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Ğ, or ğ, is a letter, known as g-breve in English, used in Turkish, Azerbaijani, Crimean Tatar, and Laz.
Contents
Turkish use
In Turkish, the ⟨ğ⟩ /ɰ/ is known as yumuşak ge [jumuʃak ɟe] (soft g) and is the ninth letter of the Turkish alphabet. It is very similar to the blødt g 'soft g' in Danish and comparable to the '-gh' sound in the Arabic letter ghayn. It has more than one function; it may lengthen the preceding vowel, which is normally short in Turkish without the ⟨ğ⟩ (for example, dağ (mountain) is pronounced similar to [daː], with just a small fluctuation in sound in the end), it may be used before a vowel in ‿ or ʲ form as sandhi for back vowels and front vowels respectively and it often creates a small fluctuation in sound even in cases where it lengthens the preceding vowel. The ⟨ğ⟩ must follow a vowel, and thus cannot be the initial letter of a word. Its exact function varies throughout Turkey and with regard to the particular vowel with which it is used: it adds a rising of the back of the tongue (as for /g/ or /k/) to /a/ and /ı/, a /j/ glide to /e/ or /i/, and a /β/ glide to the rounded vowels /o/, /u/, /ö/ and /ü/.
The letter provides a smooth transition between vowels since they do not occur consecutively in native Turkish words (in loanwords they are separated by a glottal stop). In rare cases, the phonetic /ɣ/ (gamma) or the Greek letter ⟨γ⟩ is used. Some webpages may also use ⟨Ð⟩ and ⟨ð⟩ because of improper encoding; see Turkish characters for the reasons of this.
Azerbaijani and Crimean Tatar use
In Azerbaijani and Crimean Tatar, ğ represents /ɣ/, the voiced velar fricative.
Laz use
Laz is written using two alphabets: the Georgian script and an extended Turkish Latin alphabet. In the Latin alphabet, ğ represents /ɣ/, the voiced velar fricative, and corresponds to the Georgian letter Ghani.