The written equivalents of the phonemes listed here are "Yi Pinyin". For information about the actual script used see the section above entitled Writing System.
Consonants[]
| Labial | Alveolar | Retroflex | Alveolo- palatal |
Velar | Glottal | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | voiced | m /m/ | n /n/ | ny /ȵ/ | ng /ŋ/ | ||
| unvoiced | hm /m̥/ | hn /n̥/ | |||||
| Plosive | prenasalized | nb /ᵐb/ | nd /ⁿd/ | mg /ᵑɡ/ | |||
| voiced | bb /b/ | dd /d/ | gg /ɡ/ | ||||
| unvoiced | b /p/ | d /t/ | g /k/ | ||||
| aspirated | p /pʰ/ | t /tʰ/ | k /kʰ/ | ||||
| Affricate | prenasalized | nz /ⁿdz/ | nr /ᶯɖʐ/ | nj /ⁿȡʑ/ | |||
| voiced | zz /dz/ | rr /ɖʐ/ | jj /ȡʑ/ | ||||
| unvoiced | z /ts/ | zh /ʈʂ/ | j /ȶɕ/ | ||||
| aspirated | c /tsʰ/ | ch /ʈʂʰ/ | q /ȶɕʰ/ | ||||
| Fricative | unvoiced | f /f/ | s /s/ | sh /ʂ/ | x /ɕ/ | h /x/ | hx /h/ |
| voiced | v /v/ | ss /z/ | r /ʐ/ | y /ʑ/ | w /ɣ/ | ||
| Lateral | voiced | l /l/ | |||||
| unvoiced | hl /l̥/ | ||||||
Vowels[]
| Front | Non-front | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| unrounded | rounded | |||
| Syllabic consonant |
loose | y /z̩/ | u /v̩ʷ/ | |
| tight | yr /z̩/ | ur /v̩ʷ/ | ||
| Near-close | loose | i /e̝/ | e /ɤ̝/ | o /o̝/ |
| Open-mid | tight | ie /ɛ/ | uo /ɔ/ | |
| Open | tight | a /a/ | ||
Nuosu has five pairs of phonemic vowels, contrasting in a feature Eatough calls loose throat vs. tight throat. Underlining is used as an ad-hoc symbol for tight throat; phonetically, these vowels are laryngealized and/or show a retracted tongue root. Loose vs. tight throat is the only distinction in the two pairs of syllabic consonants, but in the vocoids it is reinforced by a height difference.
The syllabic consonants y(r) u(r) are essentially the usual Sinological vowels ɿ ʮ, so y can be identified with the vowel of the Mandarin 四 sì "four", but they have diverse realizations. Y(r) completely assimilates to a preceding coronal except in voice, e.g. /ɕz̩˨˩/ [ɕʑ̩˨˩] "to marry", and are [m͡l̩] after a labial nasal, e.g. /m̥z̩˧sz̩˧/ [m̥m͡l̩˧sz̩˧] "cloth". U(r) assimilates similarly after laterals, retaining its rounding, e.g. /l̥v̩ʷ˧/ [l̥l̩ʷ˧] "to stir-fry", and is [m̩ʷ] after a labial nasal, e.g. /m̥v̩ʷ˧/ [m̥m̩ʷ˧] "mushroom"; moreover it induces a labially trilled release of preceding labial or alveolar stops, e.g. /ⁿdv̩ʷ˨˩/ [ⁿdʙv̩ʷ˨˩] "to hit".
The tight-throat phone [ɤ̝] occurs as the realization of /ɤ̝/ in the high tone. That it is phonemically loose-throat is shown by its behaviour in tightness harmony in compound words.
Tones[]
- high [˥] – written -t
- high-mid [˦] or mid falling [˧˨] – written -x
- mid [˧] – unmarked
- low falling [˨˩] – written -p
The high-mid tone is only marginally contrastive. Its two main sources are from tone sandhi rules, as the outcome of a mid tone before another mid tone, and the outcome of a low-falling tone after a mid tone. However, these changes do not occur in all compounds where they might: for instance wo "bear" + mop "mother" regularly forms wo mox "female bear", but vi "jackal" + mop "mother" forms vi mop "female jackal" without sandhi. The syntax creates other contrasts: tone sandhi applies across the boundary between object and verb, so is present in SOV clauses like mu jy lu ti shex "Mujy looks for Luti", but is absent in OSV clauses like mu jy lu ti shep "Luti looks for Mujy". A few words, like xix "what?", have underlying high-mid tone.