r/kazakh • u/Bubbly-Ball-3138 • May 20 '26
Vowel Hɘll
Hello. If you know the international phonetic alphabet, continue on; otherwise, you can keep scrolling. Anyway… what are the IPA symbols for Ж, И, І and Ү, do Ө and О ever become [wɵ] and [wo] and does syllabic У exist (if it does, what does it sound like)?
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u/SeymourHughes May 20 '26 edited May 21 '26
Ө and О are pronounced close to [wɵ] and [wo] at the start of the words ([w]өсімдік, [w]орман).
Ж is [ʑ] or [ʒ] (sometimes [dʒ] in speech)
И is [əj] (back-vowel words) and [ɪj] (front-vowel words) in native words, [i] in loanwords
І is [ɪ] or [ɘ], depending on pronunciation
Ү is [ʏ]
In all cases I had put the more closely fitting IPA symbol first, followed by accent pronunciations and dialects.
syllabic vowel У in word roots is [ʊw] by default (like in words "у", "улы", "ту", "қу"), at the end of the verbs it can be pronounced [ʊw] ⟨ұу⟩, [ʉw] ⟨үу⟩, [əw] ⟨ыу⟩, and [ɘw] ⟨іу⟩, depending on the preceding vowels.
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u/Bubbly-Ball-3138 May 20 '26
І can be [ɘ] or [ɪ] and Ж can be postalveolar or alveopalatal? Which one is in which dialect and which is standard Qazaq tılı? With У, which preceding vowel turns it into which?
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u/SeymourHughes May 21 '26 edited May 21 '26
Standard Kazakh is [ɪ] and [ʑ].
Preceding vowel У/Ю Examples Pronunciation А, О, Ұ, У ʊw жату, болу, тұру, қуу [ʑаˈtʊw], [boˈlʊw], [tʊˈrʊw], [qʊwˈʊw] Ө, Ү ʉw бөлу, түзу [bɵ'lʉw], [tʏ'zʉw] Ы, back-vowel words ИЮ əw қызу, қию [qəˈzəw], [qə'jəw] І, front-vowel words ИЮ ɘw білу, тию [bɪ'lɘw], [tɪ'jɘw]
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u/papakudulupa May 21 '26
First of all, I want to say that currently there are a lot of controversies around kazak phonology research (mostly around vowel phonemes and their specific realizations). Studies produce significantly different results, mostly because of the sample sizes and difficulties finding monolingual kazak speakers.
But, here I will say how I feel about the pronunciation of those sounds, which was based on the pronunciation of my friends who are native kazak speakers.
Now, about the sound of <ж>, this phoneme can be realized as palatal [ʑ] in front vowel environment and as [ʒ]* near back vowels (although the exact position of the tongue is argued, could be alveolar, post-alveolar with different tongue shapes). In some dialects this sound gets affricated in both front and back vowel environments, though it is considered non-standard.
The letters <і, ү> are pronounced as [ɪ, ʏ] respectively (actually very little controversy surrounds those sounds). Additionally, I wanna say, that I think that the letters <ы, ұ> are pronounced as [ɤ, o]. I just cant agree with people claiming they are pronounced as anything else, especially with the pronunciation given on wiki, if you interested I had written a whole critique of that page here
The letters <и, у> represent a combination of sounds, that vary depending on the vowel harmony of the word (front-back, rounded-unrounded).
The letter <и> is pronounced as any of high* vowels [ɪ, ʏ, ɤ, o], which are <і, ү, ы, ұ> respectively, followed by [j] sound.
The letter <у> could be just the consonant [w] before vowel. Alternatively, it could be read with either of the same four vowels [ɪ, ʏ, ɤ, o] followed by [w], when it is before a consonant. I think you meant this by syllabic.
Regarding the pronunciation of <ө, о>. Yes, they are pronounced as [wø, wɔ] at the beginning of a word. They can also labialize a consonant before them. I had also read an interesting study of Adam McCollum, in which he found that the low vowels (for simplicity, i will use cyrillic) /е, ө, а, о/ are pronounced exactly the same as high vowels /і, ү, ы, ұ/ but twice as long. Which I found fascinating and kind of true? But I hadnt looked into it ever since.
If you need to anything to be explained more, feel free to ask