The phonology of tupinambá has some interesting and unusual features. For instance, it does not have the lateral approximant /l/ or the multiple vibrant rhotic consonant /r/. It also has a rather small inventory of consonants and a large number of pure vowels (12).
This led to a Portuguese pun about this language, that Brazilians não têm fé, nem lei, nem rei (have neither faith, nor law, nor king) as the words fé (faith), lei (law) and rei (king) could not be pronounced by a native Tupi speaker (they would say pé, re'i and re'i).
Vowels[]
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | /i/, /ĩ/ | /ɨ/, /ɨ̃/ | /u/, /ũ/ |
| Mid | /ɛ/, /ɛ̃/ | /ɔ/, /ɔ̃/ | |
| Open | /a/, /ã/ |
The nasal vowels are fully vocalic, without any trace of a trailing [m] or [n]. They are pronounced with the mouth open and the palate relaxed, not blocking the air from resounding through the nostrils. These approximations, however, must be taken with caution, as no actual recording exists, and Tupi had at least seven known dialects.
Consonants[]
| Labial | Coronal | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasals | m /m/ | n /n/ | ñ /ɲ/ | ng /ŋ/ | ||
| Plosive | prenasalized | mb /ᵐb/ | nd /ⁿd/ | ng /ᵑɡ/ | ||
| voiceless | p /p/ | t /t/ | c /c/ | k /k/ | (/ʔ/)^ | |
| voiced | v /b/ | d /d/ | j /ɟ/ | l /ɡ/ | ||
| Fricatives | voiceless | f /ɸ/ | s /s/† | x /ʃ/ | q /x/ | h /h/ |
| voiced | b /β/ | ð /z/† | z /ʒ/ | g /ɣ/ | ||
| Semivowels | û /w/ | î /j/ | ŷ /ɰ/‡ | |||
| Flap | r /ɾ/ | |||||
- ^ The glottal stop is found only between a sequence of two consecutive vowels and at the beginning of vowel-initial words (aba, y, ara, etc.). When it is indicated in writing, it is generally written as an apostrophe.
- † Some authors remark that the actual pronunciation of /s/ was retroflex /ʂ/. Also, most sources describe some dialects having /s/ and /h/ in free variation.
- ‡ The actual pronunciation of ŷ is the corresponding semivowel for /ɨ/. It may not have existed in all dialects.
Alternative view[]
According to Nataniel Santos Gomes, however, the phonetic inventory of Tupi was simpler:
- Consonants:
- p, t, k, ‘ (/ʔ/)
- b (/β/)
- s, x (/ʃ/)
- m, n, ñ (/ɲ/)
- û (/w/), î (/j/)
- r (/ɾ/)
- Vowels
- i, y (/ɨ/), u, ĩ, ỹ, ũ
- e, o, õ, ẽ
- a, ã
This scheme does not regard Ŷ as a separate semivowel, does not consider the existence of G (/ɣ/), and does not differentiate between the two types of NG (/ŋ/ and /ⁿɡ/), probably because it does not regard MB (/ⁿb/), ND (/ⁿd/) and NG (/ⁿɡ/) as independent phonemes, but mere combinations of P, T, and K with nasalization.
Santos Gomes also remarks that the stop consonants shifted easily to nasal stops, which is attested by the fitful spelling of words like umbu (umu, ubu, umbu, upu, umpu) in the works of the early missionaries and by the surviving dialects.
According to most sources, Tupi semivowels were more consonantal than their IPA counterparts. The Î, for instance, was rather fricative, thus resembling a very slight [ʑ], and Û had a distinct similarity with the voiced stop [ɡʷ], thus being sometimes written gu. As a consequence of that character, Tupi loanwords in Brazilian Portuguese often have j for Î and gu for Û.