Help:IPA/Introduction: Difference between revisions

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* '''Consonants''': IPA consonants are mostly intuitive to an English speaker, with the same letter used for the same sound. Thus you already know {{IPA|/b, d, f, ɡ, h, k, l, m, n, p, r, s, t, v, w, z/}}, as long as you remember that these each have a single sound. For example, {{IPA|/ɡ/}} always represents the sound of ''get,'' never of ''gem,'' and {{IPA|/s/}} always the sound of ''so,'' never of ''rose''. The letter which most confuses people is {{IPA|/j/}}, which has its Central-European values, a ''y'' sound as in the ''j'' in English ''[[wiktionary:hallelujah|hallelujah]]''. Two English consonant sounds, ''ch'' in ''chair'' and ''j'' in ''jump'', are transcribed with two IPA letters apiece, {{IPA|/tʃ/}} and {{IPA|/dʒ/}}. The English digraphs ''ch, ng, qu, sh, th'' are not used. See and hear also [[IPA pulmonic consonant chart with audio|consonant audio chart]].

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== Vowels ==

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The second purpose concerns only linguists. The first purpose concerns any interested reader, but only to a limited degree, as transcribing words into IPA does not need to be perfect or overly [[Phonetic transcription#Narrow versus broad transcription|precise]] (something for fluent IPA users to consider). The word "transcribe" is used to distinguish this from normal writing or spelling, which has other purposes (such as preserving word etymologies and meaning).

IPA is complex enough to represent nearly anything, but high-fidelity transcriptions will use glyphs that are unfamiliar to English readers and unpracticed in English [[phonology]]. For example a transcription of something like the Icelandic name ''[[Eyjafjallajökull]]'' is pronounced {{IPA-|is|ˈeiːjaˌfjatl̥aˌjœːkʏtl̥||Is-Eyjafjallajökull (3).oga}}, meaning ''island-mountain glacier,'' may approximate Icelandic phonology, but such information will likely be too much for English readers, who may need to reference the name using what is at best an approximate pronunciation anyway. (Often an English version of a foreign name will try to employ translation in combination with partial transcription, but this often stays unnecessarily close to the original spelling and therefore prevents English speakers from using sounds they can easily produce. For example ''Eyja-fjalla glacier'' (['eija-f'jala] ''glacier'') is a sufficiently close approximation, but ''Eyja-fjatla glacier'' (['eija-f'jatla] ''glacier'') would be closer and still easy to pronounce.)

== Notes ==