Dieu phonology

This article is a technical description of the sound system of the Dieu language, including phonetics and phonology. It has 40 consonant phonemes, 8 monothongs, and 7 diphthongs.

Initials

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! colspan="2" | ! Labial ! Dental ! Retroflex ! Palatal ! Velar ! Glottal ! colspan="2" |Nasal ! rowspan="3" |Plosive ! rowspan="2" | Affricate ! rowspan="2" | Fricative ! colspan="2" | Approximant
 * m
 * n
 * ɲ
 * ŋ
 * ŋ
 * style="background: #efefef;" | tenuis
 * p
 * t
 * ʈ
 * c
 * k
 * ʔ
 * style="background: #efefef;" | aspirated
 * pʰ
 * tʰ
 * kʰ
 * style="background: #efefef;" | implosive
 * ɓ
 * ɗ
 * ᶑ
 * ʄ
 * ɠ
 * ɓ
 * ɗ
 * ᶑ
 * ʄ
 * ɠ
 * style="background: #efefef;" | tenuis
 * ts
 * tɕ
 * kx
 * style="background: #efefef;" | voiced
 * dʑ
 * ɡɣ
 * style="background: #efefef;" | voiced
 * dʑ
 * ɡɣ
 * dʑ
 * ɡɣ
 * dʑ
 * ɡɣ
 * style="background: #efefef;" | voiceless
 * s
 * ʂ
 * h
 * style="background: #efefef;" | voiced
 * β
 * z
 * ɣ
 * style="background: #efefef;" | voiced
 * β
 * z
 * ɣ
 * ɣ
 * ɣ
 * w
 * l
 * ɻ
 * j
 * }
 * }
 * }

Vowels

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! ! Front ! colspan="2" | Back ! ! Close ! Close-mid ! Open-mid ! Open
 * unrounded
 * unrounded
 * rounded
 * i ⟨i⟩
 * ɯ ⟨ï⟩
 * u ⟨u⟩
 * e ⟨ĕ⟩
 * ɤ ⟨ə⟩
 * o ⟨ŏ⟩
 * ɛ ⟨e⟩
 * ʌ ⟨ə̆⟩
 * ɔ ⟨o⟩
 * a ⟨a⟩
 * }
 * {| class="wikitable nowrap" style="text-align: center;"
 * }
 * {| class="wikitable nowrap" style="text-align: center;"

! ! Front ! colspan="2" | Back
 * Opening
 * ie
 * ɯɤ
 * uo
 * Closing
 * ei
 * oi
 * ai, au
 * }
 * All vowels exist in long-short pairs, and are unrounded except for the three back rounded vowels: /u, o, uo/.
 * The unrounded back vowels /ɯ, ɤ, ɯə/ are near-back [ɯ̟, ɤ̟, ɯ̟ə] and become [ɨ, ə, ɨə] after palatalized consonants.
 * /a/ is central /ä/.
 * All vowels exist in long-short pairs, and are unrounded except for the three back rounded vowels: /u, o, uo/.
 * The unrounded back vowels /ɯ, ɤ, ɯə/ are near-back [ɯ̟, ɤ̟, ɯ̟ə] and become [ɨ, ə, ɨə] after palatalized consonants.
 * /a/ is central /ä/.

Finals

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! ! Labial ! Dental ! Palatal ! Velar
 * Plosive
 * p
 * t
 * c
 * k
 * Nasal
 * m
 * n
 * ŋ
 * Glide
 * w
 * j
 * }
 * Glide
 * w
 * j
 * }
 * }
 * }

Tones
Like many East Asian languages, Dieu uses tone to distinguish words, with the number of possible tones depending on the type of final. In finals that end in a stop, the number of tones is reduced to three. Tones only occur in Chinese loanwords.

There are 7 phonetic tones in Dieu: high, mid, low, high rising, low rising, high falling, low falling.


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! Tone name ! Tone ID ! Contour ! Diacritic (Ping'am)
 * High level
 * 1
 * ˦˥ 45
 * h
 * Mid level
 * 2
 * ˧ 33
 * Low level
 * 3
 * ˨˩ 21
 * x
 * High rising
 * 4
 * ˧˥ 35
 * hh
 * Low rising
 * 5
 * ˩˧ 13
 * xh
 * High falling
 * 6
 * ˥˧ 53
 * hx
 * Low falling
 * 7
 * ˧˩ 31
 * xx
 * }
 * ˥˧ 53
 * hx
 * Low falling
 * 7
 * ˧˩ 31
 * xx
 * }
 * }