Phonology
- The presence of so-called prenasalized consonants. A very short homorganic nasal is added before a voiced plosive. The nasal is syllabified with the onset of the following syllable, which means that the moraic weight of the preceding syllable is left unchanged.
- The pronunciation of unstressed short a as schwa ə, which otherwise has no written symbol.
| Labial | Dental/ Alveolar |
Retroflex | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m | n̪ | ɳ | ɲ | ŋ | ||
| Plosive | p | t̪ | ʈ | tʃ | k | ||
| b | d̪ | ɖ | dʒ | ɡ | |||
| ᵐb | ⁿ̪d̪ | ᶯɖ | ᵑɡ | ||||
| Fricative | (f) | s | (ʃ) | h | |||
| Rhotic | r | ||||||
| Approximant | ʋ | l | j | ||||
| Front | Central | Back | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Close | iː | i | uː | u | ||
| Mid | eː | e | (ə) | oː | o | |
| Open | æː | æ | aː | a | ||
Read more about this topic: Sinhala Language