Near-open front unrounded vowel | |||
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æ | |||
IPA Number | 325 | ||
Audio sample | |||
Encoding | |||
Entity (decimal) | æ | ||
Unicode (hex) | U+00E6 | ||
X-SAMPA | { | ||
Braille | |||
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IPA: Vowels | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Legend: unrounded • rounded |
The near-open front unrounded vowel, or near-low front unrounded vowel, [1] is a type of vowel sound. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ⟨æ⟩, a lowercase of the ⟨ Æ⟩ ligature. Both the symbol and the sound are commonly referred to as "ash".
The rounded counterpart of [æ], the near-open front rounded vowel (for which the IPA provides no separate symbol) has been reported to occur allophonically in Danish; [2] [3] see open front rounded vowel for more information.
In practice, ⟨æ⟩ is sometimes used to represent the open front unrounded vowel; see the introduction to that page for more information.
In IPA transcriptions of Hungarian and Valencian, this vowel is typically written with ⟨ɛ⟩.
Language | Word | IPA | Meaning | Notes | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Afrikaans | Standard [4] | 'perd' | [pæːrt] | 'horse' | Allophone of /ɛ/, in some dialects, before /k χ l r/. See Afrikaans phonology |
Äiwoo | ikuwä | [ikuwæ] | 'I go' | Distinguished from both [a] and [ɑ~ɒ]. | |
Arabic | Standard [5] | كتاب / 'kitāb' | [kiˈtæːb] | 'book' | Allophone of /a/ in the environment of plain labial and coronal consonants as well as /j/ (depending on the speaker's accent). See Arabic phonology |
Azerbaijani | 'Azərbaycan' | [ɑːzæɾbɑjˈd͡ʒɑn] | 'Azerbaijan' | ||
Bambam [6] | 'bätä' | [ˈbætæ] | 'stem' | ||
Bashkir [7] | йәй / yäy | ⓘ | 'summer' | ||
Bengali [8] | এক/ek | [æk] | 'one' | See Bengali phonology | |
Bulgarian | |||||
Moesian dialects | млечен/mlečen | [mlæt͡ʃɛn] | 'made from milk' | Descendant of Proto-Slavic *ě in places where Standard Bulgarian would have / ɛ/. See Yat. | |
Rup dialects | Descendant of Proto-Slavic *ě in all positions. See Yat. | ||||
Teteven dialect | мъж/măž | [mæʃ] | 'man' | In place of Standard Bulgarian [ ɤ̞] (written as ъ). | |
Erkech dialect | |||||
Catalan | Majorcan [9] | tesi | [ˈt̪æzi] | 'thesis' | Main realization of /ɛ/. See Catalan phonology |
Valencian [9] | |||||
Chechen | аьрзу / ärzu | [ærzu] | 'eagle' | ||
Danish | Standard [2] [10] | dansk | [ˈtænˀsk] | 'Danish' | Most often transcribed in IPA with ⟨ a⟩ – the way it is realized by certain older or upper-class speakers. [11] See Danish phonology |
Dutch [12] | pen | [pæn] | 'pen' | Allophone of /ɛ/ before /n/ and coda /l/. In non-standard accents this allophone is generalized to other positions, where [ ɛ] is used in Standard Dutch. [13] See Dutch phonology | |
English | Cultivated New Zealand [14] | cat | ⓘ | 'cat' | Higher in other New Zealand varieties. See New Zealand English phonology |
General American [15] | See English phonology | ||||
Conservative Received Pronunciation [16] | Fully open [ a] in contemporary RP. [16] See English phonology | ||||
Estonian [17] | väle | [ˈvæ̠le̞ˑ] | 'agile' | Near-front. [17] See Estonian phonology | |
Finnish [18] | mäki | [ˈmæki] | 'hill' | See Finnish phonology | |
French | Parisian [19] | bain | [bæ̃] | 'bath' | Nasalized; typically transcribed in IPA with ⟨ɛ̃⟩. See French phonology |
Quebec [20] | ver | [væːʁ] | 'worm' | Allophone of /ɛ/ before /ʁ/ or in open syllables, and of /a/ in closed syllables. [20] See Quebec French phonology | |
German | Standard Austrian [21] | erlauben | [æˈlɑɔ̯bn̩] | 'allow' | Variant of pretonic [ ɛɐ̯]. [21] See Standard German phonology |
West Central German accents [22] | oder | [ˈoːdæ] | 'or' | Used instead of [ ɐ]. [22] See Standard German phonology | |
Northern accents [23] | alles | [ˈa̝ləs] | 'everything' | Lower and often also more back in other accents. [23] See Standard German phonology | |
Western Swiss accents [24] | spät | [ʃpæːt] | 'late' | Open-mid [ ɛː] or close-mid [ eː] in other accents; contrasts with the open-mid / ɛː/. [25] See Standard German phonology | |
Greek | Macedonia [26] | γάτα/ gáta | [ˈɣætæ] | 'cat' | See Modern Greek phonology |
Thessaly [26] | |||||
Thrace [26] | |||||
Pontic [27] | καλάθια/kaláthia | [kaˈlaθæ] | 'baskets' | ||
Hungarian [28] | nem | [næm] | 'no' | Typically transcribed in IPA with ⟨ɛ⟩. See Hungarian phonology | |
Kanoê [29] | [æː] | 'tobacco' | |||
Kazakh | әйел/äiel | [æ̝ˈje̘l̪ʲ] | 'woman' | Varies between near-open and open-mid. | |
Kurdish | Sorani (Central) | گاڵته/ galte | [gäːɫtʲæ] | 'joke' | Equal to Palewani (Southern) front [ a]. See Kurdish phonology |
Lakon [30] | rävräv | [ræβræβ] | 'evening' | ||
Limburgish [31] [32] [33] | twelf | [ˈtβ̞æ̠ləf] | 'twelve' | Front [32] [33] or near-front, [31] depending on the dialect. The example word is from the Maastrichtian dialect, in which the vowel is near-front. | |
Lithuanian | jachtą | [ˈjæːxt̪aː] | 'yacht' (accusative) | See Lithuanian phonology | |
Luxembourgish [34] | Käpp | [kʰæpʰ] | 'heads' | See Luxembourgish phonology | |
Norwegian | Urban East [35] [36] | lær | [læːɾ] | 'leather' | See Norwegian phonology |
Persian [37] [38] | هشت/hašt | [hæʃt] | 'eight' | ||
Portuguese | Some dialects [39] | pedra | [ˈpædɾɐ] | 'stone' | Stressed vowel. In other dialects closer / ɛ/. See Portuguese phonology |
Some European speakers [40] | também | [tɐˈmæ̃] | 'also' | Stressed vowel, allophone of nasal vowel /ẽ̞/. | |
Romanian | Bukovinian dialect [41] | piele | [ˈpæle] | 'skin' | Corresponds to [je] in standard Romanian. Also identified in some Central Transylvanian sub-dialects. [41] See Romanian phonology |
Russian [42] [43] | пять / pjatʹ | ⓘ | 'five' | Allophone of /a/ between palatalized consonants. See Russian phonology | |
Serbo-Croatian | Zeta-Raška dialect [44] | дан/ dan | [d̪æn̪] | 'day' | Regional reflex of Proto-Slavic *ь and *ъ. Sometimes nasalised. [44] |
Sinhala [45] | ඇය/æya | [æjə] | 'she' | ||
Slovak | mäso | [mæso] | 'meat, flesh' | In conversation sometimes pronounced as [e] or [a]. See Slovak phonology | |
Swedish | Central Standard [46] [47] [48] | ära | ⓘ | 'hono(u)r' | Allophone of /ɛː, ɛ/ before /r/. See Swedish phonology |
Stockholm [48] | läsa | [²læːsä] | 'to read' | Realization of /ɛː, ɛ/ for younger speakers. Higher [ ɛː, ɛ̝ ~ ɛ for other speakers | |
Turkish [49] | sen | [s̪æn̪] | 'you' | Allophone of /e/ before syllable-final /m, n, l, r/. In a limited number of words (but not before /r/), it is in free variation with [ e̞]. [49] See Turkish phonology |