In southern dialects of Dutch (that is, those spoken roughly below the rivers Rhine, Meuse and Waal),[1] the distinction between the phonemes /x/ and /ɣ/ is usual, with both realized as cardinal velars [x, ɣ] or post-palatal [ç˗, ʝ˗], hereafter represented without the diacritics.
The only exception to that are speakers from the southern Netherlands that have undergone accent reduction training, in which case they will use a trill fricative when speaking standard Dutch.
Verhoeven and Hageman[7] have found that 70% of word-initial and 56% of intervocalic lenis fricatives (which includes /v/ and /z/) are realized as fully voiceless in Belgium.
[8] In Ripuarian (spoken in the southeastern part of Limburg), [ʝ] has been so fronted and weakened as to merge with the palatal approximant [j]; compare Standard Dutch goed /ɣut/ with jód /jot/ in the Kerkrade dialect, with both words meaning 'good'.
On the Dutch side of the border, the standard pronunciation of /ɣ/ is only approximated after phonological back vowels /u, ɔ, oː, aː/, being uvular [ʁ] as in Ripuarian.
In the latter case, the sound is not voiced and differs from /x/ in length (/ɣ/ is longer) and in that it is produced a little bit further front (mediovelar, rather than postvelar) and lacks any trilling, so that vlaggen /ˈvlɑɣən/ 'flags' has a somewhat lengthened, plain voiceless velar [xˑ] (hereafter represented with ⟨ɣ̊⟩): [ˈvlɑɣ̊ə(n)], whereas lachen /ˈlɑxən/ 'to laugh' features a shorter, post-velar fricative with a simultaneous voiceless uvular trill, transcribed with ⟨x̠͡ʀ̥⟩ or ⟨ʀ̝̊˖⟩ in narrow IPA but normally written with ⟨χ⟩ or ⟨x⟩.
[2][3] Apart from Ripuarian, the voiceless trill fricative [ʀ̝̊] appears in very different contexts in Southern Dutch, being an allophone of /r/.
[12] The phrase zachte G 'soft G' is pronounced [ˈzɑxtə ˈʝeː] in Southern Dutch, whereas the Northern pronunciation is [ˈzɑχtə ˈχei].
The Ripuarian-influenced Standard Dutch pronunciation is [ˈzɑχtə ˈʝeː], that of vlaggen is [ˈvlɑʁə(n)] (as if spelled vlarren), whereas that of lachen is [ˈlɑχə(n)].
The hard ⟨g⟩ is used in most of the Netherlands, except the provinces of Limburg and most parts of North Brabant, and some dialects of Gelderland and Utrecht.
The soft ⟨g⟩ is used primarily in the southern part of the Dutch language area in Europe: Ripuarian dialects spoken in the extreme southeast part of Limburg in the Netherlands have a special allophony that does not match the soft G used in the rest of Limburg but the German dialects of Aachen and Cologne; see above.