Language/Afar/Pronunciation/Alphabet-and-Pronunciation

Letters

Letter	A a	B b	T t	S s	E e	C c	K k	X x	I i	D d	Q q	R r	F f	G g	O o	L l	M m	N n	U u	W w	H h	Y y
Name	a	ba	ta	sa	e	ca	ka	xa	i	da	qa	ra	fa	ga	o	la	ma	na	u	wa	ha	ya
IPA	[ʌ]	[b]	[t]	[s]	[e]	[ħ]	[k]	[ɖ]	[i]	[d]	[ʕ]	[r]	[f]	[g]	[o]	[l]	[m]	[n]	[u]	[w]	[h]	[j]

Consonants

The consonants of the Afar language in the standard orthography are listed below (with IPA notation in brackets):

		Labial	Alveolar	Retroflex	Palatal	Velar	Pharyngeal	Glottal
Stops	voiceless		t  [t]			k  [k]
	voiced	b  [b]	d  [d]			g  [ɡ]
Fricatives	voiceless	f  [f]	s  [s]				c  [ħ]	h  [h]
	voiced						q  [ʕ]
Nasals		m  [m]	n  [n]
Approximants		w  [w]	l  [l]		y  [j]
Tap			r  [ɾ]	x  [ɖ]

Voiceless stop consonants which close syllables are released, e.g., [ʌkʰˈme].

Long Vowels

Long vowel	aa	ee	ii	oo	uu
IPA	[aː]	[eː]	[iː]	[oː]	[uː]

stress

short

• a [ʌ]
• e [e]
• i [i]
• o [o]
• u [u]

long

• aa [aː]
• ee [eː]
• ii [iː]
• oo [oː]
• uu [uː]

Sentence final vowels of affirmative verbs are aspirated (and stressed), e.g. abeh = /aˈbeʰ/ 'He did.' Sentence final vowels of negative verbs are not aspirated (nor stressed), e.g. maabinna = /ˈmaabinna/ 'He did not do.' Sentence final vowels of interrogative verbs are lengthened (and stressed), e.g. abee? = /aˈbeː/ 'Did he do?' Otherwise, stress in word-final.

Sources

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afar_language