The voiced labiodental fricative is a type of consonantal sound used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ⟨v⟩, and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is v
.
Voiced labiodental fricative | |
---|---|
v | |
IPA Number | 129 |
Audio sample | |
source · help | |
Encoding | |
Entity (decimal) | v |
Unicode (hex) | U+0076 |
X-SAMPA | v |
Braille |
The sound is similar to voiced alveolar fricative /z/ in that it is familiar to most European speakers[citation needed] but is a fairly uncommon sound cross-linguistically, occurring in approximately 21.1% of languages.[1] Moreover, most languages that have /z/ also have /v/ and similarly to /z/, the overwhelming majority of languages with [v] are languages of Europe, Africa, or Western Asia, although the similar labiodental approximant /ʋ/ is also common in India. The presence of [v] and absence of [w], is a very distinctive areal feature of European languages and those of adjacent areas of Siberia and Central Asia.[citation needed] Speakers of East Asian languages that lack this sound may pronounce it as [b] (Korean and Japanese), or [f]/[w] (Cantonese and Mandarin), and thus be unable to distinguish between a number of English minimal pairs.[citation needed]
In certain languages, such as Danish,[2] Faroese,[3] Icelandic or Norwegian[4] the voiced labiodental fricative is in a free variation with the labiodental approximant.
Features of the voiced labiodental fricative:
Language | Word | IPA | Meaning | Notes | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Abkhaz | европа | [evˈropʼa] | 'Europe' | See Abkhaz phonology | |
Afrikaans | wees | [vɪəs] | 'to be' | See Afrikaans phonology | |
Albanian | valixhe | [vaˈlidʒɛ] | 'case' | ||
Arabic | Algerian[5] | كاڥي | [kavi] | 'ataxy' | See Arabic phonology |
Hejazi | فيروس | [vajˈruːs] | 'virus' | Only used in loanwords, transcribed and pronounced as [f] by many speakers. | |
Siirt[5] | ذهب | [vaˈhab] | 'gold' | See Arabic phonology | |
Armenian | Eastern[6] | վեց | 'six' | ||
Assyrian | ܟܬܒ̣ܐ ctava | [ctaːva] | 'book' | Only in the Urmia dialects. [ʋ] is also predominantly used. Corresponds to [w] in the other varieties. | |
Bai | Dali | ? | [ŋv˩˧] | 'fish' | |
Bulgarian | вода | [voda] | 'water' | See Bulgarian phonology | |
Catalan | Alguerese[7] | vell | [ˈveʎ] | 'old' | See Catalan phonology |
Balearic[8] [7] | |||||
Southern Catalonia[9] | |||||
Valencian[9][7] | |||||
Chechen | вашa / vaşa | [vaʃa] | 'brother' | ||
Chinese | Wu | 饭 | [vɛ] | 'cooked rice' | |
Sichuanese | 五 | [vu˥˧] | 'five' | Corresponds to /w/ in standard Mandarin. | |
Czech | voda | [ˈvodä] | 'water' | See Czech phonology | |
Danish | Standard[10] | véd | [ve̝ːˀð̠˕ˠ] | 'know(s)' | Most often an approximant [ʋ].[2] See Danish phonology |
Dutch | All dialects | wraak | [vraːk] | 'revenge' | Allophone of /ʋ/ before /r/. See Dutch phonology |
Most dialects | vreemd | [vreːmt] | 'strange' | Often devoiced to [f] by speakers from the Netherlands. See Dutch phonology | |
Standard[11] | |||||
English | All dialects | valve | [citation needed] | 'valve' | See English phonology |
African American[12] | breathe | [bɹiːv] | 'breathe' | Does not occur word-initially. See th-fronting | |
Cockney[13] | [bɹəi̯v] | ||||
Esperanto | vundo | [ˈvundo] | 'wound' | See Esperanto phonology | |
Ewe[14] | evlo | [évló] | 'he is evil' | ||
Faroese[3] | veður | [ˈveːʋuɹ] | 'speech' | Word-initial allophone of /v/, in free variation with an approximant [ʋ].[3] See Faroese phonology | |
French[15] | valve | [valv] | 'valve' | See French phonology | |
Georgian[16] | ვიწრო | [ˈvitsʼɾo] | 'narrow' | ||
German | Wächter | [ˈvɛçtɐ] | 'guard' | See Standard German phonology | |
Greek | βερνίκι verníki | [ve̞rˈnici] | 'varnish' | See Modern Greek phonology | |
Hebrew | גב | [ɡav] | 'back' | See Modern Hebrew phonology | |
Hindi[17] | व्रत | [vrət̪] | 'fast' | See Hindustani phonology | |
Hungarian | veszély | [vɛseːj] | 'danger' | See Hungarian phonology | |
Irish | bhaile | [vaːlə] | 'home' | See Irish phonology | |
Italian[18] | avare | [aˈvare] | 'miserly' (f. pl.) | See Italian phonology | |
Judaeo-Spanish | mueve | [ˈmwɛvɛ] | 'nine' | ||
Kabardian | вагъуэ / vağue / ۋاغوە | 'star' | Corresponds to [ʒʷ] in Adyghe | ||
Macedonian | вода | [vɔda] | 'water' | See Macedonian phonology | |
Maltese | iva | [iva] | 'yes' | ||
Norwegian | Urban East[4] | venn | [ve̞nː] | 'friend' | Allophone of /ʋ/ before a pause and in emphatic speech.[4] See Norwegian phonology |
Occitan | Auvergnat | vol | [vɔl] | 'flight' | See Occitan phonology |
Limousin | |||||
Provençal | |||||
Persian | Western | ورزش | [værzeʃ] | 'sport' | See Persian phonology |
Polish[19] | wór | 'bag' | See Polish phonology | ||
Portuguese[20] | vila | [ˈvilɐ] | 'town' | See Portuguese phonology | |
Romanian | val | [väl] | 'wave' | See Romanian phonology | |
Russian[21][22] | волосы | [ˈvʷo̞ɫ̪əs̪ɨ̞] | 'hair' | Contrasts with palatalized form; may be an approximant [ʋ] instead.[22] See Russian phonology | |
Serbo-Croatian | voda | [vɔ'da] | 'water' | See Serbo-Croatian phonology | |
Slovak[23] | vzrast | [vzräst] | 'height' | Appears only in syllable onset before voiced obstruents; the usual realization of /v/ is an approximant [ʋ].[23] See Slovak phonology | |
Slovene[24] | Standard | filozof gre | [filoˈz̪ôːv ˈɡɾěː] | 'philosopher goes' | Allophone of /f/ before voiced consonants.[24] See Slovene phonology |
Some dialects | voda | [ˈvɔ̀ːd̪á] | 'water' | Instead of /ʋ/. See Slovene phonology | |
Spanish[25][26] | afgano | [ävˈɣ̞äno̞] | 'Afghan' | Allophone of /f/ before voiced consonants. See Spanish phonology | |
Swedish | vägg | [ˈvɛɡː] | 'wall' | See Swedish phonology | |
Turkish[27] | vade | [väːˈd̪ɛ] | 'due date' | The main allophone of /v/; realized as bilabial [β ~ β̞] in certain contexts.[27] See Turkish phonology | |
Tyap | vak | [vag] | 'road' | ||
Urdu | ورزش | [vəɾzɪʃ] | ‘exercise’ | See Hindustani phonology | |
Vietnamese[28] | và | [vaː˨˩] | 'and' | In southern dialects, is in free variation with [j]. See Vietnamese phonology | |
West Frisian | weevje | [ˈʋeɪ̯vjə] | 'to weave' | Never occurs in word-initial positions. See West Frisian phonology | |
Welsh | fi | [vi] | 'I' | See Welsh phonology | |
Yi | ꃶ/vu | [vu˧] | 'intestines' |