Help:IPA/Greenlandic
< Help:IPA
 | This is the pronunciation key for IPA transcriptions of Greenlandic on Wikipedia. It provides a set of symbols to represent the pronunciation of Greenlandic 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 Greenlandic pronunciations in Wikipedia articles. For a guide to adding IPA characters to Wikipedia articles, see Template:IPA and Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Pronunciation § Entering IPA characters.
See Greenlandic phonology and Inuit phonology for a more thorough look at the sounds of Greenlandic and other Inuit languages.
| IPA | Examples | nearest English equivalent |
|---|---|---|
| çː | agguut | hue |
| fː | affaq | for |
| ɣ | igaaq | Spanish fuego |
| j | qajaq | yes |
| k | kukik | ski |
| l | aleqa | land |
| ɬː | illu | By getting the tongue up to the roof and giving a quick breath out; Welsh llwyd. |
| m | mannik | man |
| n | nuna | now |
| ŋ | angut | sing |
| ɴ | arnaq [b] | like ng but further down the throat |
| p | putu | spoil |
| q | qajaq | like k but further down the throat |
| ʁ | erinaq | French rester |
| s | sisamat | soon |
| t | tallimat | stop |
| ts | timi, atsa [c] | cats |
| v | savik | love |
| χː | tarraq | like Scottish loch but further down the throat |
| IPA | Examples | nearest English equivalent |
|---|---|---|
| a | aja | cat |
| aː | aak | mad |
| ɑ | qajaq[d] | like father, but shorter |
| ɑː | aaq[d] | father |
| ɜ | erneq[d] | about |
| ɜː | meeraq[d] | burn |
| i | isi | meat |
| iː | kiinaq | knee |
| ɔ | oqaq[d] | off |
| ɔː | sooq[d] | more |
| u | pukusuk | cool (short) |
| ʉ | nuna[e] | goose (some dialects<ref name="goose">These dialects most accents of Southern England English (including Multicultural London English, Cockney, Estuary English and modern Received Pronunciation), Scouse, Mancunian, Australian English, New Zealand English, Scottish English, Ulster English, Southern American English, Midland American English, Philadelphia-Baltimore English, Western Pennsylvania English and California English. Other dialects have no close equivalent vowel sound.) |
| uː | kuuk | cool (long) |
| y | ipi[f] | roughly like meat, but with rounded lips |
| Diphthongs | ||
| ai | iliorarpai | irate |
Notes
- ^ Between vowels, Greenlandic consonants can occur either short or long. In IPA, long consonants may be written doubled or be followed by the length sign: /nn/ or /nː/. Long fricatives are voiceless.
- ^ The uvular nasal [ɴ] is not found in all dialects and there is dialectal variability regarding its status as a phoneme
- ^ Short [t͡s] is in complementary distribution with short [t], with the former appearing before /i/ and the latter elsewhere; both are written ⟨t⟩ and could be analysed as belonging to the same phoneme /t/. Before /i/, long [tt͡s] occurs while long [tt] doesn't, so long [tt͡s] before /i/ could be analysed as long /tt/. However, before /a/ and /u/, both long [tt͡s] and long [tt] occur (except in some dialects, including that of Greenland's third largest town). Long [tt͡s] is always written ⟨ts⟩
- ^ a b c d e f The vowels /a, i, u/ are lowered to [ɑ, ɛ~ɜ, ɔ], respectively, before uvular consonants /q, ʁ/.
- ^ /u/ is fronted to [ʉ] between two coronal consonants.
- ^ /i/ is rounded to [y] before labial consonants.