A voiced uvular fricative is a type of consonantal sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is , an inverted small uppercase letter , or in broad transcription if rhotic. This consonant is one of the several collectively called guttural R when found in European languages.
A voiced uvular approximant is also found interchangeably with the fricative, and may also be transcribed as . Because the IPA symbol stands for the uvular fricative, the approximant may be specified by adding the downtack: , though some writings use a superscript , which is not an official IPA practice.
For a voiced pre-uvular fricative (also called post-velar), see voiced velar fricative.
Features
Features of a voiced uvular fricative:
In many languages it is closer to an approximant, however, and no language distinguishes the two at the uvular articulation.
Occurrence
In Western Europe, a uvular trill pronunciation of rhotic consonants spread from northern French to several dialects and registers of Basque, Catalan, Danish, Dutch, German, Judaeo-Spanish, Norwegian, Occitan, Portuguese, Swedish, some variants of Low Saxon, and Yiddish. However, not all of them remain a uvular trill today.
In Brazilian Portuguese, it is usually a velar fricative (, ), voiceless uvular fricative , or glottal transition (, ), except in southern Brazil, where alveolar and uvular trills as well as the voiced uvular fricative predominate. Because such uvular rhotics often do not contrast with alveolar ones, IPA transcriptions may often use to represent them for ease of typesetting. For more information, see guttural R.
note, "There is... a complication in the case of uvular fricatives in that the shape of the vocal tract may be such that the uvula vibrates."
It is also present in most Turkic languages, except for Turkish, and in Caucasian languages. It may also occur as .
{| class="wikitable"
! colspan="2" | Language !! Word !! IPA!! Meaning !! Notes
|-
| colspan="2" | Abkhaz || / |||| 'marten'|| See Abkhaz phonology
|-
| colspan="2" | Adyghe || / / |||| 'sun'||
|-
| Afrikaans || Parts of the former Cape Province || || || 'red' || May be a trill instead. See Afrikaans phonology
|-
|Albanian
|Arbëresh
Some Moresian accents
|vëlla
|
|'brother'
|May be pronounced as a normal double l. Sometimes, the guttural r is present in words starting with g in some dialects.
|-
| Aleut ||Atkan dialect|| || ||'to wash'||
|-
| Arabic || Modern Standard || / || || 'room' || Mostly transcribed as , may be velar, post-velar or uvular, depending on dialect. See Arabic phonology
|-
| colspan="2" | Archi|| / || || 'croak' || Pharyngealized.
|-
| colspan="2" | Armenian || / || || 'rudder' ||
|-
| colspan="2" | Asturian|||| ||'cat'||Allophone of . May be an approximant. See IPA/Astur-Leonese
|-
| colspan="2" | Avar|| / / |||| 'cap'||
|-
|Azerbaijani
|Southern dialects such as in Maragha, Malekan, Binab, Ajab shir and Leylan counties of East Azerbaijan, and Chaharburj, Miyandoab alongside Baruq in West Azerbaijan
|yeralma / یئرآلما
|
|'potato'
|Unlike many of Turkic dialects that have solely adapted the pronunciation of <r> into a voiced alveolar trill, these dialects often use voiced uvular fricative or they might use close-mid back unrounded vowel almost entirely in their speeches as an equivalent of r. it also has to be noted that this is not the same as voiced velar fricative which is to be resembled with ğ.
|-
| colspan="2" | Bashkir || / / || || 'nine' ||
|-
|Basque|| Northern dialects|| || || 'gold' ||
|-
| colspan="2" | Chilcotin || || ||'he walks'||
|-
| Danish || Standard || || || 'red' || Most often an approximant when initial. In other positions, it can be either a fricative (also described as voiceless ) or an approximant. It can be a fricative trill in word-initial positions when emphasizing a word. See Danish phonology
|-
| rowspan="6" | Dutch || Belgian Limburg || rowspan="6" | || rowspan="6" | || rowspan="6" | 'wheel' || rowspan="6" | Either a fricative or an approximant. Realization of varies considerably among dialects. See Dutch phonology
|-
| Central Netherlands
|-
| East Flanders || rowspan="5" | || rowspan="5" | || rowspan="5" | 'red' || rowspan="2" | Not all speakers. || Corresponds to in other dialects of English in Ireland.
|-
| Northumbrian || Described both as a fricative || rowspan="3" | || rowspan="2" | || rowspan="3" | 'rust' || rowspan="2" | Either a fricative or, more often, an approximant. In free variation with a uvular trill. See Standard German phonology
|-
| Lower Rhine || || An approximant.
|-
| Inuktitut ||East Inuktitut dialect|| || ||'two'||
|-
| Italian || Some speakers || || || 'rare' || Rendition alternative to the standard Italian alveolar trill , due to individual orthoepic defects and/or regional variations that make the alternative sound more prevalent, notably in Alto Adige (bordering with German-speaking Austria), Val d'Aosta (bordering with France) and in parts of the Parma province, more markedly around Fidenza. Other alternative sounds may be a uvular trill or a labiodental approximant . See Italian phonology.
|-
| colspan="2" | Kabardian|| / / |||| 'eagle'||
|-
| colspan="2" | Kabyle|| / / |||| 'to dive'||
|-
| colspan="2" | Kazakh|| / /
|||| 'to you'||
|-
| colspan="2" | Kyrgyz|| / / |||| 'rain'||
|-
| colspan="2" | Lakota|| || || 'bread'||
|-
| colspan="2" | Luxembourgish || || || 'Parmesan' || Appears as an allophone of between a vowel and a voiced consonant and as an allophone of between a back vowel and another vowel (back or otherwise). A minority of speakers use it as the only consonantal variety of (in a complementary distribution with ), also where it is trilled in the standard language. See Luxembourgish phonology
|-
| rowspan="2" |Malay
|Kedah
|ramai
|
|'many'
|Corresponds to prevocalic and intervocalic Standard Malay . Word-finally, Standard Malay corresponds to in Kedah Malay. See Kedah Malay
|-
| Perak|| Perak || || 'Perak' || See Malay phonology
|-
|colspan=2| Malto || पोग़े || || 'smoke' ||May be a stop instead.
|-
| Minangkabau || Kampar dialect|| boghe || || 'rice' ||
|-
| rowspan="2" | Norwegian || Southern dialects || rowspan="2" | || rowspan="2" | || rowspan="2" | 'strange' || rowspan="2" | Either an approximant or a fricative. See Norwegian phonology
|-
| Southwestern dialects
|-
|Toba qom
|Takshek dialect
|Awo<s>g</s>oyk
|
|'moon'
|
|-
|Tundra Nenets
|Some speakers
|вара
|
|'goose'
|
|-
|Ossetic
|Iron
|æгъгъæд / æğğæd
|
|'enough'
|
|-
| rowspan="4" | Portuguese||European || || || 'car'|| Word-initial is commonly realized as a uvular trill [<nowiki/>ʀ] in Lisbon. See Portuguese phonology
|-
| Setubalense || || || 'to ruralize' || Outcome of a merger of with , which is unique in the Lusophone world. Often trilled instead.
|-
| Fluminense || || || 'burning feeling' || rowspan=2 | Due to 19th century Portuguese influence, Rio de Janeiro's dialect merged coda into . Often trilled. In free variation with , and before voiced sounds, , , and before voiceless consonants
|-
| Sulista || || || 'rice'
|-
| rowspan="2" | Spanish||Puerto Rican|| || || 'car'|| Word-initial, and inter-vocallic double r ('rr') are commonly realized as a fricative trill in rural sectors and generally (but not exclusively) lower socioeconomic strata among Puerto Ricans. .
|-
|As spoken in Asturias
|
|
|'worm'
|Most common allophone of . May also be an approximant.