From its earliest days [...] the International Phonetic Association has aimed to provide 'a separate sign for each distinctive sound; that is, for each sound which, being used instead of another, in the same language, can change the meaning of a word'." (International Phonetic Association, Handbook, p. 27)
  14. Laver, Principles of Phonetics, pp. 174–175
  15. ⟨S⟩ is particularly ambiguous. It has been used for 'stop', 'fricative', 'sibilant', 'sonorant' and 'semivowel'. The illustrations given here use, as much as possible, letters that are members of the sets they stand for: [n] is a nasal, [p] a plosive, [f] a fricative, [s] a sibilant, [l] a liquid, [r] both a rhotic and a resonant, and [ʞ] a click.
  16. Perry (2000) Phonological/phonetic assessment of an English-speaking adult with dysarthria
  17. For other Turkic languages, ⟨I⟩ may be restricted to {ɯ i} (that is, to ı i), ⟨U⟩ to u ü, ⟨A⟩ to a e/ä, etc.
  18. Laver (1994) Principles of Phonetics, p. 374.
  19. Cf. the notes at the Unicode IPA EXTENSIONS code chart as well as blogs by Michael Everson Archived 10 October 2017 at the Wayback Machine and John Wells here and here.
  20. Handbook, International Phonetic Association, p. 196, The new letters should be suggestive of the sounds they represent, by their resemblance to the old ones..
  21. IPA Handbook p. 175
  22. IPA Handbook p. 176
  23. IPA Handbook p. 191
  24. IPA (1999) Handbook, p 188, 192
  25. IPA (1999) Handbook, p 176, 192
  26. Basbøll (2005) The Phonology of Danish pp. 45, 59
  27. For example, with the pipe symbols for prosodic breaks. Although the IPA describes the prosodic symbol for a minor (foot) group as a "thick" vertical line, and thus presumably intended it to be distinct from a simple ASCII pipe (as is the case in Dania dialect transcription), the Handbook (p. 174) assigns it the digital encoding U+007C, which is the ASCII pipe symbol.
  28. The proper angle brackets in Unicode are the mathematical symbols ⟨...⟩ (U+27E8 and U+27E9). Chevrons ‹...› (U+2039, U+203A) are sometimes substituted, as in Americanist phonetic notation, as are the less-than and greater-than signs <...> (U+003C, U+003E) found on ASCII keyboards.
  29. Association phonétique internationale (January 1895). "vɔt syr l alfabɛ" [Votes sur l'alphabet]. Le Maître Phonétique: 16–17. JSTOR 44707535.
  30. Association phonétique internationale (February–March 1900a). "akt ɔfisjɛl" [Acte officiel]. Le Maître Phonétique: 20. JSTOR 44701257.
  31. Association phonétique internationale (July–September 1931). "desizjɔ̃ ofisjɛl" [Décisions officielles]. Le Maître Phonétique (35): 40–42. JSTOR 44704452.
  32. Jones, Daniel (July–December 1948). "desizjɔ̃ ofisjɛl" [Décisions officielles]. Le Maître Phonétique (90): 28–30. JSTOR 44705217.
  33. International Phonetic Association (1993). "Council actions on revisions of the IPA". Journal of the International Phonetic Association. 23 (1): 32–34. doi:10.1017/S002510030000476X.
  34. International Phonetic Association (1949). The Principles of the International Phonetic Association. Department of Phonetics, University College, London. Supplement to Le Maître Phonétique 91, January–June 1949. JSTOR i40200179. Reprinted in Journal of the International Phonetic Association 40 (3), December 2010, pp. 299–358, doi:10.1017/S0025100311000089.
  35. Wells, John C. (6 November 2006). "Scenes from IPA history". John Wells's phonetic blog. Department of Phonetics and Linguistics, University College London.
  36. International Phonetic Association (1999), p. 19.
  37. John Esling (2010) "Phonetic Notation", in Hardcastle, Laver & Gibbon (eds) The Handbook of Phonetic Sciences, 2nd ed., pp. 688, 693.
  38. Martin J. Ball; Joan Rahilly (August 2011). "The symbolization of central approximants in the IPA". Journal of the International Phonetic Association. Cambridge Journals Online. 41 (2): 231–237. doi:10.1017/s0025100311000107.
  39. "Cambridge Journals Online – Journal of the International Phonetic Association Vol. 39 Iss. 02". Journals.cambridge.org. 23 October 2012. Retrieved 20 November 2012.
  40. "IPA: About us". Langsci.ucl.ac.uk. Archived from the original on 10 October 2012. Retrieved 20 November 2012.
  41. "IPA: Statutes". Langsci.ucl.ac.uk. Archived from the original on 10 October 2012. Retrieved 20 November 2012.
  42. "IPA: News". Langsci.ucl.ac.uk. Archived from the original on 11 November 2012. Retrieved 20 November 2012.
  43. "IPA: News". Langsci.ucl.ac.uk. Archived from the original on 11 November 2012. Retrieved 20 November 2012.
  44. IPA Handbook (1999)
  45. Sally Thomason (2 January 2008). "Why I Don't Love the International Phonetic Alphabet". Language Log.
  46. For example, the English school textbooks by I. N. Vereshagina, K. A. Bondarenko and T. A. Pritykina.
  47. For example, "Le Français à la portée de tous" by K. K. Parchevsky and E. B. Roisenblit (1995) and "English Through Eye and Ear" by L.V. Bankevich (1975).
  48. "Phonetics". Cambridge Dictionaries Online. 2002. Retrieved 11 March 2007.
  49. "Merriam-Webster Online Pronunciation Symbols". Archived from the original on 1 June 2007. Retrieved 4 June 2007.
    Agnes, Michael (1999). Webster's New World College Dictionary. New York: Macmillan. xxiii. ISBN 0-02-863119-6.
    Pronunciation respelling for English has detailed comparisons.
  50. (in Czech) Fronek, J. (2006). Velký anglicko-český slovník (in Czech). Praha: Leda. ISBN 80-7335-022-X. In accordance with long-established Czech lexicographical tradition, a modified version of the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is adopted in which letters of the Czech alphabet are employed.
  51. Principles of the International Phonetic Association, 1949:17.
  52. Severens, Sara E. (2017). "The Effects of the International Phonetic Alphabet in Singing". Student Scholar Showcase.
  53. "Nico Castel's Complete Libretti Series". Castel Opera Arts. Retrieved 29 September 2008.
  54. Cheek, Timothy (2001). Singing in Czech. The Scarecrow Press. p. 392. ISBN 978-0-8108-4003-4. Archived from the original on 7 October 2011. Retrieved 25 January 2020.
  55. Zimmer, Benjamin (14 May 2008). "Operatic IPA and the Visual Thesaurus". Language Log. University of Pennsylvania. Retrieved 29 September 2009.
  56. "Segments can usefully be divided into two major categories, consonants and vowels." (International Phonetic Association, Handbook, p. 3)
  57. International Phonetic Association, Handbook, p. 6.
  58. "for presentational convenience [...] because of [their] rarity and the small number of types of sounds which are found there." (IPA Handbook, p 18)
  59. A chart of IPA numbers can be found on the IPA website.IPA number chart
  60. Fromkin, Victoria; Rodman, Robert (1998) [1974]. An Introduction to Language (6th ed.). Fort Worth, TX: Harcourt Brace College Publishers. ISBN 0-03-018682-X.
  61. Ladefoged and Maddieson, 1996, Sounds of the World's Languages, §2.1.
  62. Ladefoged and Maddieson, 1996, Sounds of the World's Languages, §9.3.
  63. Amanda L. Miller et al., "Differences in airstream and posterior place of articulation among Nǀuu lingual stops". Submitted to the Journal of the International Phonetic Association. Retrieved 27 May 2007.
  64. "Phonetic analysis of Afrikaans, English, Xhosa and Zulu using South African speech databases". Ajol.info. Retrieved 20 November 2012. It is traditional to place the tie bar above the letters. It may be placed below to avoid overlap with ascenders or diacritic marks, or simply because it is more legible that way, as in Niesler, Louw, & Roux (2005)
  65. Ladefoged, Peter; Ian Maddieson (1996). The sounds of the world's languages. Oxford: Blackwell. pp. 329–330. ISBN 0-631-19815-6.
  66. International Phonetic Association, Handbook, p. 10.
  67. International Phonetic Association, Handbook, pp. 14–15.
  68. 'Further report on the 1989 Kiel Convention', Journal of the International Phonetic Association 20:2 (December 1990), p. 23.
  69. International Phonetic Association, Handbook, p. 13.
  70. The global rise and fall arrows come before the affected syllable or prosodic unit, like stress and upstep/downstep. This contrasts with the Chao tone letters, which most commonly come after.
  71. P.J. Roach, Report on the 1989 Kiel Convention, Journal of the International Phonetic Association, Vol. 19, No. 2 (December 1989), p. 75–76
  72. Esling, John H. (2013), "Phonetic Notation", in Hardcastle, William J.; Laver, John; Gibbon, Fiona E. (eds.), The Handbook of Phonetic Sciences (2nd ed.), Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell, p. 691, ISBN 978-1-118-35820-7
  73. Ian Maddieson (December 1990) The transcription of tone in the IPA, JIPA 20.2, p. 31.
  74. This count includes double letters because, in the Chao convention, single ˦ may used for a high tone on a checked syllable, versus double ˦˦ for high tone on an open syllable.
  75. Bloomfield (1933) Language p. 91
  76. Passy, 1958, Conversations françaises en transcription phonétique. 2nd ed.
  77. Chao 1968, p. xxiii
  78. Ladefoged, Peter; Maddieson, Ian (1996). The Sounds of the World's Languages. Oxford: Blackwell. p. 314. ISBN 978-0-631-19815-4.
  79. Sometimes the obsolete transcription ⟨kʻ⟩ (with a turned apostrophe) vs. ⟨kʰ⟩ is still seen.
  80. Peter Ladefoged (1971) Preliminaries of Linguistic Phonetics, p. 35.
  81. Fallon (2013) The Synchronic and Diachronic Phonology of Ejectives, p. 267
  82. Heselwood (2013) Phonetic Transcription in Theory and Practice, p. 233.
  83. E.g. in Laver (1994) Principles of Phonetics, pp. 559–560
  84. "John Wells's phonetic blog". Phonetic-blog.blogspot.com. 9 September 2009. Retrieved 18 October 2010.
  85. "At the 1989 Kiel Convention of the IPA, a sub-group was established to draw up recommendations for the transcription of disordered speech." ("Extensions to the IPA: An ExtIPA Chart" in International Phonetic Association, Handbook, p. 186.)
  86. PRDS Group (1983). The Phonetic Representation of Disordered Speech. London: The King's Fund.
  87. "Extensions to the IPA: An ExtIPA Chart" in International Phonetic Association, Handbook, pp. 186–187.
  88. "Diacritics may also be employed to create symbols for phonemes, thus reducing the need to create new letter shapes." (International Phonetic Association, Handbook, p. 27)
  89. Dedicated letters have been proposed, such as ⟨β⟩ and ⟨ð⟩. Ball, Rahilly & Lowry (2017) Phonetics for speech pathology, 3rd edition, Equinox, Sheffield.
  90. Olson, Kenneth S.; Hajek, John (1999). "The phonetic status of the labial flap". Journal of the International Phonetic Association. 29 (2): 101–114. doi:10.1017/s0025100300006484.
  91. "The diacritics...can be used to modify the lip or tongue position implied by a vowel symbol." (International Phonetic Association, Handbook, p. 16)
  92. "...the International Phonetic Association has never officially approved a set of names..." (International Phonetic Association, Handbook, p. 31)
  93. Online IPA keyboard utilities like IPA i-chart by the Association, IPA character picker 19 at GitHub, TypeIt.org, and IPA Chart keyboard at GitHub.
  94. "Gboard updated with 63 new languages, including IPA (not the beer)". Android Police. 18 April 2019. Retrieved 28 April 2019.
  95. "Set up Gboard – Android – Gboard Help". support.google.com. Retrieved 28 April 2019.

Further reading
  • Ball, Martin J.; John H. Esling; B. Craig Dickson (1995). "The VoQS system for the transcription of voice quality". Journal of the International Phonetic Association. 25 (2): 71–80. doi:10.1017/S0025100300005181.
  • Duckworth, M.; G. Allen; M.J. Ball (December 1990). "Extensions to the International Phonetic Alphabet for the transcription of atypical speech". Clinical Linguistics and Phonetics. 4 (4): 273–280. doi:10.3109/02699209008985489.
  • Hill, Kenneth C.; Pullum, Geoffrey K.; Ladusaw, William (March 1988). "Review of Phonetic Symbol Guide by G. K. Pullum & W. Ladusaw". Language. 64 (1): 143–144. doi:10.2307/414792. JSTOR 414792.
  • International Phonetic Association (1989). "Report on the 1989 Kiel convention". Journal of the International Phonetic Association. 19 (2): 67–80. doi:10.1017/s0025100300003868.
  • International Phonetic Association (1999). Handbook of the International Phonetic Association: A guide to the use of the International Phonetic Alphabet. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-65236-7. (hb); ISBN 0-521-63751-1 (pb).
  • Jones, Daniel (1988). English pronouncing dictionary (revised 14th ed.). London: Dent. ISBN 0-521-86230-2. OCLC 18415701.
  • Ladefoged, Peter (September 1990). "The revised International Phonetic Alphabet". Language. 66 (3): 550–552. doi:10.2307/414611. JSTOR 414611.
  • Ladefoged, Peter; Morris Hale (September 1988). "Some major features of the International Phonetic Alphabet". Language. 64 (3): 577–582. doi:10.2307/414533. JSTOR 414533.
  • Laver, John (1994). Principles of Phonetics. New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-45031-4. (hb); ISBN 0-521-45655-X (pb).
  • Pullum, Geoffrey K.; William A. Ladusaw (1986). Phonetic Symbol Guide. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. ISBN 0-226-68532-2.
  • Skinner, Edith; Timothy Monich; Lilene Mansell (1990). Speak with Distinction. New York: Applause Theatre Book Publishers. ISBN 1-55783-047-9.
  • Fromkin, Victoria; Rodman, Robert; Hyams, Nina (2011). An Introduction to Language (9th ed.). Boston: Wadsworth, Cenage Learning. pp. 233–234. ISBN 978-1-4282-6392-5.
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