Modern Standard Imperial

Phonology

Phonemic Inventory

Consonants

POA	Labials	Dentals	Palatals	Velars	Gutturals
Fortis stops	p /p/	t /t/	c /tS/	k /k/	q /q/
Lenis stops	b /b/	d /d/	j /dZ/	g /g/
Fortis fricatives	ph /f/	th /T/	ch /C/	kh /x/	qh /H\/
Lenis fricatives	f /f/	s /s/	ç /C/	x /x/	gh /<\/
Nasals	m /m/	n /n/
Liquids		l /l/			r /R/
Glides	(u) /w/		(i) /j/	(u) /w/

Vowels

POA	Front Short	Front Long	Front Rounded	Near-Front Long	Central Short	Central Long	Near-Back Long	Back Short	Back Long
Close	i /i/	ī /i:/	ue /y:/					u /u/	ū /u:/
Near-close				īh /I:/			ūh /U:/
Close-Mid		ē /e:/						ō /o:/
Mid
Open-Mid	e /E/	ēh /E:/	oe /2:/				o /O/	ōh /O:/
Near-Open
Open				a /a/	ā /a:/	ā /A:/

Phonetic Realization and Allophonic Variation

Consonants

• Most consonants have different allophones for initial, intervocalic, and coda situations:

Orthography	Initial	Intervocalic	Coda
p	[p_h]	[b]	[p_}]
b	[b_<]	[B]	[p_}]
ph	[f]	[f]	[f]
t	[t_h]	[d]	[t_}]
d	[d_<]	[D]	[t_}]
c	[tS_h]	[tS]	[k_}]
j	[dZ]	[dZ]	[k_}]
k	[k_h]	[g]	[k_}]
g	[g_<]	[G]	[k_}]
q	[q]	[?]	[?]
f	[f]	[v]	[v]
s	[s]	[z]	[h]
m	[m]	[~B]	[~B]
n	[n]	[~D]	[~]
l	[l]	[l, 5]	[l, 5, U]
r	[R]	[4]	[6]

• Intervocalic geminates de-geminate but undergo no further lenition.
• Note that <ph> is distinguished from <f> in all but initial position.
• All other consonants are the same in all positions.
• The voiced fricative allophones of the lenis stops may or may not have actual frication
• /m/ and /n/ are realized intervocalically like /b/ and /d/, but with nasalization of the preceding vowel

Vowels

• Short vowels are lax before two consonants, or a consonant and a word-boundary. The lax allophones of /i e A o u/ are [I E a O U].
• Long vowels are realized phonetically short word-finally, and before a cluster containing a fortis phoneme; the short vowels are reduced in these environments
• The reduced vowels differ by region, but the Capital Region has /i e a/->[@] and /u o/->[U]

Neutralizations

The three-way distinction between short, long lax, long tense vowels is neutralized before /r/, /l/, and /n/:

Vowel	_/r/	_/l/	_/n/
i	[I6]	[I@l], [IU]	I~(:)
e	[E6], [E:]	[E@l], [EU]	E~(:)
a	[A:]	[Q:l], [O:]	a~(:)
o	[O:]	[O:l], [O:]	O~(:)
u	[U6]	[U@l], [U:]	U~(:)
/y: 2:/	[3:]	[3:l], [8U]	I~(:)