Open back rounded vowel

The open back rounded vowel, or low back rounded vowel,^[1] is a type of vowel sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ⟨ɒ⟩. It is called Latin turned alpha being a rotated version of Latin alpha. It seems a "turned script a", being a rotated version of "script (cursive) a", which is the variant of a that lacks the extra stroke on top of a "printed a". Latin turned alpha a ⟨ɒ⟩ has its linear stroke on the left, whereas Latin alpha a ⟨ɑ⟩ (for its unrounded counterpart) has its linear stroke on the right.

Open back rounded vowel
ɒ
IPA number	313
Audio sample
source · help
Encoding
Entity (decimal)	ɒ
Unicode (hex)	U+0252
X-SAMPA	Q
Braille
Image

IPA: Vowels
Front Central Back Close i y ɨ ʉ ɯ u Near-close ɪ ʏ ʊ Close-mid e ø ɘ ɵ ɤ o Mid e̞ ø̞ ə ɤ̞ o̞ Open-mid ɛ œ ɜ ɞ ʌ ɔ Near-open æ ɐ Open a ɶ ä ɑ ɒ
IPA help  audio full chart template Legend: unrounded • rounded

Features

• Its vowel height is open, also known as low, which means the tongue is positioned far from the roof of the mouth – that is, low in the mouth.
• Its vowel backness is back, which means the tongue is positioned back in the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant.
• Its place of articulation is pharyngeal, which means it is articulated with the tongue root against the back of the throat (the pharynx).
• It is rounded, which means that the lips are rounded rather than spread or relaxed.

Occurrence

Language		Word	IPA	Meaning	Notes
Afrikaans	Standard[2]	daar	[dɒːr]	'there'	Fully back. Used by some speakers, particularly young female speakers of northern accents. Other speakers use an unrounded vowel [ɑː ~ ɑ̟ː].[2] See Afrikaans phonology
Assamese		কৰ (kor)	[kɒ̹ɹ]	'to do'	An "over-rounded" [ɒ̹], with rounding as strong as that for [u].[3] May also be transcribed [ɔ].
Bulgarian	Some Rhodopean dialects	мъж (măž)	[ˈmɒʃʲ]	'man'	Found as the unification of the Proto-Slavic *ǫ, *ę, *ъ and *ь. Standard Bulgarian has /ɤ̞/ for *ǫ and *ъ and /ɛ/ for *ę and *ь.
Dutch	Some dialects[4]	bot	[bɒt]	'bone'	Some non-Randstad dialects,[4] for example those of Den Bosch and Groningen. It is open-mid [ɔ] in standard Dutch.
English	South African[5]	not	[nɒ̜̈t]	'not'	Near-back and weakly rounded.[5] Some younger speakers of the General variety may actually have a higher and fully unrounded vowel [ʌ̈].[5] See South African English phonology
	Conservative Received Pronunciation[6]		[nɒt]		Somewhat raised. Contemporary RP speakers pronounce a closer vowel [ɔ]. It is proposed that the /ɒ/ vowel of Conservative RP, which is normally described as a rounded vowel, is pronounced by some speakers without rounded lips for whom the characteristic quality is rather one of sulcality.[7] See English phonology
	Northern English[8]				May be somewhat raised and fronted.[8]
	Canadian[9]				Lot and thought have the same vowel in Canadian English; see cot–caught merger.
		thought	[θɒt]ⓘ	'thought'
	General American				Vowel /ɔ(:)/ is lowered (phonetic realization of /ɔ(:)/ is much lower in GA than in RP). However, "Short o" before r before a vowel (a short o sound followed by r and then another vowel, as in orange, forest, moral, and warrant) is realized as [oɹ~ɔɹ].
	Inland Northern American[10]				See Northern cities vowel shift
	Indian[11]		[t̪ʰɒʈ]		/ɒ/ and /ɔː/ differ entirely by length in Indian English.
	Welsh[12][13]		[θɒːt]		Open-mid in Cardiff; may merge with /oː/ in northern dialects.
German	Many speakers[14]	Gourmand	[ɡ̊ʊʁˈmɒ̃ː]	'gourmand'	Nasalized; common phonetic realization of /ɑ̃ː/.[14] See Standard German phonology
	Many Swiss dialects[15]	maane	[ˈmɒːnə]	'remind'	The example word is from the Zurich dialect, in which [ɒː] is in free variation with the unrounded [ɑː].[16]
Istro-Romanian[17]		cåp	[kɒp]	'head'	See Istro-Romanian pronunciation (in Romanian).
Jeju[18]		ᄒᆞ나 (haona)	[hɒna]	'one'	See Jeju phonology
Malay	Kedah	tua	[tu.ɒ]	'old'	Northern Kedah subdialect/dialect. Allophone of /a/ in word-final position in open-ended words and close-ended words that end with a glottal stop /ʔ/ or a glottal fricative /h/.
Mansi	Central/Northern	ам	[ɒm]	'me'	The pronunciation of 'a' sometimes varies between /ɒ/ and /o/.
Neapolitan[19]	Vastese	uâʃtə	[uˈwɒʃtə]	'Vasto'
Norwegian	Dialects along the Swedish border[20]	hat	[hɒ̜ːt]	'hate'	Weakly rounded and fully back.[20] See Norwegian phonology
Persian		ف‍‍ارسی (fârsi)	[fɒːɾˈsiː]	'Persian'
Brazilian Portuguese	Carioca	ova	[ˈɒːva]	'fish roe'	Allophone of /ɔ/. See Portuguese phonology
Slovak	Some speakers[21]	a	[ɒ]	'and'	Under Hungarian influence, some speakers realize the short /a/ as rounded.[21] See Slovak phonology
Swedish	Gothenburg[22]	jag	[jɒːɡ]	'I'	More rounded than in Central Standard Swedish.[22]
Uzbek	Standard[23]	choy	[t͡ʃɒj]	'tea'

Near-open back rounded vowel

Near-open back rounded vowel
ɒ̝
ɔ̞

In some languages there is the near-open back rounded vowel (a sound between cardinal ⟨ɒ⟩ and ⟨ɔ⟩), which can be transcribed in IPA with [ɒ̝] or [ɔ̞].

Features

• Its vowel height is near-open, also known as near-low, which means the tongue is positioned similarly to an open vowel, but is slightly more constricted – that is, the tongue is positioned similarly to a low vowel, but slightly higher.
• Its vowel backness is back, which means the tongue is positioned back in the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant.
• Its place of articulation is pharyngeal, which means it is articulated with the tongue root against the back of the throat (the pharynx).
• It is rounded, which means that the lips are rounded rather than spread or relaxed.

Occurrence

Language		Word	IPA	Meaning	Notes
Catalan	Balearic (except Ibizan)[24][25]	dones	[ˈd̪ɔ̞nəs̺]	'women'	Main realization of /ɔ/ (also represented as /ɒ/). May be unrounded [ɑ] in Majorcan and some Southern Valencian dialects. See Catalan phonology
	Valencian (general pronunciation)[24][25]		[ˈd̪ɔ̞nes̺]
	Valencian (some speakers)[26]	taula	[ˈt̪ɑwɫɔ̞̈]	'table'	Can be realized as unrounded and/or fronted.
Dutch	Leiden[27]	bad	[bɒ̝t]	'bath'	Near-open fully back; may be unrounded [ɑ̝] instead.[27] It corresponds to [ɑ] in standard Dutch.
	Rotterdam[27]
Hungarian	Standard[28]	magyar	[ˈmɒ̜̽ɟɒ̜̽r]	'Hungarian'	Somewhat fronted and raised, with only slight rounding; sometimes transcribed in IPA with ⟨ɔ⟩. Unrounded [ɑ] in some dialects.[29] See Hungarian phonology
Ibibio[30]		dọ	[dɒ̝́]	'marry'	Near-open;[30] typically transcribed in IPA with ⟨ɔ⟩.
Irish	Ulster[31]	ólann	[ɒ̝ːɫ̪ən̪ˠ]	'(he) drinks'	Near-open;[31] may be transcribed in IPA with ⟨ɔː⟩.
Lehali[32]		dön̄	[ⁿdɒ̝ŋ]	'yam'	Raised vowel, being the back rounded counterpart of /æ/ in a symmetrical vowel inventory.[32]
Lemerig[33]		‘ān̄sār	[ʔɒ̝ŋsɒ̝r]	'person'	Raised vowel, being the back rounded counterpart of /æ/ in a symmetrical vowel inventory.[33]
Limburgish	Maastrichtian[34]	plaots	[plɒ̝ːts]	'place'	Near-open fully back; typically transcribed in IPA with ⟨ɔː⟩.[34] Corresponds to [ɔː] in other dialects.
Norwegian	Urban East[35][36]	topp	[tʰɒ̝pː]	'top'	Near-open,[35][36] also described as close-mid back [o].[37] Typically transcribed in IPA with ⟨ɔ⟩. See Norwegian phonology
Swedish	Central Standard[38][22]	ska	[s̪kɒ̝͑ː]ⓘ	'be going to'	Near-open fully back weakly rounded vowel.[38] Typically transcribed in IPA with ⟨ɑː⟩. See Swedish phonology
Yoruba[39]		itọju	[itɒ̝ju]	'care'	Near-open; most often transcribed in IPA with ⟨ɔ⟩.

See also

• Turned a
• Index of phonetics articles