Close-mid back rounded vowel

The close-mid back 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 o, and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is o.

Features

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

Occurrence

Language		Word	IPA	Meaning	Notes
Catalan		sóc	[sok]	'I am'	See Catalan phonology
Dutch		kool		'cabbage'	See Dutch phonology
English	Australian	caught		'caught'	See Australian English phonology
	New Zealand				See English phonology
	GA	row		'row'	May also be diphthongized to [oʊ]
Estonian		tool		'chair'
Faroese		tosa		'speak'
French		réseau		'net'	See French phonology
German		Kohl		'cabbage'	See German phonology
Hungarian		kór		'disease'	See Hungarian phonology
Icelandic		bók		'book'
Italian		foro		'hole'	See Italian phonology
Korean		보수/bosu		'salary'	See Korean phonology
Norwegian		lov		'law'	See Norwegian phonology
Silesian		Ślůnsk		'Silesia'
Portuguese		sou	[so]	'I am'	See Portuguese phonology
Swedish		åka		'travel, go'	See Swedish phonology
Vietnamese		tô		'soup, bowl'	See Vietnamese phonology

Mid back rounded vowel

Many languages, such as Spanish and Japanese, have a mid back rounded vowel, which to speakers is clearly distinct from both the close-mid and open-mid vowels. However, since no language is known to distinguish all three, there is no separate IPA symbol for the mid vowel, and [o] is generally used. If precision is desired, the lowering diacritic may be used: [o̞].

Note that just because a language has only one non-close, non-open back vowel, that doesn't mean it's a cardinal mid vowel. The Sulawesian language Tukang Besi, for example, has a close-mid [o], whereas the Moluccan language Taba has an open-mid [ɔ]; in neither language does this contrast with another open/close-mid vowel.

Occurrence

In the following transcriptions, the lowering diacritic has been omitted for the sake of simplicity.

Language		Word	IPA	Meaning	Notes
Croatian		kolodvor		'railway station'
English	Yorkshire	coat		'coat'	Corresponds to /əʊ/ in other British dialects. See English phonology
Finnish		koloon		'into hole'	See Finnish phonology
Hebrew		שלום	[ʃalom]	'peace'	Hebrew vowels are not shown in the script, see Niqqud and Hebrew phonology
Greek		ωκεανός		'ocean'	See Modern Greek phonology
Japanese		日本/nihon		'Japan'	See Japanese phonology
Korean		보리/bori		'barley'	See Korean phonology
Romanian		copil		'child'	See Romanian phonology
Russian		сухой		'dry'	See Russian phonology
Spanish		todo	[ˈt̪oð̞o]	'all'	See Spanish phonology
Turkish		kol	[koɫ]	'arm'	See Turkish phonology
Ukrainian		поїзд		'train'	See Ukrainian phonology

References

Bibliography