Appendix:Tpaalha pronunciation

Tpaalha Language Navigation: Home, Phonology, Grammar, Vocabulary, Orthography

The Tpaalha language has 26 consonants, 8 vowels, and 2 glides.

Standard Romanization

Letter	IPA	English example	Notes
a	a	father
b	b	bog
d	ɖ	—
e	ɛ	bet
f	ɸ	food
g	g	good
gh	ɣ	—	Approximately like the r in French rouge.
h	h	ham
i	i	machine
k	k	skill
kh	x	loch (Scottish English)
l	l	left
ly	ʎ	million
m	m	man
n	n	no
ng	ŋ	sing
ny	ɲ	onion
o	ʌ	cut
p	p	span
s	s	see
sh	ʂ	sheep
sy	ç	huge
t	ʈ	—
u	ɯ	—
v	β	—
w	ʍ	what (certain varieties)
y	j	yawn
z	z	zoo
zh	ʐ	azure
zy	ʝ	—	Like the h in "huge" but voiced.

Phonetics

Consonants

		Labial	Alveolar	Retroflex	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Nasal		m	n [n ~ ɳ]		ny [ɲ]	ng [ŋ]
Plosive	voiceless	p		t [ʈ]	ty [c]	k
	voiced	b		d [ɖ]	dy [ɟ]	g
Fricative	voiceless	f [ɸ]	s	sh [ʂ]	sy [ç]	kh [x]	h
	voiced	v [β]	z	zh [ʐ]	zy [ʝ]	gh [ɣ]
Lateral	voiceless			lh [ꞎ]
	voiced			l [ɭ]	ly [ʎ]
Approximant	voiceless	w [ʍ]
	voiced	(w)		r [ɻ]	y [j]

Notes:

• [w] is of uncertain status as a phoneme. [ʍ] is more common, and is what is usually spelled w in the romanization.

Vowels

Tpaalha has five vowel qualities, with the three cardinal vowels having two lengths, making up a total of eight monophthongs:

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i [i] ii [iː]		u [ɯ] uu [ɯː]
Mid	e [ɛ]		o [ʌ]
Open		a [a] aa [aː]

Diphthongs

There are a number of diphthongs, for example uo [ɯʌ] and ou [ʌɯ].