International Phonetic Alphabet
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- "IPA" redirects here. For other uses, see IPA (disambiguation). The NATO phonetic alphabet has also informally been called the "International Phonetic Alphabet."
The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is a system of phonetic notation devised by linguists to accurately and uniquely represent each of the wide variety of sounds (phones or phonemes) used in spoken human language. It is intended as a notational standard for the phonemic and phonetic representation of all spoken languages.
For a treatment of the English language using the IPA, see International Phonetic Alphabet for English; for a brief chart, see IPA chart for English.
[edit] History
- Main article: History of the International Phonetic Alphabet
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[edit] Description
The general principle of the IPA is to provide a separate symbol for each speech segment, avoiding letter combinations (digraphs) such as sh and th in English orthography, and avoiding ambiguity such as that of c in English.
[edit] The principle of formation
The IPA is what MacMahon (1996) has termed a "selective" phonetic alphabet. It aims to provide a separate symbol for every contrastive (that is, phonemic) sound occurring in human language. For instance, a flap and a tap are two different articulations, but since no language has (yet) been found to make a phonemic distinction between them, the IPA does not provide them with dedicated symbols. Instead, it provides a single symbol, ɾ, that covers both. For non-contrastive (that is, phonetic or subphonemic) details of these sounds, the IPA relies on diacritics, which are optional. Thus there is a certain level of flexibility in representing a language with the IPA.
[edit] Principles behind the symbols
The letters chosen for the IPA are generally drawn from the Latin and Greek alphabets, or are modifications of Latin or Greek letters. There are also a few letters derived from Latin punctuation, such as the glottal stop ʔ (originally an apostrophe, but later given the form of a "gelded" question mark to have the visual impact of the other consonants), and one, ʕ, although Latin in form, was inspired by Arabic letter <ﻉ> `ain. On the other hand, the original Latin-derived symbols for the clicks have been abandoned in favor of iconic Khoisanist symbols such as ǁ.
The sound-values of the consonants taken from the Latin alphabet correspond to usage in French and Italian, and are close to those of most other European languages as well: [b], [d], [f], [ɡ], [k], [l], [m], [n], [p], (unvoiced) [s], [t], [v], [z]. English values are used for [h] and [w].
The vowels from the Latin alphabet ([a], [e], [i], [o], [u]) correspond to the vowels of Spanish and are similar to Italian. [i] is like the vowel in piece, [u] like rule, etc.
The other symbols from the Latin alphabet, [c], [j], [q], [r], [x], and [y], correspond to sounds these letters represent in various other languages. [j] has the Slavic and Germanic value of <j>, that of English y in yoke; [y] has the Scandinavian and Old English value: Finnish y, German y or ü, French u, Dutch u.
Letters that share a particular modification sometimes correspond to a similar type of sound. For example, all the retroflex consonants have the same symbol as the equivalent alveolar consonant, with the addition of a rightward facing hook at the bottom. Although there is some correspondence between modified letters, generally the IPA symbols do not have a systematic featural relationship between shape and articulation. For instance, there is not a consistent relationship between lowercase letters and their small capital counterparts, nor are all labial consonants linked through a common design.
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.
[edit] Types of transcriptions
The International Phonetic Association recommends that a phonetic transcription should be enclosed in square brackets "[ ]". A transcription that specifically denotes only phonological contrasts may be enclosed in slashes "/ /" instead. If one is in doubt, it is best to use brackets, for by setting off a transcription with slashes one makes a theoretical claim that every symbol within is phonemically contrastive for the language being transcribed.
Phonetic transcriptions try to objectively capture the actual pronunciation of a word, whereas phonemic transcriptions are model dependent. For example, Noam Chomsky transcribed the English word night phonemically as /nixt/. In his model, the phoneme /x/ is often silent, but shows its presence by “lengthening” the preceding vowel. The preceding vowel in this case is the phoneme /i/, which is pronounced [aj] when long. So phonemic /nixt/ is equivalent to phonetic [najt], but only if you share Chomsky's belief that historical sounds such as the gh in night may remain in a word long after they have ceased to be pronounced.
For phonetic transcriptions, there is flexibility in how closely sounds may be transcribed. A transcription that gives only a basic idea of the sounds of a language in the broadest terms is called a "broad transcription"; in some cases this may be equivalent to a phonemic transcription (only without any theoretical claims). A close transcription, indicating precise details of the sounds, is called a "narrow transcription". These are not binary choices, but the ends of a continuum, with many possibilities in between. All are enclosed in brackets.
For example, in some dialects the English word pretzel in a narrow transcription would be [ˈpʰɹ̥ʷɛʔt.sɫ̩], which notes several phonetic features that may not be evident even to a native speaker. An example of a broader transcription is [ˈpʰɹɛt.sɫ̩], which only indicates some of the easier to hear features. A yet broader transcription would be [ˈpɹɛtsl]. Here every symbol represents an unambiguous speech sound, but without making any claims as to their status in the language.
There are also several possibilities in how to transcribe this word phonemically, but here the differences are generally not of precision, but of analysis. For example, pretzel could be /ˈprɛtsl/ or /ˈpretsəl/. The special symbol for English r is not used, for it is not meaningful to distinguish it from a rolled r. The differences in the letter e reflect claims as to what the essential difference is between the vowels of pretzel and pray; there are half a dozen ideas in the literature as to what this may be. The second transcription claims that there are two vowels in the word, even if they can't both be heard, while the first claims there is only one.
However, phonemic transcriptions may also be broad or narrow, or perhaps it would be better to say abstract vs. concrete. They may show a fair amount of phonetic detail, usually of a phoneme's most common allophone, but because they are abstract symbols they do not need to directly resemble any sound at all. Phonemic symbols will frequently be chosen to avoid diacritics as much as possible, under a 'one sound one symbol' policy, or may even be restricted to the ASCII symbols of a typical keyboard. For example, the English word church may be transcribed as /tʃɚtʃ/, a close approximation of its actual pronunciation, or more abstractly as /crc/ (three phonemes, three symbols), which is easier to type. Phonemic symbols should always be explained, especially when they are as divergent from actual pronunciation as /crc/.
Occasionally a transcription will be enclosed in pipes ("| |"). This goes beyond phonology into morphological analysis. For example, the words pets and beds could be transcribed phonetically as [pʰɛʔts] and [b̥ɛdz] (in a fairly narrow transcription), and phonemically as /pets/ and /bedz/. Because /s/ and /z/ are separate phonemes in English (unlike Spanish, for example), they receive separate symbols in the phonemic analysis. However, you probably recognize that underneath this, they represent the same plural ending. This can be indicated with the pipe notation. If you believe the plural ending is essentially an s, as English spelling would suggest, the words can be transcribed |pets| and |beds|. If, as most linguists would probably suggest, it is essentially a z, these would be |petz| and |bedz|.
To avoid confusion with IPA symbols, it may be desirable to specify when native orthography is being used, so that, for example, the English word jet is not read as "yet". This is done with angle brackets or chevrons: 〈jet〉. It is also common to italicize such words, but the chevrons indicate specifically that they are in the original language's orthography, and not in English transliteration.
The Extended IPA for speech pathology has added additional bracket notations. Parentheses are used to indicate mouthing (silent articulation), as in (ʃːː), a silent sign to hush; parentheses are also used to indicate silent pauses, for example (...). Double parentheses indicate obscured or unintelligible sound, as in ((2 syll.)), two audible but unidentifiable syllables. Curly brackets with Italian musical terms are used to mark prosodic notation, such as [{falsetto hɛlp falsetto}].
[edit] Consonants (pulmonic)
[edit] Single articulation
Closeup of the main pulmonic consonant section of the IPA chart
The pulmonic consonant table, which includes most consonants, is arranged in rows that designate manner of articulation and columns that designate place of articulation. The main chart only includes consonants with a single place of articulation.
| Place of articulation → | Labial | Coronal | Dorsal | Radical | (none) | ||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Manner of articulation ↓ | Bilabial | Labio‐ dental | Dental | Alveolar | Post‐ alveolar | Retro‐ flex | Palatal | Velar | Uvular | Pharyn‐ geal | Epi‐ glottal | Glottal | |||||
| Nasal | m | ɱ | n | ɳ | ɲ | ŋ</span> | ɴ | ||||||||||
| Plosive | p b | * * | t d | ʈ ɖ | c ɟ | k ɡ | q ɢ | ʡ | ʔ | ||||||||
| Fricative | ɸ β | f v | θ ð | s z | ʃ ʒ | ʂ ʐ | ç ʝ | x ɣ | χ | ʁ | ħ | ʕ | ʜ | ʢ | h ɦ | ||
| Approximant | β̞ | ʋ | ɹ | ɻ | j | ɰ | |||||||||||
| Trill | ʙ | r | * | ʀ | * | ||||||||||||
| Tap or Flap | * |  †
| ɾ | ɽ | * | ||||||||||||
| Lateral Fricative | ɬ ɮ | * | * | * | |||||||||||||
| Lateral Approximant | l | ɭ | ʎ | ʟ | |||||||||||||
| Lateral Flap | ɺ | * | * | * | |||||||||||||
Notes:
- Asterisks (*) mark reported sounds that do not (yet) have official IPA symbols. See the articles for ad hoc symbols found in the literature.
- Daggers (†) mark IPA symbols that do not yet have official Unicode support. Since May 2005, this is the case of the labiodental flap, symbolized by a right-hook v:
(Proposal to add this symbol to Unicode)
- In rows where some symbols appear in pairs (the obstruents), the symbol to the right represents a voiced consonant (except for breathy-voiced [ɦ]). However, [ʔ] cannot be voiced. In the other rows (the sonorants), the single symbol represents a voiced consonant.
- Although there is a single symbol for the coronal places of articulation for all consonants but fricatives, when dealing with a particular language, the symbols are treated as specifically alveolar, post-alveolar, etc., as appropriate for that language.
- Shaded areas indicate articulations judged to be impossible.
- The symbols [ʁ, ʕ, ʢ] represent either voiced fricatives or approximants.
- It is primarily the shape of the tongue rather than its position that distinguishes the fricatives [ʃ ʒ], [ɕ ʑ], and [ʂ ʐ].
- The labiodental nasal [ɱ] is not known to exist as a phoneme in any language.
[edit] Coarticulation
Closeup of the co-articulated consonant section of the IPA chart
| ʍ | Voiceless labialized velar approximant |
| w | Voiced labialized velar approximant |
| ɥ | Voiced labialized palatal approximant |
| ɕ | Voiceless palatalized postalveolar (alveolo-palatal) fricative |
| ʑ | Voiced palatalized postalveolar (alveolo-palatal) fricative |
| ɧ | Voiceless "palatal-velar" fricative |
Notes:
- [ɧ] is described as a "simultaneous [ʃ] and [x]". However, this analysis is disputed. See the article for discussion.
[edit] Consonants (non-pulmonic)
Closeup of the non-pulmonic consonant section of the IPA chart
| Click releases | Implosives | Ejectives | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ʘ | Bilabial | ɓ | Bilabial | ʼ | For example: |
| ǀ | Laminal alveolar ("dental") | ɗ | Alveolar | pʼ | Bilabial |
| ǃ | Apical (post-) alveolar ("retroflex") | ʄ | Palatal | tʼ | Alveolar |
| ǂ | Laminal postalveolar ("palatal") | ɠ | Velar | kʼ | Velar |
| ǁ | Lateral coronal ("lateral") | ʛ | Uvular | sʼ | Alveolar fricative |
Notes:
- All clicks are doubly articulated and require two symbols: a velar or uvular stop, plus a symbol for the anterior release: [k͡ǂ, ɡ͡ǂ, ŋ͡ǂ, q͡ǂ, ɢ͡ǂ, ɴ͡ǂ] etc., or [ǂ͡k, ǂ͡ɡ, ǂ͡ŋ, ǂ͡q, ǂ͡ɢ, ǂ͡ɴ]. When the dorsal articulation is omitted, a [k] may usually be assumed.
- Symbols for the voiceless implosives [ƥ, ƭ, ƈ, ƙ, ʠ] are no longer supported by the IPA, though they remain in Unicode. Instead, the IPA uses the voiced equivalent with a voiceless diacritic: [ɓ̥, ʛ̥], etc.
- Although not confirmed from any language, and therefore not "explicitly recognized" by the IPA, a retroflex implosive, [ᶑ], is supported in the Unicode Phonetic Extensions Supplement, added in version 4.1 of the Unicode Standard, or can be created as a composite [ɗ̢].
- The ejective symbol is often seen for glottalized but pulmonic sonorants, such as [mʼ], [lʼ], [wʼ], [aʼ], but these are more properly transcribed as creaky ([m̰], [l̰], [w̰], [a̰]).
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[edit] Vowels
Closeup of the vowel chart of the IPA
| Edit - 2× | Front | N.-front | Central | N.-back | Back |
| Close | |||||
| Near-close | |||||
| Close-mid | |||||
| Mid | |||||
| Open-mid | |||||
| Near-open | |||||
| Open | |||||
Notes:
- Where symbols appear in pairs, the one to the right represents a rounded vowel, as does [ʊ] (at least prototypically). All others are unrounded.
- [ɶ] is not confirmed as a distinct phoneme in any language.
- [a] is officially a front vowel, but there is little distinction between front and central open vowels, and [a] is frequently used for an open central vowel.
[edit] Affricates and double articulation
Affricates and doubly articulated stops are represented by two symbols joined by a tie bar, either above or below the symbols. The six most common affricates are optionally represented by ligatures, though this is no longer official IPA usage, due to the great number of ligatures that would be required to represent all affricates this way. A third affricate transcription sometimes seen uses the superscript notation for a consonant release, for example tˢ for t͡s, paralleling kˣ ~ k͡x. The symbols for the palatal plosives, <c ɟ>, are often used as a convenience for [t͡ʃ d͡ʒ] or similar affricates, even in official IPA publications, so they must be interpreted with care.
Image of the six common affricate ligatures and their official IPA equivalents
| Tie bar | Ligature | Description |
|---|---|---|
| t͡s | ʦ | voiceless alveolar affricate |
| d͡z | ʣ | voiced alveolar affricate |
| t͡ʃ | ʧ | voiceless postalveolar affricate |
| d͡ʒ | ʤ | voiced postalveolar affricate |
| t͡ɕ | ʨ | voiceless alveolo-palatal affricate |
| d͡ʑ | ʥ | voiced alveolo-palatal affricate |
| t͡ɬ | – | voiceless alveolar lateral affricate |
| k͡p | – | voiceless labial-velar plosive |
| ɡ͡b | – | voiced labial-velar plosive |
| ŋ͡m | – | labial-velar nasal stop |
Note:
- If your browser uses 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, kp͡, ɡb͡, ŋm͡.
[edit] Extended IPA
The Extended IPA was designed for disordered speech. However, some of the symbols (especially diacritics, below) are occasionally used for transcribing normal speech as well.
View a pdf file here.
| ʩ | Velopharyngeal fricative (often occurs with a cleft palate) |
| ʪ | Voiceless central-plus-lateral alveolar fricative, [ɬ͡s] (a lisp) |
| ʫ | Voiced central-plus-lateral alveolar fricative, [ɮ͡z] (a lisp) |
| ʬ | Bilabial percussive (smacking lips) |
| ʭ | Bidental percussive (gnashing teeth) |
| ¡ | Sublaminal lower alveolar click (sucking tongue) |
The last symbol may be used with the alveolar click for [ǃ¡], a combined alveolar and sublaminal click or "cluck-click".
[edit] Suprasegmentals
Closeup of the suprasegmental section of the IPA chart
| ˈ | Primary stress |
| ˌ | Secondary stress |
| ː | Long (long vowel or geminate consonant) |
| ˑ | Half-long |
| ˘ | Extra-short |
| . | Syllable break |
| ‿ | Linking (absence of a break) |
[edit] Intonation
| | | Minor (foot) break |
| ‖ | Major (intonation) break |
| ↗ | Global rise |
| ↘ | Global fall |
[edit] Tone
IPA allows for the use of either tone diacritics or tone letters to indicate tones.
| e̋ or ˥ | Extra high |
| é or ˦ | High |
| ē or ˧ | Mid |
| è or ˨ | Low |
| ȅ or ˩ | Extra low |
| ě | Rise |
| ê | Fall |
| ↓e | Downstep |
| ↑e | Upstep |
Note:
- With regard to tone diacritics, Unicode encodes marks for some contour tones, but not all. In Unicode version 4.1, only hacek (rising) and circumflex (falling) diacritics were encoded. Subsequent versions may also include six additional diacritics for contour tones, such as the macron-acute and the grave-acute-grave ligatures. (See an image here.) Note that contour tone diacritics are not encoded as sequences of level tone diacritics in Unicode.
- With regard to tone letters, Unicode does not have separate encodings for contour tones. Instead, sequences of level tone letters are used, with proper display dependent on the font, usually by means of OpenType font rendition: [˥˩] or [˦˥˧]. (These are probably not displaying correctly in your browser. See the image for a sample of how they should appear.) Since few fonts support combination tone letters (see the external links for one that is free), a common solution is to use the old system of superscript numerals from '1' to '5', for example [e53, e312]. However, this depends on local linguistic tradition, with '5' generally being high and '1' being low for Asian languages, but '1' being high and '5' low for African languages. An old IPA convention sometimes still seen is to use sub-diacritics for low contour tones: [e̖, e̗] for low-falling and low-rising.
- The upstep and downstep modifiers are superscript arrows. Unicode version 4.1 does not encode these, though subsequent versions will. The arrows for upstep and downstep should not be confused with the full-height arrows, which are used to indicate airflow direction.
[edit] Diacritics
Closeup of the diacritic section of the IPA chart
Sub-diacritics may be placed above a symbol with a descender, i.e. ŋ̊. The dotless i, <ı>, is used when the dot would interfere with the diacritic. Other IPA symbols may appear as diacritics to represent phonetic detail: tˢ (fricative release), bʱ (breathy voice), ˀa (glottal onset), ᵊ (epenthetic schwa), oʊ (diphthongization).
| Syllabicity diacritics | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| ɹ̩ n̩ | Syllabic | e̯ ʊ̯ | Non-syllabic |
| Consonant-release diacritics | |||
| tʰ dʰ | Aspirated 2 | d̚ | No audible release |
| dⁿ | Nasal release | dˡ | Lateral release |
| Phonation diacritics | |||
| n̥ d̥ | Voiceless | s̬ t̬ | Voiced |
| b̤ a̤ | Breathy voiced 1 | b̰ a̰ | Creaky voiced |
| Articulation diacritics | |||
| t̪ d̪ | Dental | t̼ d̼ | Linguolabial |
| t̺ d̺ | Apical | t̻ d̻ | Laminal |
| u̟ t̟ | Advanced | i̠ t̠ | Retracted |
| ë ä | Centralized | e̽ ɯ̽ | Mid-centralized |
| e̝ ɹ̝ ˔ | Raised (ɹ̝ = voiced alveolar nonsibilant fricative) | ||
| e̞ β̞ ˕ | Lowered (β̞ = bilabial approximant) | ||
| Co-articulation diacritics | |||
| ɔ̹ x̹ | More rounded | ɔ̜ x̜ʷ | Less rounded |
| tʷ dʷ | Labialized | tʲ dʲ | Palatalized |
| tˠ dˠ | Velarized | tˁ dˁ | Pharyngealized |
| ɫ z̴ | Velarized or pharyngealized | ||
| e̘ o̘ | Advanced tongue root | e̙ o̙ | Retracted tongue root |
| ẽ z̃ | Nasalized | ɚ ɝ | Rhoticity |
Notes:
- Some linguists restrict this breathy-voice diacritic to sonorants, and transcribe obstruents as bʱ.
- With aspirated voiced consonants, the aspiration is also voiced. Many linguists prefer one of the diacritics dedicated to breathy voice.
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:
| [t] | voiceless |
| [d̤] | breathy voice, also called murmured |
| [d̥] | slack voice |
| [d] | modal voice |
| [d̬] | stiff voice |
| [d̰] | creaky voice |
| [ʔ͡t] | glottal closure |
[edit] Extended IPA diacritics
The letters and diacritics of the ExtIPA
The ExtIPA has widened the use of some of the regular IPA symbols, such as ʰp for pre-aspiration, tʶ for uvularization, or s̼ for a linguolabial sibilant, as well as adding some new ones. Some of the ExtIPA diacritics are occasionally used for non-disordered speech, for example for the unusual airstream mechanisms of Damin.
One modification is the use of subscript parentheses around the phonation diacritics to indicate partial phonation; a single parenthesis at the left or right of the voicing indicates that it is partially phonated at the beginning or end of the segment. For example, ₍s̬₎ is a partially voiced [s],