Mid back unrounded vowel

Updated on Dec 23, 2024

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IPA number 315 430 Unicode (hex) U+0264 U+031E		Entity (decimal) ɤ̞

The mid back unrounded vowel is a type of vowel sound, used in some spoken languages. Acoustically it is a mid back-central unrounded vowel. Although there is no dedicated symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents the exact mid back unrounded vowel between close-mid [ɤ] and open-mid [ʌ] because no language is known to distinguish all three, ⟨ɤ⟩ is normally used. If more precision is desired, diacritics can be used, such as ⟨ɤ̞⟩ or ⟨ʌ̝⟩.

Features

Its vowel height is mid, which means the tongue is positioned halfway between a close vowel and an open vowel.

Its vowel backness is back, which means the tongue is positioned as far back as possible in the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant. Note that unrounded back vowels tend to be centralized, which means that often they are in fact near-back.

It is unrounded, which means that the lips are not rounded.

References

Mid back unrounded vowel Wikipedia

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