Diacritics
Diacritics are small markings which are placed around the IPA letter in order to show a certain alteration or more specific description in the letter's pronunciation. Sub-diacritics (markings normally placed below a letter) may be placed above a letter having a descender (informally called a tail), e.g. ŋ̊, ȷ̈.
The dotless i, ⟨ı⟩, is used when the dot would interfere with the diacritic. Other IPA letters may appear as diacritic variants to represent phonetic detail: tˢ (fricative release), bʱ (breathy voice), ˀa (glottal onset), ᵊ (epenthetic schwa), oᶷ (diphthongization). Additional diacritics were introduced in the Extensions to the IPA, which were designed principally for speech pathology.
| View the diacritic table as an image | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Syllabicity diacritics | |||||
| ◌̩ | ɹ̩ n̩ | Syllabic | ◌̯ | e̯ ʊ̯ | Non-syllabic |
| Consonant-release diacritics | |||||
| ◌ʰ | tʰ | Aspirated | ◌̚ | d̚ | No audible release |
| ◌ʱ | dʱ | ||||
| ◌ⁿ | dⁿ | Nasal release | ◌ˡ | dˡ | Lateral release |
| Phonation diacritics | |||||
| ◌̥ | n̥ d̥ | Voiceless | ◌̬ | s̬ t̬ | Voiced |
| ◌̤ | b̤ a̤ | Breathy voiced | ◌̰ | 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 |
| ◌ʷ | tʷ dʷ | Labialized or labio-velarized | ◌ʲ | tʲ dʲ | Palatalized |
| ◌ˠ | tˠ dˠ | Velarized | ◌ˤ | tˤ aˤ | Pharyngealized |
| ◌ᶣ | tᶣ dᶣ | Labio-palatalized | ◌̴ | ɫ z̴ | Velarized or pharyngealized |
| ◌̘ | e̘ o̘ | Advanced tongue root | ◌̙ | e̙ o̙ | Retracted tongue root |
| ◌̃ | ẽ z̃ | Nasalized | ◌˞ | ɚ ɝ | Rhotacized |
- Notes
- a^ With aspirated voiced consonants, the aspiration is also voiced. Many linguists prefer one of the diacritics dedicated to breathy voice.
- b^ Some linguists restrict this breathy-voice diacritic to sonorants, and transcribe obstruents as bʱ.
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:
| Open glottis | voiceless | |
|---|---|---|
| breathy voice, also called murmured | ||
| slack voice | ||
| Sweet spot | modal voice | |
| stiff voice | ||
| creaky voice | ||
| Closed glottis | glottal closure |
Read more about this topic: International Phonetic Alphabet