Persian phonology

The phonology of the Persian language varies between regional dialects and standard varieties.

Linguists tend to focus on Iranian Persian, so this article may contain less adequate information regarding other varieties.

('roundedness' refers to the shape of the lips during pronunciation) In Iranian Persian word-final /o/ is rare except for تُوْ [tʰo] "you" and nouns of foreign origin.

[6][7] A major factor that complicates the matter is the change of two classical and pre-classical Persian diphthongs: /ai/ > /ei/ and /au/ > /ou/.

[6] Morphological analysis also supports the view that the alleged Persian diphthongs are combinations of the vowels with /j/ and /w/.

[7] The Persian orthography does not distinguish between the diphthongs and the consonants /j/ and /w/; that is, they are both respectively written as ی and و.

These quality contrasts have in modern Persian varieties become the main distinction between the two sets of vowels.

[8] The inherited eight-vowel inventory is retained without major upheaval in Dari, which also preserves quantitative distinctions.

Open ā has been rounded and raised to an open-mid vowel /ɔ/ (compare with Canaanite shift).

In northern dialects, mid ō (transcribed phonologically as ⟨ӯ⟩ in the Cyrillic script and "ū" in the Latin script) has shifted to /ɵ/, while in southern dialects, mid ō has shifted upward and merged with ū (and u) as /ʊ/.

[15] The Persian language does not have syllable-initial consonant clusters (see below), so unlike in English, /p, t, k/ are aspirated even following /s/, as in هَسْتَم /ˈhæstæm/ ('I exist').

In Classical Persian, the uvular consonants غ and ق denoted the original Arabic phonemes, the fricative [ʁ] and the plosive [q], respectively.

In modern Tehrani Persian (which is used in the Iranian mass media, both colloquial and standard), there is no difference in the pronunciation of غ and ق.

The classical pronunciations of غ and ق are preserved in the eastern varieties, Dari and Tajiki, as well as in the southern varieties (e.g. Zoroastrian Dari language and other Central / Central Plateau or Kermanic languages).

Some Iranian speakers show a similar merger of ج and ژ, such that [d͡ʒ] alternates with [ʒ], with the latter being restricted to intervocalic position.

Some speakers front /h/ to a voiceless palatal fricative [ç] in the vicinity of /i/, especially in syllable-final position.

Also /b/ may in some cases change into [β], or even [v]; for example باز ('open') may be pronounced [bɒːz] as well as [βɒːz] or [vɒːz] and/or [vɒː], colloquially.

Before every initial vowel onset, a glottal stop /ʔ/ is pronounced (e.g., ایران [ʔiˈɾɒn] 'Iran').