User:Tphcm/Vietnamese Phonology

Vietnamese Phonology describes the sound system of the Vietnamese language, including its phonetics and phonology. This article concentrates on the two most commonly encountered variants: the spoken languages of Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City.

Syllable structure

Vietnamese words are generally monosyllabic, such as the examples một 'one' and hai 'two'. The phonotactics of the Vietnamese language restrict syllables to the following internal structure:

• Onset: the initial consonant (optional)
• Rime (obligatory)
  • Syllable glide (The labial-velar approximant /w/) (optional)
  • Nucleus: vowels (monophthongs, diphthongs or triphthongs) (obligatory)
  • Coda: final consonants (optional)
• Tone (one of six possible tones)

The structure of a Vietnamese word can be represented as:

[Onset] + [[Glide] + Vowel + [Coda]] + Tone

For example, the most common Vietnamese family name Nguyễn /ŋwien³¹⁵/ shows all five possible components of a Vietnamese syllable:

• Onset: 'Ng' /ŋ/.
• Glide: 'u' /w/.
• Nucleus: 'yê' /ie/. Here, the nucleus is a diphthong.
• Coda: 'n' /n/.
• Tone: This is the ngã tone with tone contour '315', and it is written here with a tilde over 'ê'.

Simpler combinations are possible, such as in the words for the two syllable morpheme y tá /i³³ ta³⁵/ (nurse). The first syllable has got a nucleus /i/, but no onset, glide nor coda. The second has got an onset /t/ and a nucleus /a/, but neither glide nor coda. However, both these syllables have tone - the ngang and sắc respectively.

Consonants

This table shows the consonant phonemes in Vietnamese. Not all of them are present in all varieties of Vietnamese.

		Bilabial	Labio- dental	Dental/ Alveolar	Retroflex	Palatal	Labial- velar	Velar	Glottal
Stop	unaspirated	p1		t2	ʈ3	c	k͡p4	k	ʔ5[1]
	aspirated			tʰ2
	glottalized	ɓ5		ɗ5
Fricative			f    v6	s    z2	ʂ3      ʐ7			x   ɣ	h
Nasal		m		n		ɲ	ŋ͡m4	ŋ
Approximant	central			r7		j	w8
	lateral			l

1. /p/ is generally present only at the end of words, except for words derived from French.
2. /t/ is unaspirated, while /tʰ/ is aspirated. These are different phonemes in all varieties of Vietnamese.
3. Something about North South differences.
4. These are doubly articulated consonants, and only occur in the coda.
5. See note.
6. The glottalized stops are preglottalized and voiced: [ʔɓ, ʔɗ] (i.e., the glottis is always closed before the oral closure). This glottal closure is often not released before the release of the oral closure, resulting in the characteric implosive pronunciation. However, sometimes the glottal closure is released prior to the oral release in which case the stops are pronounced as [ʔb, ʔd]. Therefore, the primary characteristic is preglottalization with implosion being secondary.
7. /v/ is generally still present in the northern and central regions), but is often elided to /j/ or palatized as [vʲj]. In addition to this [vj], there is [bj, βj] that is present among other speakers. These pronunciations are remnants of a merger and sound change involving /v, z/ in southern speech.
8. In southern speech, the phoneme /r/ has a number of variant pronunciations that depend on the speaker. More than one pronunciation may even be found within a single speaker. It may occur as a retroflex fricative [ʐ], a postalveolar fricative [ʒ], a flap [ɾ], a trill [r], or a fricative flap/trill [ɾ̝, r̝]. This sound is generally represented in Vietnamese linguistics by the symbol < r >
9. This is the glide.

• Among the coronals:
  • /tʰ, s, z, l/ are dental: [t̪ʰ, s̪, z̪, l̪].
  • /t, ɗ, n/ are alveolar: [t͇, ɗ͇, n͇].
  • /tʰ, l, t, ɗ, n/ are apical [t̺ʰ, l̺, t̺, ɗ̺, n̺] (i.e. with the tongue tip).
  • /s, z, c, ɲ/ are laminal [s̻, z̻, c̻, ɲ̻] (i.e. with the tongue blade).
• /c, ɲ/ are phonetically palatoalveolar [ṯ, ṉ] (i.e. the blade of the tongue makes contact behind the alveolar ridge).
• /c/ is often slightly affricated [ṯ^ʃ], although much less than English [tʃʰ]. (Note that the English affricate is also aspirated and usually apical, unlike Vietnamese). This affrication, however, is not obligatory.

Phonological processes

• A glottal stop [ʔ] is inserted before words that begin with a vowel or the glide /w/:^[2]

ăn	'to eat'	/ɐn/	→	[ʔɐn]
uỷ	'to delegate'	/wi/	→	[ʔwij]

• When stops /p, t, k/ occur at the end of words, they are unreleased [p̚, t̚, k̚]:

đáp	'to reply'	/ɗɐːp/	→	[ʔɗɐːp̚]
mát	'cool'	/mɐːt/	→	[mɐːt̚]
khác	'different'	/xɐːk/	→	[xɐːk̚]

• When the velar consonants /k, ŋ/ follow /u, w/, they are articulated with a simultaneous bilabial closure [k͡p, ŋ͡m] (i.e. doubly-articulated) or are strongly labialized [kʷ, ŋʷ].

đục	'muddy'	/ɗuk/	→	[ʔɗuk͡p̚]
độc	'poison'	/ɗɜwk/	→	[ʔɗɜwk͡p̚]
ung	'cancer'	/uŋ/	→	[ʔuŋ͡m]
ong	'bee'	/ɐwŋ/	→	[ʔɐwŋ͡m]

Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon)

The 22 consonants of the Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC) variety (a.k.a. Saigon variety):

Phonetics

The HCMC Vietnamese variety is essentially the same as the Hanoi with the following exceptions:

• /v/ is generally not present in HCMC. When it is pronounced, it is often a spelling pronunciation in which case it always occurs palatalized with a [j] following it: [vʲj]. In addition to this [vj], there is [bj, βj] that is present among other speakers. These pronunciations are remnants of a merger and sound change involving /v, z/ in southern speech (/v/ is generally still present in the northern and central regions).
• Hanoi /z/ is not present in HCMC.
• HCMC /l/ is generally slightly more palatalized than the Hanoi variety: [lʲ].
• In southern speech, the phoneme /r/ has a number of variant pronunciations that depend on the speaker. More than one pronunciation may even be found within a single speaker. It may occur as a retroflex fricative [ʐ], a postalveolar fricative [ʒ], a flap [ɾ], a trill [r], or a fricative flap/trill [ɾ̝, r̝]. This sound is generally represented in Vietnamese linguistics by the symbol < r >.
• Among the coronals:
  • /tʰ/ is dental: [t̪ʰ].
  • /t, ɗ, s, n, l/ are alveolar: [t͇, ɗ͇, s͇, n͇, l͇].
  • /t, tʰ, ɗ, s, n/ are apical: [t̺, t̺ʰ, ɗ̺, s̺, n̺] .
  • /l, c, ɲ/ are laminal: [l̻ʲ, c̻, ɲ̻].
• Unlike Hanoi, the glide /w/ in HCMC when at the beginning of a syllable is not preceded by a glottal stop.

Regional consonant variation

At the beginning of syllables, Hanoi /v, z/ appear as HCMC /j/. HCMC /r/ appears as Hanoi /z/, HCMC /c, ʈ^ʂ/ appear as Hanoi /c/, and HCMC /s, ʂ/ appear as Hanoi /s/. The table below summarizes these sound correspondences:

Syllable onsets
Hanoi	HCMC	Example
		word	Hanoi	HCMC
/v/	/j/	vợ   "wife"	/vəː/	/(v)jəː/
/z/	/j/	da   "skin"	/zɐː/	/jɐː/
/z/	/r/	ra   "to go out"	/zɐː/	/rɐː/
/c/	/c, ʈʂ/	chi   "what/why/how"	/ci/	/ci/
		trắng   "white"	/cɐŋ/	/ʈʂɐŋ/
/s/	/s, ʂ/	xa   "far"	/sɐː/	/sɐː/
		số   "number"	/so/	/ʂo/

There are also sound mergers involving syllable-final consonants among the different regional varieties. These correspondences differ from the initial consonant correspondences discussed above. Coronals /t, n/ in Hanoi appear as velars /k, ŋ/ in HCMC, except when the coronals occur after the higher front vocalics /i, e, j/, in which case HCMC /t, n/ remain the same as Hanoi /t, n/. Additionally, Hanoi /k, ŋ/ appear as HCMC /t, n/ when they occur after /i, e, j/ (otherwise they are /k, ŋ/):

Syllable codas
Hanoi	HCMC	Example
		word	Hanoi	HCMC
/t, k/	/k/	hát   "to sing"	/hɐːt/	/hɐːk/
		thác   "waterfall"	/tʰɐːk/	/tʰɐːk/
/n, ŋ/	/ŋ/	xuân   "spring"	/swɜn/	/swɨŋ/
		vâng   "to obey"	/vɜŋ/	/(v)jɜŋ/
/t, k/ after /i, e, j/	/t/	ít   "few, small in quantity"	/it/	/it/
		ếch   "frog"	/ɜjk/	/ɜt/
/n, ŋ/ after /i, e, j/	/n/	đến   "to arrive"	/ɗen/	/ɗɜn/
		lính   "soldier"	/liŋ/	/lɨn/

As can be seen above, vowels also vary among different regions.

Vowels

Monophthongs

The IPA vowel chart of monophthongs (i.e., simple vowels) below is a composite of the phonetic descriptions of Nguyễn (1997), Thompson (1965), and Han (1966).^[3] This is a vowel description of Hanoi Vietnamese (i.e., other regions of Vietnam may have different inventories).

	Front	Central	Back
High	i	ɨ	u
Upper Mid	e	əː	o
Lower Mid	ɛ	ɜ	ɔ
Low		ɐ / ɐː

• All vowels are unrounded except for the three back rounded vowels: /u, o, ɔ/.
• /ɜ/ and /ɐ/ are pronounced short — shorter than the other vowels.
  • /ɐ/ vs. /ɐː/: Short /ɐ/ (orthographic ă) and long /ɐː/ (orthographic a) are different phonemic vowels, differing in length only (and not quality). (The [ː] symbol indicates a long vowel.)
  • /ɜ/ vs. /əː/: Han (1966) suggests that short /ɜ/ (orthographic â) and long /əː/ (orthographic ơ) and differ in both height and length, but that the difference in length is probably the primary distinction. Thompson (1965) seems to suggest that the distinction is due to height (as he does for all Vietnamese vowels), although he also notes the length difference.
• /ɨ/ (orthographic ư) is close central unrounded and backed and lowered: [ɨ̞̠]. Many descriptions, such as Thompson (1959, 1965), Nguyễn (1970), Nguyễn (1997), consider this vowel to be close back unrounded: [ɯ]. However, Han's (1966) instrumental analysis indicates that it is more central than back. Brunelle (2003) and Pham (2003) also transcribe this vowel as central.
• The high and upper-mid vowels /i, ɨ, u, e, əː, o/ have phonetic offglides: [ɪj, ɨɰ, ʊw, ej, əːɰ, ow], particularly in open syllables:

chị	'elder sister'	/ci/	→	[cɪj]		quê	'countryside'	/ke/	→	[kej]
tư	'fourth'	/tɨ/	→	[tɨɰ]		mơ	'to dream'	/məː/	→	[məːɰ]
thu	'autumn'	/tʰu/	→	[tʰʊw]		cô	'paternal aunt'	/ko/	→	[kow]

Diphthongs and triphthongs

In addition to monophthongs, Vietnamese has many diphthongs and triphthongs. Most of these consist of a vowel followed by /j/ or /w/. (Phonologically speaking, it is best to consider these as a sequence of a vowel and a consonant.) Below is a chart (Nguyễn 1997) listing the diphthongs & triphthongs of general northern speech.

/ɜ/ Diphthongs	/j/ Diphthongs/Triphthongs	/w/ Diphthongs/Triphthongs
/iɜ/	/əːj/	/iw/
/ɨɜ/	/ɜj/	/ew/
/uɜ/	/ɐːj/	/ɛw/
	/ɐj/	/əːw/
	/ɨj/	/ɜw/
	/uj/	/ɐːw/
	/oj/	/ɐw/
	/ɔj/	/ɨw/
	/ɨɜj/	/iɜw/
	/uɜj/	/ɨɜw/

• /j/ never follows front vowels /i, e, ɛ/.
• /w/ never follows rounded vowels /u, o, ɔ/.

Regional vowel variation

Thompson (1965) says that in Hanoi words spelled with ưu and ươu are pronounced as /iw, iɜw/, respectively, whereas other dialects in the Tonkin delta pronounce them as /ɨw/ and /ɨɜw/. Hanoi speakers that do pronounce these words with /ɨw/ and /ɨɜw/ are using a spelling pronunciation.

Thompson (1965) also notes that in Hanoi the diphthongs, iê /iɜ/, ươ /ɨɜ/, uô /uɜ/, may be pronounced as /ie, ɨəː, uo/, respectively (as the spelling suggests), but before /k, ŋ/ and in open syllables these are always pronounced /iɜ, ɨɜ, uɜ/.

Tone

Vietnamese vowels are all pronounced with an inherent tone. Tones differ in

• pitch
• length
• contour melody
• intensity
• glottality (with or without accompanying constricted vocal cords)

Unlike many Native American, African, and Chinese languages, Vietnamese tones do not rely solely on pitch contour. Vietnamese often uses instead a register complex (which is a combination of phonation type, pitch, length, vowel quality, etc.). So perhaps a better description would be that Vietnamese is a register language and not a "pure" tonal language (Pham 2003).

In Vietnamese orthography, tone is indicated by diacritics written above or below the vowel.

6-tone analysis

The six tones in the Hanoi and other northern varieties are:

Name	Description	Chao Tone Contour	Diacritic	Example
ngang	high (or mid) level	33	(no mark)	ba  'three'
huyền	low falling	21	`	bà  'lady'
hỏi	(low) dipping-rising	313	̛	bả  'poison'
ngã	creaking-rising	35	˜	bã  'residue'
sắc	high (or mid) rising	35	´	bá  'governor'
nặng	constricted	32 or 31	̣	bạ  'at random'

There is much variation among speakers concerning how tone is realized phonetically. There are differences between varieties of Vietnamese spoken in the major geographic areas (i.e. northern, central, southern) and smaller differences within the major areas (e.g. Hanoi vs. other northern varieties). In addition, there seems to be variation among individuals. More research is needed to determine the remaining details of tone realization and the variation among speakers.

Below are details about tone realization in the northern varieties.

Ngang tone:

• The ngang tone is produced with modal voice phonation (i.e. with "normal" phonation).

Huyền tone:

• The huyền tone has accompanying breathy voice phonation in some speakers, but this is lacking in other speakers: bà = [ʔɓɐ̤ː²¹] or [ʔɓɐː²¹].

Hỏi tone:

• The hỏi is pronounced low falling in the beginning of the syllable, and rises slightly after that.

Ngã tone:

• For some speakers, the ngã tone is pronounced falling-rising, with the rising part noticably higher than the Hỏi tone. Hỏi = ³¹³; ngã = ³¹⁵. In Southern Vietnam this tone is merged with the hỏi tone (same pitch levels).

Sắc tone:

• The sắc tone is produced with modal voice although the vocal cords are often tenser than the ngang tone. In some speakers, the sắc tone has the same tone contour as the ngã tone (i.e. ³⁵). In other speakers, the ngã tone is noticeably higher than the sắc tone: sắc = ³⁴ or ²⁴; ngã = ³⁵ or ⁴⁵.

Nặng tone:

• The nặng is pronounced falling and glottalized.

Endnotes

(1-2) ^

Thompson (1959, 1965) posits a glottal stop phoneme in a more abstract analysis of Hanoi Vietnamese that would eliminate the phonemes /ɓ, ɗ, v/ by involving sequences of glottal stop + consonant (ʔC). Specifically, he proposes:

• /p/ → [p]
• /ʔp/ → [ʔɓ]
• /t/ → [t]
• /ʔt/ → [ʔɗ]
• /w/ → [v]
• /ʔw/ → [ʔw]

This analysis also simplifies the syllable description: all syllables have obligatory onsets.

In the southern varieties, [ʔ] does not occur before [w].

(3) ^

Below are three linguists' different descriptions of Vietnamese vowels. Which one is correct? You will have to make your own observations. Thompson and Han are not native speakers of Vietnamese, but Nguyễn is a native speaker.

Thompson's vowels

	Front	Central	Back
High	iː		ɯː    uː
Upper-Mid	eː		ɤː    oː
Lower-Mid	ɛː		ʌ      ɔː
Upper-Low		ɐ
Lower-Low	æː

Han's vowels

	Front	Central	Back
High	i	ɨ	u
Upper-Mid	e		o
Lower-Mid	ɛ	ɜː/ɜ	ɔ
Low		ɐː/ɐ

Nguyễn's vowels

	Front	Central	Back
High	i		ɯ    u
Mid	e	əː/ə	o
Low	a	ɐː/ɐ	ɒ

Thompson (1965) says that the vowels [ʌ] (orthographic â) and [ɐ] (orthographic ă) are shorter than all of the other vowels, which is shown here with the length mark [ː] added to the other vowels. His vowels above are only the basic vowel phonemes. Thompson gives a very detailed description of each vowel's various allophonic realizations.

Han (1966) uses acoustic analysis, including spectrograms and format measuring & plotting, to describe the vowels. She states that the primary difference between orthographic ơ & â and a & ă is a difference of length (a ratio of 2:1). ơ = /ɜː/, â = /ɜ/; a = /ɐː/, ă = /ɐ/. Her format plots also seem show that /ɜː/ may be slightly higher than /ɜ/ in some contexts (but this would be secondary to the main difference of length). However, it must be pointed out that Han only considers F1 and F2 but not F3.

Another thing to mention about Han's studies is that she uses a rather small number of participants and, additionally, although her participants are native speakers of the Hanoi variety, they all have lived outside of Hanoi for a significant period of their lives (i.e. in France or Ho Chi Minh City).

Nguyễn (1997) is probably simplifying his vowel description somewhat, making it more symmetrical (which is good phonology). He says that this is not a "complete grammar" but rather a "descriptive introduction". So, his chart above is more a phonological vowel chart rather than a phonetic one.

Below is a table comparing the different descriptions to the orthography. Notice that this website is mostly following Han (1966).

comparison of orthography & vowel descriptions

Orthography	this website	Thompson	Han	Nguyễn	Đoàn
i	i	i	i	i	i
ê	e	e	e	e	e
e	ɛ	ɛ	ɛ	a	ɛ
ư	ɨ	ɯ	ɨ	ɯ	ɯ
u	u	u	u	u	u
ô	o	o	o	o	o
o	ɔ	ɔ	ɔ	ɔ	ɔ
ơ	əː	ɤ	ɜː	əː	ɤː
â	ɜ	ʌ	ɜ	ə	ɤ
a	ɐː	æ	ɐː	ɐː	aː
ă	ɐ	ɐ	ɐ	ɐ	a

Bibliography

• Brunelle, Marc. (2003). Coarticulation effects in northern Vietnamese tones. (Longer online version of a paper published in the Proceedings of the 15th International Conference of Phonetic Sciences). [Accessed Mar. 10, 2005, http://www.people.cornell.edu/pages/mb236/Papers+Pubs.html].
• Đoàn, Thiện Thuật. (1980). Ngữ âm tiếng Việt. Hà Nội: Đại học và Trung học Chuyên nghiệp, 1980.
• Đoàn, Thiện Thuật; Nguyễn, Khánh Hà, Phạm, Như Quỳnh. (2003). A Concise Vietnamese Grammar (For Non-Native Speakers). Hà Nội: Thế Giới Publishers, 2001.
• Earle, M. A. (1975). An acoustic study of northern Vietnamese tones. Santa Barbara: Speech Communications Research Laboratory, Inc.
• Ferlus, Michel. (1997). Problemes de la formation du systeme vocalique du vietnamien. Asie Orientale, 26 (1), .
• Gregerson, Kenneth J. (1969). A study of Middle Vietnamese phonology. Bulletin de la Société des Etudes Indochinoises, 44, 135-193. (Published version of the author's MA thesis, University of Washington). (Reprinted 1981, Dallas: Summer Institute of Linguistics).
• Han, Mieko S. (1966). Vietnamese vowels. Studies in the phonology of Asian languages (Vol. 4). Los Angeles: Acoustic Phonetics Research Laboratory, University of Southern California.
• Han, Mieko S. (1968). Complex syllable nuclei in Vietnamese. Studies in the phonology of Asian languages (Vol. 6); U.S. Office of Naval Research. Los Angeles: University of Southern California.
• Han, Mieko S. (1969). Vietnamese tones. Studies in the phonology of Asian languages (Vol. 8). Los Angeles: Acoustic Phonetics Research Laboratory, University of Southern California.
• Han, Mieko S.; & Kim, Kong-On. (1972). Intertonal influences in two-syllable utterances of Vietnamese. Studies in the phonology of Asian languages (Vol. 10). Los Angeles: Acoustic Phonetics Research Laboratory, University of Southern California.
• Han, Mieko S.; & Kim, Kong-On. (1974). Phonetic variation of Vietnamese tones in disyllabic utterances. Journal of Phonetics, 2, 223-232.
• Haudricourt, André-Georges. (1949). Origine des particularités de l'alphabet vietnamien. Dân Việt-Nam, 3, 61-68.
• Haudricourt, André-Georges. (1954). De l'origine des tons en vietnamien. Journal Asiatique, 142 (1).
• Haupers, Ralph. (1969). A note on Vietnamese kh and ph. Mon-Khmer Studies, 3, 76.
• Hoàng, Thị Châu. (1989). Tiếng Việt trên các miền đất nước: Phương ngữ học. Hà Nội: Khoa học xã hội.
• Nguyễn, Đăng-Liêm. (1970). Vietnamese pronunciation. PALI language texts: Southeast Asia. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press. ISBN 0-8702-2462-X
• Nguyễn, Đình-Hoà. (1955). Quốc-ngữ: The modern writing system in Vietnam. Washington, D. C.
• Nguyễn, Đình-Hoà. (1959). Hòa's Vietnamese-English dictionary. Saigon. (Revised as Nguyễn 1966 & 1995).
• Nguyễn, Đình-Hoà. (1966). Vietnamese-English dictionary. Rutland, VT: C.E. Tuttle Co. (Revised version of Nguyễn 1959).
• Nguyễn, Đình-Hoà. (1992). Vietnamese phonology and graphemic borrowings from Chinese: The Book of 3,000 Characters revisited. Mon-Khmer Studies, 20, 163-182.
• Nguyễn, Đình-Hoà. (1995). NTC's Vietnamese-English dictionary (rev. ed.). Lincolnwood, IL.: NTC Pub. Group. (Revised & expanded version of Nguyễn 1966).
• Nguyễn, Đình-Hoà. (1996). Vietnamese. In P. T. Daniels, & W. Bright (Eds.), The world's writing systems, (pp. 691-699). New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-507993-0.
• Nguyễn, Đình-Hoà. (1997). Vietnamese: Tiếng Việt không son phấn. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company. ISBN 1-55619-733-0.
• Nguyễn, Văn Lợi; & Edmondson, Jerold A. (1998). Tones and voice quality in modern northern Vietnamese: Instrumental case studies. Mon-Khmer Studies, 28, 1-18.
• Pham, Hoa. (2001). A phonetic study of Vietnamese tones: Reconsideration of the register flip-flop rule in reduplication. In C. Féry, A. D. Green, & R. van de Vijver (Eds.), Proceedings of HILP5 (pp. 140-158). Linguistics in Potsdam (No. 12). Potsdam: Universität Potsdam (5th conference of the Holland Institute of Linguistics-Phonology. ISBN 3-935024-27-4.
• Pham, Andrea Hoa. (2003). Vietnamese tone: A new analysis. Outstanding dissertations in linguistics. New York: Routledge. (Published version of author's 2001 PhD dissertation, University of Florida: Hoa, Pham. Vietnamese tone: Tone is not pitch). ISBN 0-4159-6762-7.
• Thompson, Laurence E. (1959). Saigon phonemics. Language, 35 (3), 454-476.
• Thompson, Laurence E. (1991). A Vietnamese reference grammar. Seattle: University of Washington Press. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press. ISBN 0-8248-1117-8. (Original work published 1965).
• Thompson, Laurence E. (1967). The history of Vietnamese final palatals. Language, 43 (1), 362-371.
• Thurgood, Graham. (2002). Vietnamese and tonogenesis: Revising the model and the analysis. Diachronica, 19 (2), 333-363.

See also

• List of phonetics topics

External links

• Ngữ âm học