User:Bukkia/sandboxVIII

Vowels

There are 9 vocalic phonemes, which display other forms of distinction:

IPA						Transcription
[i]	[iː]			[u]	[uː]	i	ī			u	ū
[ʏ]						ü
										ō
[ɛ]	[œ]	[œː]				ɛ	ö	ő
[æ]						ä
		[aː]						ā

3 vowels have a short form and a long form: [i] - [iː], [u] - [uː], and [œ] - [œː]. However, length is not deemed by the speakers as a distinctive feature of the same phoneme. These pairs are regarded as four fully independent phonemes, thus bringing the amount of distinguished vowels to 12.

The vowels [aː] and [oː] are only long. The imbalance between the amount of front and back vowels is easily noticeable.