IPA – number 323
IPA – text ɵ
Entity ɵ
X-SAMPA 8
Kirshenbaum @.<umd>
Sound sample (help·info)

The close-mid central rounded vowel is a type of vowel sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ɵ, and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is 8. The symbol ɵ is a lowercase barred letter o, and should not be confused with the Greek letter theta (θ), which in IPA corresponds to a consonant sound, the voiceless dental fricative.

The symbol for the close-mid central unrounded vowel may also be used with a lowering diacritic [ɵ̞], to denote the mid central rounded vowel.

The character ɵ has been used is several Latin-derived alphabets such as the one for Janalif, but in that language it denotes another sound than it does in the IPA. The character is homographic with Cyrillic Ө. The Unicode number is U+019F, and the symbol is called "LATIN LETTER O WITH MIDDLE TILDE".

Features

Features of this vowel:

• Its vowel height is close-mid, which means the tongue is positioned halfway between close vowel and a mid vowel.
• Its vowel backness is central, which means the tongue is positioned halfway between a front vowel and a back vowel.
• Its vowel roundedness is rounded, which means that the lips are rounded.

Occurrence

Language Word IPA Meaning Notes
Chinese Cantonese 出/ceot7 [tsʰɵt˥ʔ] 'to go out' See Standard Cantonese
English Australian[1][2] bird [bɵːd] 'bird' See Australian English phonology
Swedish dum [dɵmː] 'dumb' Not actually [ɵ], but an in-rounded variant of it.
Toda ? [pɵːr̘] 'name'

The Swedish [ɵ] is endolabial. The type of rounding of [ɵ] in other languages, or whether there is even a difference, is not clear.

References

Bibliography