Help:IPA/Russian
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![]() | This is the pronunciation key for IPA transcriptions of Russian on Wikipedia. It provides a set of symbols to represent the pronunciation of Russian in Wikipedia articles, and example words that illustrate the sounds that correspond to them. Integrity must be maintained between the key and the transcriptions that link here; do not change any symbol or value without establishing consensus on the talk page first. For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA. For the distinction between [ ], / / and ⟨ ⟩, see IPA § Brackets and transcription delimiters. |
The charts below show the way in which the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) represents Russian pronunciations in Wikipedia articles. For a guide to adding IPA characters to Wikipedia articles, see {{IPA-ru}} and Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Pronunciation § Entering IPA characters.
Russian distinguishes hard (unpalatalized or plain) and soft (palatalized) consonants. Soft consonants, most of which are denoted by a superscript j, ⟨ʲ⟩, are pronounced with the body of the tongue raised toward the hard palate, like the articulation of the y sound in yes. /j, ɕː, tɕ/ are always soft, whereas /ʂ, ts, ʐ/ are always hard.
See Russian phonology and Russian alphabet for a more thorough look at the sounds of Russian.
Consonants | ||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Hard | Soft | |||||
IPA | Examples | English approximation | IPA | Examples | English approximation | |
b | апде́йт[1] | ;boot | bʲ | beautiful | ||
d | [1] | ;do | dʲ | [1] | ; ;dew (UK) | |
f | [1] [2] | ; ;fool | fʲ | [2] | ; ;few | |
ɡ | [3][4]; [1] | goo | ɡʲ | argue | ||
— | j | [je-]; [jɵ-]; [ju-]; [ja]; [5] | yes, York, you, yard, boy | |||
k | [1]; [2] | ;scar | kʲ | секью́рити | ;skew | |
l | [6] | pill | lʲ | ; | lean | |
m | moot | mʲ | ; | mute | ||
mː | программа | as in ‘moot’ but doubled; somewhat like ‘emasculate’ | N/A | |||
n | noon | nʲ | [7] | ; ;newt (for some dialects) | ||
nː | оловянный | as in ‘noon’ but doubled; somewhat like ‘enact’ | N/A | |||
p | [1]; [2] | ;span | pʲ | [2] | ; ;spew | |
r | flapped or trilled r, like in Spanish | rʲ | ; | flapped or trilled r, like in Spanish | ||
s | [1]; [2] | ;soup | sʲ | [1] | ; ; ;assume (for some dialects) | |
ʂ | [1]; [2]; [8] | ;rush | ɕː | [9][10] | ; ;wish sheep | |
t | [1] [2] | ; ;stand | tʲ | [2] | ; ; ;stew (UK; for some dialects) | |
ts[11] | [10] | ;cats | tɕ[11] | [10] | ;chip | |
v | его́[4]; афга́н[1] | ;voodoo | vʲ | ; | view | |
x | [3][10] | ;loch (Scottish) | xʲ | Хью́стон; [1][3][10] | ;huge (for some dialects) | |
z | [1] | ;zoo | zʲ | резьба́; ; [1] | ;presume (for some dialects) | |
ʐ | волшба́[1] | ;rouge | ʑː | [12] | prestige genre | |
Stressed vowels | ||||||
[-soft] | [+soft] | |||||
IPA | Examples | English approximation | IPA | Examples | English approximation | |
a | father | æ | [13] | ;pat (US) | ||
ɛ | ; | met | e | [13] | ;penny | |
ɨ | с и́грами | ; ;roses (for some dialects) | i | ; | meet | |
o | ; | chore | ɵ | [13] | ;foot | |
u | boot | ʉ | [13] | ;choose | ||
Unstressed vowels | ||||||
[-soft] | [+soft] | |||||
IPA | Examples | English approximation | IPA | Examples | English approximation | |
ɐ | [14] | ; ; ;bud | — | |||
ə | ; ; | about | ə | [15] | ; ;lasagna | |
ɨ | к Ива́ну | ; ; ; ;roses (for some dialects) | ɪ | [16] | ; ; ; ;bit | |
ʊ | put | ʉ | [13] | ;youth | ||
ɛ | тетра́эдр; поэте́сса[17] | met | — | |||
o | поэте́сса[17] | ;chore | ɵ | ма́чо; сёрфинги́ст[18] | foot | |
Suprasegmental | ||||||
IPA | Example | Explanation | ||||
ˈ | [tɕɪˈtɨrʲɪ] | Stress mark, placed before the stressed syllable | ||||
ː | [ˈzːadʲɪ][1] | Consonant length mark, placed after the geminated consonant |
Notes
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Consonants in consonant clusters are assimilated in voicing if the final consonant in the sequence is an obstruent (except [v, vʲ]). All consonants become voiceless if the final consonant is voiceless or voiced if the final consonant is voiced (Halle 1959:31).
- ^ a b c d e f g h i The voiced obstruents /b, bʲ, d, dʲ, ɡ, v, vʲ, z, zʲ, ʐ/ are devoiced word-finally unless the next word begins with a voiced obstruent (Halle 1959:22).
- ^ a b c ⟨г⟩ is usually pronounced [ɣ] or [x] in some religious words and colloquial derivatives from them, such as and , and in the interjections , , , , and also in бухга́лтер [bʊˈɣaltʲɪr] (Timberlake 2004:23). /ɡ/ devoices and lenites to [x] before voiceless obstruents (dissimilation) in the word roots -мягк- or -мягч-, -легк- or -легч-, -тягч-, and also in the old-fashioned pronunciation of -ногт-, -когт-, кто. Speakers of the Southern Russian dialects may pronounce ⟨г⟩ as [ɣ] (soft [ɣʲ], devoiced [x] and [xʲ]) throughout.
- ^ a b Intervocalic ⟨г⟩ represents /v/ in certain words ( , , итого́ ), and in the genitive suffix -ого/-его (Timberlake 2004:23).
- ^ The soft vowel letters ⟨е, ë, ю, я⟩ represent iotated vowels /je, jo, ju, ja/, except when following a consonant. When these vowels are unstressed (save for ⟨ë⟩, which is always stressed) and follow another vowel letter, the /j/ may not be present. The letter ⟨и⟩ produces iotated sound /ji/ only after ь.
- ^ /l/ is often strongly pharyngealized [ɫ], but that feature is not distinctive (Ladefoged & Maddieson 1996:187-188).
- ^ Alveolo-palatal consonants are subjected to regressive assimilative palatalization; i.e. they tend to become palatalized in front of other phones with the same place of articulation.
- ^ Most speakers pronounce ⟨ч⟩ in the pronoun что and its derivatives as [ʂ]. All other occurrences of чт cluster stay as affricate and stop.
- ^ ⟨щ⟩ is sometimes pronounced as [ɕː] or [ɕɕ] and sometimes as [ɕtɕ], but no speakers contrast the two pronunciations. This generally includes the other spellings of the sound, but the word счи́тывать sometimes has [ɕtɕ] because of the morpheme boundary between the prefix ⟨с-⟩ and the root ⟨-чит-⟩.
- ^ a b c d e [ts], [tɕ], [ɕː], [x], have voiced allophones, [dz], [dʑ], [ʑː], [ɣ] respectively, before voiced stop consonants. Examples: , начди́в, , вещдо́к, трёхдне́вный.
- ^ a b The affricates [ts] and [tɕ] are sometimes written with ligature ties: [t͡s] and [t͡ɕ]. Ties are not used in transcriptions on Wikipedia (except in phonology articles) because they may not display correctly in all browsers.
- ^ Geminated [ʐː] is pronounced as soft [ʑː], the voiced counterpart to [ɕː], in a few lexical items (such as дро́жжи or заезжа́ть) by conservative Moscow speakers; such realization is now somewhat obsolete (Yanushevskaya & Bunčić (2015:224)).
- ^ a b c d e Vowels are fronted and/or raised in the context of palatalized consonants: /a/ and /u/ become [æ] and [ʉ], respectively between palatalized consonants, /e/ is realized as [e] before and between palatalized consonants and /o/ becomes [ɵ] after and between palatalized consonants.
- ^ Word-initial and pretonic (before the stress) /a/ and /o/, as well as when in a sequence.
- ^ Only in certain word-final morphemes (Timberlake 2004:48-51).
- ^ Unstressed /a/ is pronounced as [ɪ] after ⟨ч⟩ and ⟨щ⟩ except when word-final.[citation needed]
- ^ a b In the careful style of pronunciation unstressed /e/ and /o/ in foreign words may be pronounced with little or no reduction.
- ^ Unstressed [ɵ] only occurs in foreign words.
References
- Cubberley, Paul (2002), "The phonology of Modern Russian", Russian: A Linguistic Introduction, Cambridge University Press
- Halle, Morris (1959), Sound Pattern of Russian, MIT Press
- Jones, Daniel; Ward, Dennis (1969), The Phonetics of Russian, Cambridge University Press
- Ladefoged, Peter; Maddieson, Ian (1996). The Sounds of the World's Languages. Oxford: Blackwell. ISBN 0-631-19815-6.
- Timberlake, Alan (2004), "Sounds", A Reference Grammar of Russian, Cambridge University Press
- Yanushevskaya, Irena; Bunčić, Daniel (2015), "Russian" (PDF), Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 45 (2): 221–228, doi:10.1017/S0025100314000395