Luxembourgish phonology

This article aims to describe the phonology and phonetics of central Luxembourgish, which is regarded as the emerging standard.[1]

Consonants

The consonant inventory of Luxembourgish is quite similar to that of Standard German.[1]

Consonant phonemes of Luxembourgish[1]
		Labial	Alveolar	Postalveolar	Dorsal	Glottal
Nasal		m	n		ŋ
Plosive	fortis	p	t		k
Plosive	lenis	b	d		ɡ
Affricate	fortis	(p͡f)	t͡s	t͡ʃ
Affricate	lenis		(d͡z)	(d͡ʒ)
Fricative	fortis	f	s	ʃ	χ	h
Fricative	lenis	v	z	ʒ	ʁ
Approximant					j
Liquid			l		ʀ

/m, p, b/ are bilabial, /pf/ is bilabial-labiodental, whereas /f, v/ are labiodental.[1]
- /pf/ occurs only in loanwords from Standard German.[2] Just as among many native German-speakers, it tends to be simplified to [f] word-initially. For example, Pflicht ('obligation') is pronounced [fliɕt], or in careful speech [pfliɕt].
- /v/ is realized as [w] when it occurs after /k, ts, ʃ/, e.g. zwee [tsweː] ('two').[3]
/p, t, k/ are voiceless fortis [p, t, k]. They are aspirated [pʰ, tʰ, kʰ] in most positions,[4] but not when /s/ or /ʃ/ precedes in the same syllable, or when another plosive or affricate follows.
- If followed by a vowel, the fortis stops are moved to the onset of the following syllable and voiced to [b, d, ɡ]; see below.[2]
/b, d, ɡ/ are unaspirated lenis, more often voiceless [b̥, d̥, ɡ̊] than voiced [b, d, ɡ].[4]
/d͡z/ as a phoneme appears only in a few words, such as spadséieren /ʃpɑˈd͡zəɪ̯eʀen/ ('to go for a walk'). /d͡ʒ/ as a phoneme occurs only in loanwords from English.[2]
- Note that phonetic [d͡z] and [d͡ʒ] occur due to voicing of word-final /t͡s/ and /t͡ʃ/; see below.
/s/ and /z/ only contrast between vowels. /s/ does not occur word-initially except in French and English loanwords. In the oldest loans from French it is often replaced with /t͡s/.
/ŋ, k, ɡ/ are velar, /j/ is palatal whereas /ʀ/ is uvular.[1]
- /j/ is frequently realized as [ʒ], e.g. Juni [ˈjuːniː] or [ˈʒuːniː] ('June').[3]
- The normal realization of /ʀ/ is more often a trill [ʀ] than a fricative [ʁ]. The fricative variant is used after short vowels before consonants. If the consonant is voiceless, the fricative is also voiceless, i.e. [χ]. Older speakers use the consonantal variant [ʀ ~ ʁ] also in the word-final position, where younger speakers tend to vocalize the /ʀ/ to a central vowel [ə] or [ɐ].[4]
/χ, ʁ/ have two types of allophones: alveolo-palatal [ɕ, ʑ] and uvular [χ, ʁ]. The latter occur after back vowels, whereas the former occur in all other positions.[4]
- The [ʑ] allophone appears only in a few words intervocalically, e.g. Spigel [ˈʃpiʑəl] ('mirror'), héijen [ˈhəɪ̯ʑən] (inflected form of héich 'high'). Note that an increasing number of speakers do not distinguish between the alveolo-palatal allophones [ɕ, ʑ] and the postalveolar phonemes /ʃ, ʒ/.[5]

In external sandhi, syllable-final /n/ is deleted unless followed by [n t d ts h], with few exceptions. Furthermore, some unusual consonant clusters may arise post-lexically after cliticisation of the definite article d' (for feminine, neuter and plural forms), e.g. d'Land [dlɑnt] ('the country') or d'Kräiz [tkʀæːɪ̯ts] ('the cross').[2] Due to cluster simplification this article often disappears entirely between consonants.

Word-final obstruents

Phonetically, word-final /b, d, dʒ, ɡ, v, z, ʒ, ʁ/ are realized exactly the same as /p, t, tʃ, k, f, s, ʃ, χ/. In most cases, they are realized the same as the main allophones of /p, t, tʃ, k, f, s, ʃ, χ/ (i.e. voiceless), but when the next word begins with a vowel and is pronounced without a pause, they are realized the same as the main allophones of /b, d, dʒ, ɡ, v, z, ʒ, ʁ/, i.e. voiced and are resyllabified, that is, moved to the onset of the first syllable of the next word (the same happens with /ts/, which becomes [dz], and the non-native affricate /pf/, which is also voiced to [bv]). For instance, sech eens (phonemically /zeχ ˈeːns/) is pronounced [zəˈʑeːns],[6] although this article transcribes it [zəʑ‿ˈeːns] so that it corresponds more closely to the spelling. Similarly, eng interessant Iddi [eŋ intʀæˈsɑnd‿ˈidi] ('an interesting idea').

Pronunciation of the letter g

In Luxembourgish, the letter g has no fewer than nine possible pronunciations, depending both on the origin of a word and the phonetic environment. Natively, it is pronounced [ɡ] initially and [ʁ ~ ʑ] elsewhere, the latter being devoiced to [χ ~ ɕ] at the end of a morpheme. Words from French, English and (in a few cases) German have introduced [ɡ] (devoiced [k]) in other environments, and French orthography's "soft g" indicates [ʒ] (devoiced [ʃ]).

By the now very common mergers of [ʒ] and [ʑ], as well as [ʃ] and [ɕ], this number may be reduced to seven, however. The pronunciation [j] is also (generally) not obligatory but a common alternative to [ʑ] in the environment indicated below.

Summary of pronunciation of ⟨g⟩
Phoneme	Allophone	Applies in	Phonetic environment	Example	IPA	Meaning
/ɡ/	[ɡ]	native and German words	stem-initially	géi	[ɡəɪ̯]	go
		some German words	stem-internally	Drogen	[ˈdʀoːɡən]	drugs
		French words	stem-initially and internally before written a, o, u, or consonant	Negatioun	[neɡɑˈsjəʊ̯n]	negation

[k]	French and some German words	word-finally	Drog	[dʀoːk]	drug
/ʒ/	[ʒ]	French words	stem-initially and internally before written e, i or y	originell	[oʀiʒiˈnæl]	original
/ʒ/	[ʃ]	French words	word-finally before mute e	Plage	[plaːʃ]	beach
/ʁ/	[ʁ]	native and most German words	stem-internally after back vowels	Lager	[ˈlaːʁɐ]	store
	[χ]		word-finally after back vowels	Dag	[daːχ]	day
	[ʑ]		stem-internally after consonants and non-back vowels	Verfügung	[fɐˈfyːʑuŋ]	disposal
	[ɕ]		word-finally after consonants and non-back vowels	bëlleg	[ˈbələɕ]	cheap
	[j]		in the unstressed sequences /eʁe/ ([əjə]) and /eʁɐ/ ([əjɐ])	bëllegen	[ˈbələjən]	cheap [inflected]

Vowels

Monophthongs

Native monophthongs of Luxembourgish, from Gilles & Trouvain (2013:70)

The monophthongs of Luxembourgish are as follows:[7]

		Front				Central	Back
		unrounded		rounded			Back
		short	long	short	long		short	long
Close		i	iː	y	yː		u	uː
Mid	close		eː		øː			oː
Mid	open	e		œ	œː		o
Open		æ				ɐ	ɑ	aː
Nasal			ɛ̃ː					õː ɑ̃ː

/i, iː, u, uː, o/ are close to the corresponding cardinal vowels [i, u, o].[7]
- Some speakers may realize /o/ as open-mid [ɔ], especially before /ʀ/.[7]
/e/ has two allophones:
- Before velars: close-mid [e], which for some speakers may be open-mid [ɛ] – this is especially frequent before /ʀ/.[7]
- All other positions: mid central vowel with variable rounding, but more often slightly rounded [ə̹] than unrounded [ə̜]. Contrary to Standard German, the sequence of [ə] and a sonorant never results in a syllabic sonorant; however, Standard German spoken in Luxembourg often also lacks syllabic sonorants, so that e.g. tragen is pronounced [ˈtʀaːɡən], rather than [ˈtʀaːɡn̩] or [ˈtʀaːɡŋ̍].[8][9]
/eː, oː/ are higher than close-mid [e̝ː, o̝ː] and may be even as high as /i, u/.[7]
- Before /ʀ/, /eː/ is realized as open-mid [ɛː].[7]
The quality of /æ/ matches the prototypical IPA value of the ⟨æ⟩ symbol ([æ]).[7]
/ɐ/ appears only in unstressed syllables. Phonetically it is a near-open near-back unrounded vowel [ɐ̠].[7] It is similar to /ɑ/, though it is shorter and somewhat more central. Phonemically, it can be analyzed either as a marginal phoneme or a non-prevocalic sequence of /e/ and /ʀ/.
/ɑ/ is near-open [ɑ̝].[7]
/aː/, a phonological back vowel (the long counterpart of /ɑ/), is phonetically near-front [a̠ː]. Sometimes, it may be as front and as high as /æ/ ([æː]), though without losing its length.[10]
The nasal vowels appear only in loanwords from French, whereas the oral front rounded vowels appear in loans from both French and German.[2]
- The opposition between close-mid and open-mid vowels does not exist in native Luxembourgish words. In non-native words, there is a marginal contrast between the close-mid /øː/ and the open-mid /œː/.
- The short /œ/ is generally indistinguishable from the native allophone [ə̹].

Diphthongs

Part 1 of native diphthongs of Luxembourgish, from Gilles & Trouvain (2013:71)

Part 2 of native diphthongs of Luxembourgish, from Gilles & Trouvain (2013:71)

Diphthong phonemes[11]
Closing	əɪ̯ əʊ̯ oɪ̯ æːɪ̯ æːʊ̯ ɑɪ̯ ɑʊ̯
Centering	iə̯ uə̯

The ending points of the closing diphthongs tend to be fairly close, more like [i, u] than [ɪ, ʊ].[11]
The starting points of /əɪ̯, əʊ̯/ are typically schwa-like [ə], but the first element of /əɪ̯/ may be more of a centralized front vowel [ë̞].[11]
The starting points of /æːɪ̯, æːʊ̯/, /ɑɪ̯, ɑʊ̯/ as well as /iə̯/ and /uə̯/ are similar to the corresponding short monophthongs [æ, ɑ, i, u].[11]
- The first elements of /æːɪ̯, æːʊ̯/ may be phonetically short [æ] in fast speech or in unstressed syllables.[11]
The centering diphthongs end in the mid central unrounded area [ə].[11]
/oɪ̯/ appears only in loanwords from Standard German.[2]

The /æːɪ̯ ~ ɑɪ̯/ and /æːʊ̯ ~ ɑʊ̯/ contrasts arose from a former lexical tone contrast: the shorter /ɑɪ̯, ɑʊ̯/ were used in words with Accent 1, whereas the lengthened /æːɪ̯, æːʊ̯/ were used in words with Accent 2 (see Pitch-accent language#Franconian dialects.)[2]

Additional phonetic diphthongs arise after vocalisation of /ʀ/.[11] These are [iːə̯, uːə̯, oːə̯, ɛːə̯], with [iːɐ̯, uːɐ̯, oːɐ̯, ɛːɐ̯] as possible alternatives. However, the sequence /aːʀ/ is realized the same as long /aː/, unless a vowel follows within the same word.

In loanwords from Standard German (such as Bad Dürkheim and Föhr) [yːə̯] and [øːə̯] also occur, again with [yːɐ̯] and [øːɐ̯] as possible alternatives.

References

Gilles & Trouvain (2013), p. 67.
Gilles & Trouvain (2013), p. 72.
Gilles & Trouvain (2013), p. 69.
Gilles & Trouvain (2013), p. 68.
Gilles & Trouvain (2013), pp. 68–69.
Gilles & Trouvain (2013), pp. 68, 72.
Gilles & Trouvain (2013), p. 70.
Gilles & Trouvain (2013), pp. 70–71.
Dudenredaktion, Kleiner & Knöbl (2015), p. 39.
Gilles & Trouvain (2013), pp. 68, 70–71.
Gilles & Trouvain (2013), p. 71.

Bibliography

Dudenredaktion; Kleiner, Stefan; Knöbl, Ralf (2015) [First published 1962], Das Aussprachewörterbuch (in German) (7th ed.), Berlin: Dudenverlag, ISBN 978-3-411-04067-4
Gilles, Peter; Trouvain, Jürgen (2013), "Luxembourgish" (PDF), Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 43 (1): 67–74, doi:10.1017/S0025100312000278