Initial consonants which exist only in the Northern dialect are in red, while those that exist only in the Southern dialect are in blue. • /w/ is the only consonant sound permitted to form
consonant clusters with other consonants. The phenomenon of no longer distinguishing from in words whose orthographic form begins with the letter
n or
l has three manifestations: • The initial consonant of all words whose orthographic form begins with
n or
l is . • The initial consonant of all words is . • In some words, the initial consonant corresponding to the letter
n at the beginning of the spelling form of the word is , with
l being , in some other words the sound corresponding to
n is , with
l being . • In Northern dialects, some words have the initial consonant as the
voiced palatal nasal , such as
nhuộm,
nhức,
nhỏ (
nhỏ in
nhỏ giọt, not
nhỏ in
nhỏ bé),
nhổ,
nhốt, have phonetic variants with the initial consonant . This sound is written with the letter
d or
gi or
r depending on the word (at least one of those three letters, sometimes two, or even all three). • Some words with the initial consonant being the
voiced velar nasal also have phonetic variants with the initial consonant being the
voiced velar fricative , which are used in some places in the North. For example, the words
ngáy (
ngáy in
ngáy ngủ),
ngẫm (
ngẫm in
suy ngẫm) also have phonetic variants
gáy,
gẫm. • In Northern dialects, the
voiceless bilabial plosive is only the initial consonant in a few loanwords from other languages, mainly from French. In writing, the sound is written with the letter
p, as in
sâm panh, derived from French
champagne. In Southern dialects, the initial consonant of words whose spelling form begins with the letter
p is in many speakers. • The glottalized stops are preglottalized and voiced: (the
glottis is always closed before the oral closure). This glottal closure is often not released before the release of the oral closure, resulting in the characteristic
implosive pronunciation. However, sometimes the glottal closure is released prior to the oral release in which case the stops are pronounced . Therefore, the primary characteristic is preglottalization with implosion being secondary. • are phonetically
lamino-
alveolar. • is
apico-
alveolar: . In loanwords, it is pronounced , or , for example,
va li is pronounced , or . • Historically, a distinction is made between
ch and
tr , as well as between
x and
s . However, in many speakers, these two pairs are becoming merged as and respectively. • In southern speech, the phoneme , generally represented in Vietnamese linguistics by the letter , has a number of variant pronunciations depending on the speaker. A person can also have many pronunciations. It may occur as a
retroflex fricative , an
alveolar approximant , an
alveolar flap , a
trill , or a
tapped fricative/
fricative trill . In the border area between
Ho Chi Minh City and
Long An province (
Bình Chánh,
Cần Giuộc,
Cần Đước), the letter is pronounced as a
palatal approximant . In many areas in the
Mekong Delta, the letter is pronounced as a
velar fricative .
Simplification of consonant clusters in southern dialects As mentioned above, the only cluster in Vietnamese is in which is a consonant. Although this cluster tends to be retained by many young urban people in
southern Vietnam, especially in
Ho Chi Minh City and surrounding areas, it is generally reduced to one element in southern dialects. Depending on which consonant forms the cluster , there are two patterns in this simplification process. In one pattern the consonant is deleted and remains. In the other, is deleted while the consonant remains: • In southern speech, , , and are usually pronounced , including among educated urban speakers. : : However, they are becoming distinct and pronounced as or , , , , and respectively, especially in formal speech or when reading a text. • In informal speech, the
voiceless velar fricative (represented by the letter
kh) is often transformed into the corresponding
voiceless bilabial and
labiodental consonants , and the prevocalic is deleted, for example:
cá khoai is pronounced as
cá phai,
khóa máy is pronounced as
phá máy,
khỏe không? is pronounced as
phẻ không?. This pronunciation is observed only in rural southern dialects, and it does not occur in the speech of educated speakers. • There are only a few words where the
bilabial and
labiodental consonants are followed by the prevocalic . Most of them are French loanwords, for example:
tiền boa (''
), đậu pơ-ti-poa
(), xe buýt
(), vải voan
(). The initial consonant is kept and the prevocalic is lost and pronounced as: tiền bo
, đậu bo
, xe bít
, vải von''. • After the consonant clusters of the remaining articulators (
alveolar,
postalveolar,
palatal consonants) followed by the prevocalic , the initial consonant is kept and the prevocalic is lost as above, for example:
vô duyên is pronounced as
vô diên,
cái loa (hát) is pronounced as
cái la.
Comparison of initials The table below summarizes these sound correspondences: : ==Vowels==