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Latvian Phonology
This article is about the phonology of the Latvian language. It deals with synchronic phonology as well as phonetics. Consonants Table adopted from * are denti-alveolar, while are alveolar. * The consonant sounds are only found in loanwords. * is only an allophone of nasals before velars and . * Latvian plosives are not aspirated (unlike in English). * Voiced and unvoiced consonants assimilate to the subsequent consonant, e.g. or . At the same time single voiced consonants (, , , etc.) are not devoiced word-finally: , . * Doubled consonants are pronounced longer: . The same occurs with plosives and fricatives located between two short vowels, as in , and with that is pronounced as , and and as . * A palatalized dental trill is still used in some dialects (mainly outside Latvia) but quite rarely, and hence the corresponding letter was removed from the alphabet. Vowels Latvian has six vowels, with length as distinctive feature: , and the diphthongs invol ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Phonology
Phonology is the branch of linguistics that studies how languages or dialects systematically organize their sounds or, for sign languages, their constituent parts of signs. The term can also refer specifically to the sound or sign system of a particular language variety. At one time, the study of phonology related only to the study of the systems of phonemes in spoken languages, but may now relate to any linguistic analysis either: Sign languages have a phonological system equivalent to the system of sounds in spoken languages. The building blocks of signs are specifications for movement, location, and handshape. At first, a separate terminology was used for the study of sign phonology ('chereme' instead of 'phoneme', etc.), but the concepts are now considered to apply universally to all human languages. Terminology The word 'phonology' (as in 'phonology of English') can refer either to the field of study or to the phonological system of a given language. This is one of th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Final-obstruent Devoicing
Final-obstruent devoicing or terminal devoicing is a systematic phonological process occurring in languages such as Catalan, German, Dutch, Breton, Russian, Polish, Lithuanian, Turkish, and Wolof. In such languages, voiced obstruents in final position (at the end of a word) become voiceless before voiceless consonants and in pausa. The process can be written as *Cvoice/sub> → Cvoice/sub>/__#. Languages with final-obstruent devoicing Germanic languages Most modern continental West Germanic languages developed final devoicing, the earliest evidence appearing in Old Dutch around the 9th or 10th century. * Afrikaans * Dutch, also Old and Middle Dutch * (High) German, also Middle High German * Gothic (for fricatives) * Limburgish * Low German, also Middle Low German * Luxembourgish (only when not resyllabified) * Old English (for fricatives, inconsistently for ) * West Frisian. In contrast, North Frisian (and some Low German dialects in North Frisia that have a Frisian subst ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Norwegian Phonology
The sound system of Norwegian resembles that of Swedish. There is considerable variation among the dialects, and all pronunciations are considered by official policy to be equally correct – there is no official spoken standard, although it can be said that ''Eastern Norwegian'' Bokmål speech (not Norwegian Bokmål in general) has an unofficial spoken standard, called Urban East Norwegian or Standard East Norwegian ( no, standard østnorsk), loosely based on the speech of the literate classes of the Oslo area. This variant is the most common one taught to foreign students. Despite there being no official standard variety of Norwegian, Urban East Norwegian has traditionally been used in public venues such as theatre and TV, although today local dialects are used extensively in spoken and visual media. The background for this lack of agreement is that after the dissolution of Denmark–Norway in 1814, the upper classes would speak in what was perceived as the Danish language, w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Swedish Phonology
Swedish has a large vowel inventory, with nine vowels distinguished in quality and to some degree quantity, making 18 vowel phonemes in most dialects. Swedish pronunciation of most consonants is similar to that of other Germanic languages. Another notable feature is the pitch accent, which is not found in most European languages. There are 18 consonant phonemes, of which and show considerable variation depending on both social and dialectal context. ''Finlandssvenska'' (Finland Swedish) has a slightly different phonology. Vowels Swedish has nine vowels that, as in many other Germanic languages, exist in pairs of long and short versions. The length covaries with the quality of the vowels, as shown in the table below (long vowels in the first column, short in the second), with short variants being more centered and lax. The length is generally viewed as the primary distinction, with quality being secondary. No short vowels appear in open stressed syllables. The front vo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lithuanian Phonology
Lithuanian has eleven vowels and 45 consonants, including 22 pairs of consonants distinguished by the presence or absence of palatalization. Most vowels come in pairs which are differentiated through length and degree of centralization. Only one syllable in the word bears the accent, but exactly which syllable is often unpredictable. Accented syllables are marked with either a falling or rising tone. Its location in a word may also be affected during inflection. Consonants All Lithuanian consonants except have two variants: a non- palatalized one and a palatalized one, represented by the IPA symbols in the chart (i.e., – , – , – , and so on). The consonants , , and their palatalized variants are only found in loanwords. Consonants preceding the front vowels , , , and , as well as any palatalized consonant or are always moderately palatalized (a feature Lithuanian has in common with the Belarusian and Russian languages but which is not present in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Latvia
Latvia ( or ; lv, Latvija ; ltg, Latveja; liv, Leţmō), officially the Republic of Latvia ( lv, Latvijas Republika, links=no, ltg, Latvejas Republika, links=no, liv, Leţmō Vabāmō, links=no), is a country in the Baltic region of Northern Europe. It is one of the Baltic states; and is bordered by Estonia to the north, Lithuania to the south, Russia to the east, Belarus to the southeast, and shares a maritime border with Sweden to the west. Latvia covers an area of , with a population of 1.9 million. The country has a temperate seasonal climate. Its capital and largest city is Riga. Latvians belong to the ethno-linguistic group of the Balts; and speak Latvian, one of the only two surviving Baltic languages. Russians are the most prominent minority in the country, at almost a quarter of the population. After centuries of Teutonic, Swedish, Polish-Lithuanian and Russian rule, which was mainly executed by the local Baltic German aristocracy, the independent R ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sonorant
In phonetics and phonology, a sonorant or resonant is a speech sound that is produced with continuous, non-turbulent airflow in the vocal tract; these are the manners of articulation that are most often voiced in the world's languages. Vowels are sonorants, as are nasals like and , liquids like and , and semivowels like and . This set of sounds contrasts with the obstruents ( stops, affricates and fricatives). For some authors, only the term ''resonant'' is used with this broader meaning, while ''sonorant'' is restricted to consonants, referring to nasals and liquids but not vocoids (vowels and semivowels). Types Whereas obstruents are frequently voiceless, sonorants are almost always voiced. A typical sonorant consonant inventory found in many languages comprises the following: two nasals , two semivowels , and two liquids . In the sonority hierarchy, all sounds higher than fricatives are sonorants. They can therefore form the nucleus of a syllable in languages that place ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Diphthong
A diphthong ( ; , ), also known as a gliding vowel, is a combination of two adjacent vowel sounds within the same syllable. Technically, a diphthong is a vowel with two different targets: that is, the tongue (and/or other parts of the speech organ, speech apparatus) moves during the pronunciation of the vowel. In most International Phonetic Alphabet chart for English dialects, varieties of English language, English, the phrase "no highway cowboy" () has five distinct diphthongs, one in every syllable. Diphthongs contrast with monophthongs, where the tongue or other speech organs do not move and the syllable contains only a single vowel sound. For instance, in English, the word ''ah'' is spoken as a monophthong (), while the word ''ow'' is spoken as a diphthong in most varieties (). Where two adjacent vowel sounds occur in different syllables (e.g. in the English word ''re-elect'') the result is described as hiatus (linguistics), hiatus, not as a diphthong. (The English word ''h ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Open Vowel
An open vowel is a vowel sound in which the tongue is positioned as far as possible from the roof of the mouth. Open vowels are sometimes also called low vowels (in U.S. terminology ) in reference to the low position of the tongue. In the context of the phonology of any particular language, a ''low vowel'' can be any vowel that is more open than a mid vowel. That is, open-mid vowels, near-open vowels, and open vowels can all be considered low vowels. Partial list The open vowels with dedicated symbols in the International Phonetic Alphabet are: * open front unrounded vowel * open front rounded vowel This vowel is not known to occur as a phoneme distinct from in any language. * open back unrounded vowel * open back rounded vowel There also are central vowels that do not have dedicated symbols in the IPA: * open central unrounded vowel or (commonly written as if it were front) * open central rounded vowel There is no unambiguous way of transcribing the open central ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Open-mid Vowel
An open-mid vowel (also mid-open vowel, low-mid vowel, mid-low vowel or half-open vowel) is any in a class of vowel sound used in some spoken languages. The defining characteristic of an open-mid vowel is that the tongue is positioned one third of the way from an open vowel to a close vowel. Partial list The open-mid vowels that have dedicated symbols in the International Phonetic Alphabet are: * open-mid front unrounded vowel * open-mid front rounded vowel * open-mid central unrounded vowel (older publications may use ) * open-mid central rounded vowel (older publications may use ) * open-mid back unrounded vowel * open-mid back rounded vowel The open-mid back rounded vowel, or low-mid back rounded vowel, is a type of vowel sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is . The IPA symbol is a turned letter ''c'' a ... Other open-mid vowels can be indicated with diacritics of relative articulati ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Close Vowel
A close vowel, also known as a high vowel (in U.S. terminology), is any in a class of vowel sounds used in many spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a close vowel is that the tongue is positioned as close as possible to the roof of the mouth as it can be without creating a constriction. A constriction would produce a sound that would be classified as a consonant. The term "close" is recommended by the International Phonetic Association. Close vowels are often referred to as "high" vowels, as in the Americanist phonetic tradition, because the tongue is positioned high in the mouth during articulation. In the context of the phonology of any particular language, a ''high vowel'' can be any vowel that is more close than a mid vowel. That is, close-mid vowels, near-close vowels, and close vowels can all be considered high vowels. Partial list The six close vowels that have dedicated symbols in the International Phonetic Alphabet are: * close front unrounded vowel * c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Back Vowel
A back vowel is any in a class of vowel sound used in spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a back vowel is that the highest point of the tongue is positioned relatively back in the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant. Back vowels are sometimes also called dark vowels because they are perceived as sounding darker than the front vowels. Near-back vowels are essentially a type of back vowels; no language is known to contrast back and near-back vowels based on backness alone. The category "back vowel" comprises both raised vowels and retracted vowels. Articulation In their articulation, back vowels do not form a single category, but may be either raised vowels such as or retracted vowels such as .Scott Moisik, Ewa Czaykowska-Higgins, & John H. Esling (2012"The Epilaryngeal Articulator: A New Conceptual Tool for Understanding Lingual-Laryngeal Contrasts"/ref> Partial list The back vowels that have dedicated symbols in the Intern ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
