Ukrainian phonology

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This article deals with the phonology of the Ukrainian language.

Contents 1 Vowels 2 Consonants 2.1 Consonant assimilation 3 Historical phonological changes 4 References 5 Bibliography

[edit] Vowels

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i		u
N-close	ɪ
Mid	ɛ		ɔ
Open		ɑ

There is no consensus among specialists in Ukrainian phonology about the main allophones or phonemic representation of the non-high vowels.^[1] This article will use /ɛ ɔ ɑ/ thouigh /e o a/ have also been used.

[edit] Consonants

Place of articulation →	Labial		Coronal			Dorsal		(none)
Manner of articulation ↓	Bilabial	Labio- dental	Dental/ Alveolar	Palatalized Alveolar	Post- alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Nasal	m		n̪	nʲ
Plosive	p b		t̪ d̪	tʲ dʲ			k ɡ
Affricate			t͡s d͡z	t͡sʲ d͡zʲ	t͡ʂ d͡ʐ
Fricative		f	s z	sʲ zʲ	ʂ ʐ		x	ɦ
Approximant	w		l	lʲ		j
Trill			r	rʲ

When consonants appear in pairs, the one to the left is voiceless and the one to the right voiced. While /x/ and /ɦ/ do not share a place of articulation, phonologically speaking they are a voiceless-voiced pair.

Ukrainian consonants can be plain (Ukrainian: тверді - hard), palatalized (Ukrainian: м’які - soft), or semi-palatalized (Ukrainian: пом’якшені - softened, or Ukrainian: напівм’які - half-soft). They are always plain when followed by /ɪ/ and are always either palatalized or semi-palatalized when followed by /i/.

• /j/ is always "soft".
• Dental and alveolar consonants can be either plain or palatalized and are considered distinct phonemes. Palatalized consonants (except /rʲ/) can occur before vowels, before other consonants and at the end of the word, /rʲ/ can occur only before vowels.
• Remaining consonants can be either plain or semi-palatalized. Semi-palatalized consonants are considered allophones of their plain versions. Semi-palatalization occurs only before vowels. In native words this is further restricted to when before /i/; also before /ɑ/ and /u/ when geminated or preceded by another consonant other than /r/.

Gemination may occur:

• Between vowels for palatalized alveolar consonants (other than /rʲ/), and semi-palatalized allophones of postalveolar consonants.
• Between vowels across prefix-root or root-root boundaries for other coronal consonants as a result of their coincidence. In this case /w/+/w/ form [u̯w].
• At the start of the word for forms of the verb лити (ллю /lʲːu/, ллєш /lʲːɛʂ/, etc.), the verb ссати /sːɑtɪ/ and derivatives.
• In other cases for /n/.

When two or more consonants occur word-finally, then a vowel is epenthesized under the following conditions.^[2] Given a consonantal grouping C₁(ь)C₂(ь), where C is any consonant. The vowel is inserted between the two consonants and after the ь. A vowel is only inserted if C₂ is either /k/, /w/, /l/, /m/, /r/, or /ts/. In this case:

1. If C₁ is either /w/, /ɦ/, /k/, or /x/, then the epenthisized vowel is always [o]
   1. No vowel is epenthesized if the /w/ is derived from a Common Slavic vocalic *l, for example, /wowk/ (see below)
2. If C₂ is /l/, /m/, /r/, or /ts/, then the vowel is /ɛ/.
3. The combinations, /-stw/ /-sk/ are not broken up
4. If the C₁ is /j/ (й), then the above rules can apply. However, both forms (with and without the fill vowel) often exist

Ukrainian, like Russian, has a non-syllabic [i̯] as an allophone of /j/. It also has a non-syllabic [u̯] as an allophone of /w/. Moreover, due to their semi-vocalic nature these sounds alternate with the vowel phonemes /i/ and /u/ respectively, the latter being used at the absolute beginning of a phrase, after a pause or after a consonant and the former following a vowel and preceding a consonant (cluster), either within a word or at a word boundary:

він іде /win idɛ/ ('he's coming')

вона йде /wɔnɑ jdɛ/ ('she's coming')

він і вона /win i wɔnɑ/ ('he and she')

вона й він /wɔnɑ j win/ ('she and he');

Утомився вже /utɔmɪwsʲɑ wʐɛ/ ('already gotten tired')

Уже втомився /uʐɛ wtɔmɪwsʲɑ/ ('already gotten tired')

Він утомився. /win utɔmɪwsʲɑ/ ('he's gotten tired')

Він у хаті. /win u xɑtʲi/ ('he's inside the house')

Вона в хаті. /wɔnɑ w xɑtʲi/ ('she's inside the house')

підучити /pidut͡ʂɪtɪ/ ('to learn')

вивчити /wɪwt͡ʂɪtɪ/ ('to learn')

This feature distinguishes Ukrainian phonology remarkably from Russian and Polish, two related languages with many cognates.

[edit] Consonant assimilation

Voiceless obstruents are voiced when preceding voiced ones, but the reverse is not true.^[3]

• [nɑʂ] ('our')
• [nɑʐdʲid] ('our grandfather')

• [bɛrɛzɑ] ('birch')
• [bɛrɛzkɑ] ('small birch')

The exceptions are the words легко, вогко, нігті, кігті, дьогтю, дігтяр, and derivatives where /ɦ/ may be devoiced to [h], or even its phonological voiceless counterpart [x]. Prefixes ending in /z/ may be devoiced before voiceless obstruents, especially in fast speech.

Affricates are not formed across prefix-root, or root-root boundaries, or across word boundaries, however they are formed across left boundaries of suffixes /sʲk/ and /stw/.

Sibilant consonants (including affricates) in clusters assimilate place of articulation and palatalization state of the last segment in a cluster. The most common case of such assimilation is verbal ending -шся where |ʂsʲɑ| assimilates into /sʲːɑ/. This assimilation is specific to morpheme boundaries because such clusters don't occur within one morpheme.

[edit] Historical phonological changes

In the Ukrainian language, the following sound changes have occurred between the Common Slavic period and current Ukrainian:

1. In a newly closed syllable, that is, a syllable that ends in a consonant, Common Slavic *o and *e mutated into *i if the next vowel was one of the yers (*ĭ/ь or *ŭ/ъ).
2. Pleophony: The Common Slavic combinations, CoLC and CeLC, where L is either *r or *l become in Ukrainian
   1. CorC gives CoroC (Common Slavic *borda gives Ukrainian boroda)
   2. ColC gives ColoC (Common Slavic *bolto gives Ukrainian boloto)
   3. CerC gives CereC (Common Slavic *berza gives Ukrainian bereza)
   4. CelC gives ColoC (Common Slavic *melko gives Ukrainian moloko)
3. The Common Slavic nasal vowel *ę is reflected as /jɑ/; a preceding labial consonant generally was not palatalized after this, and after a postalveolar it became /ɑ/ Examples: Common Slavic *pętĭ became Ukrainian /pjɑt/ (п’ять); Common Slavic *telę became Ukrainian /tɛlʲjɑ/; and Common Slavic *kurčę became Ukrainian /kurtʂɑ/.
4. Common Slavic *ě (Cyrillic ѣ), generally became Ukrainian /i/ except:
   1. word-initially, where it became /ji/: Common Slavic *ěsti became Ukrainian /jistɪ/
   2. after the post-alveolar sibilants where it became /ɑ/: Common Slavic *ležěti became Ukrainian /lɛʐɑtɪ/
5. Common Slavic *i and *y are both reflected in Ukrainian as /ɪ/
6. The Common Slavic combination -CǐjV, where V is any vowel, became -CʲCʲV, except
   1. if C is labial or /r/ where it became -CjV
   2. if V is the Common Slavic *e, then the vowel in Ukrainian mutated to /ɑ/, e.g., Common Slavic *žitĭje became Ukrainian /ʐɪttjɑ/
   3. if V is Common Slavic *ĭ, then the combination became /ɛj/, e.g., genitive plural in Common Slavic *myšĭjĭ became Ukrainian /mɪʂɛj/
   4. if one or more consonants precede C then there is no doubling of the consonants in Ukrainian
7. Sometime around the early thirteenth century, the voiced velar plosive lenited to [ɣ] (except in the cluster *zg).^[4] Within a century, /g/ was reintroduced from Western European loanwords and, around the sixteenth century, [ɣ] debuccalized to [ɦ].^[5]
8. Common Slavic combinations *dl and *tl were simplified to /l/, for example, Common Slavic *mydlo became Ukrainian /mɪlo/
9. Common Slavic *ǔl (vocalic *l̥) and *ǐl (vocalic ĺ̥) became /ow/, while word-final *lǔ became /w/. For example, Common Slavic *vĺ̥kǔ became /wowk/ in Ukrainian.

[edit] References

[edit] Bibliography

• Ukrainian IPA by Tonia Bilous, Весна, December 05, 2005, retrieved December 05, 2005 (Ukrainian language: UkrIPA.pdf, UkrIPA.doc)
• Mascaró, Joan; Wetzels, W. Leo (2001), "The Typology of Voicing and Devoicing", Language 77(2): 207–244 
• Shevelov, George Y. (1977), "On the Chronology of h and the New g in Ukrainian", in Harvard Ukrainian Studies, vol 1, Cambridge: Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute, pp. 137–52 
• Zilyns'kyj, I. (1979). A Phonetic Description of the Ukrainian Language.. Harvard University Press. ISBN 0-674-66612-7. .

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