KINARAY-A
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KINARAY-A ALPHABET

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Letter IPA Example Gloss
a /a/ ayam 'dog'
b /b/ babuy 'pig'
k /k/ kahuy 'tree'
d /d/ dahun 'leaf'
i /i/ itlug 'egg'
g /g/ gunting 'scissors'
h /h/ hügüt 'tight'
l /l/ lapis 'pencil'
m /m/ manuk 'chicken'
n /n/ niyug 'coconut'
ng /ŋ/ ngütngüt 'pain in a wound'
o /o/ walo 'eight'
p /p/ pispis 'bird'
r /r/ rapit 'near'
s /s/ sarakyan 'automobile'
t /t/ tunug 'loud; quality of sound'
u /u/ umang 'crazy'

ü

 /ɯ/ ügüt 'angry'
w /w/ wara 'none'
y /j/ yabi 'key'

This is a revised alphabet developed by various people in the areas of Panay Island that speak Kinaray-a. The current alphabet uses the grapheme < o > for the sound /u/ and < u > for the sound /ɯ/. The sound /o/ is understood from context, because in many words, the sound /u/ will change to /o/ in the last syllable. However, for this project, we decided to use the revised alphabet for clarity. The grapheme < o > is always used for the sound /o/ (which is predominantly found in borrowed words from Tagalog or Cebuano), < ü > always for /ɯ/, and < u > for /u/ (although in normal pronunciation, /u/ sounds more like /o/ in the last syllable).

The glottal stop /Ɂ/ is understood by two conventions: 1) after a consonant, the hyphen represents a glottal stop (such as < sin-o > = /sinɁo/ 'who'), but 2) in between vowels a glottal stop is pronounced even though there is no orthographic symbol (such as < batiis > = /batiɁis/ 'leg').

MINIMAL PAIRS

Minimal pairs are like rhyming words which show that the difference in the meaning of two words depends on just one sound.  We find minimal pairs by comparing two consonants or comparing two vowels.  Minimal pairs help us find the important sounds in a language.

p ~ b pitas
'pick from a branch'		 batas
'to bear a burden'
t ~ d tudu
'point'		 dugu
'blood'
k ~ g kapüt
'to hold'		 gapus
'already tied with rope'
m ~ n mata
'eyes'		 natün
'ours (inclusive)'
n ~ ng nipa
'type of palm'		 ngita
'to look for'
l ~ r rara
'to weave'		 lata
'can'
s ~ h saging
'banana'		 hangin
'wind'
w ~ y wara
'none'		 yapun
'dinner'
u ~ ü tubug
'bring the carabao to the water hole'		 tübüg
'throat'
i ~ ü lisu
'seed'		 lüsü
'torn to pieces'
i ~ u isüg
'brave'		 usug
'power, spiritual energy'
i ~ a igma
'lunch'		 agda
'to invite'
u ~ a tul-an
'bone		 talinga
'ear'
ü ~ a lüsü
'torn to pieces'		 lasang
'forest'

* The letter < o > is not included here because the sound /o/ is not a contrastive vowel in Kinaray-a.