Wutung has fifteen consonants and seven vowels, six of which have nasal variants. This gives a total of 28 phonemes. Wutung also makes suprasegmental distinctions in tone.
Consonants[]
Wutung is one of the very few languages that lack dorsal consonants.
| Labial | Alveolar | Palatal | Glottal | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Plosive or Affricate |
voiceless | p | t | t͡ʃ | ʔ |
| voiced | b | d | d͡ʒ | ||
| Nasal | m | n | ɲ | ||
| Fricative | voiceless | f | s | ʃ | h |
| voiced | v | z | ʒ | ||
| Approximant | w | l | j | ||
Vowels[]
Wutung has thirteen vowels, which includes seven oral and six nasal vowels. The table below shows the oral vowels. Each of these vowels, apart from the close-mid vowel ur /ɵ/, has an equivalent nasal vowel. The nasal vowels are indicated using the same symbol as the equivalent oral, but with a following ng, e.g. ca, 'pig' vs. cang 'blossom', the latter having the nasal vowel.
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | i /i/ |
u /u/ | |
| Close-mid | ey /e/ |
ur /ɵ/ |
o /o/ |
| Open-mid | e /ɛ/ |
ɔ /ɔ/ | |
| Open | æ /æ/ |
a /a/ |
ɐ /ɒ/ |