Sinhala Letters: Intro

image

Hello, everyone! Today's post is a revised edition of the 08/12/2022 post (now archived). I will be introducing the Sinhala alphabet and its pronunciation here. However, this isn't the entire thing you need to know to read and write Sinhala letters, as vowels are used with diacritics (vowel symbols) unlike in Latin script (like English). Let's get started.

Vowels

Below is a table of the vowels in Sinhala, there are 18 of them. However, for your much relief, two of them are no longer used in common life. I have highlighted them for you.

Now we need to learn how to pronounce these. Please refer to the table below for that. I have added the phonetic sound as well as an English phrase that includes the sound.

ʌ up
ɑː father
ae cat
aeː Anne
i it
ii meat
u put
uu loop
ru fruit
ruu broom
li -
liː -
e bed
ate
ai night
o not
note
au foul

Sounds and Consonants

Now that we have covered the vowels, let's move on to the remainder. Don't get scared when I say sounds, because they are pretty much like vowels, but catergorised outside them (highlighted in blue). Learning the consonants are much easier because, much of these sounds are light and heavy versions of the same sound. Also, please note that the soiltary letter in pink is a letter used, but not in the alphabet.

අං අඃ
 

Now that the consonants are covered, let's see how to pronounce them. Some sounds might not be used in English, so it might not have examples, however, I have included instructions for those. Please note that the letter sounds are written with the inherent vowel 'a' sound (අ) and the examples only refer to the pure consonant pronunciations. Let's crack on.

අං ŋ ring
අඃ Voiceless Aspirant -
ka kind
χa clock
ga gamma
gʰa ghost
ŋ ring
ᵑɡa younger
t͡ʃa chat
t͡ʃaʰ as above, aspirant
d͡ʒa jump
d͡ʒa as above, aspirant
ɲa piñata
nd͡ʒa jump (nasal)
ʈa top
ʈa as above, aspirant
ɖa dock
ɖa as above, aspirant
ɳa noise
ᶯɖa dock (nasal)
t̪a sloth
t̪aʰ as above, aspirant
d̪a Dhamma
d̪aʰ as above, aspirant
na name
ⁿda Dhamma (nasal)
pa pen
pʰa as above, aspirant
ba bond
bʰa as above, aspirant
ma mode
ᵐba bond (nasal)
ja yes
ra road
la lead
ʋa/va vine
sa shop
sa shop
sa stop
ha happy
la luck
fa fun
&nbsp
gna piñata (dental)

Ok, so that's it. You have completly gone through the individual pronunciations of the Sinhala Alphabet. You might have found repititive or largely similar sounds, but that is part of the richness of the language (and there are some grammer reasons behind that too). Find the full alphabet here (I didn't skip any letter. I mean the whole alphabet without the seperation). So, untill next time, have a great time!

Sinhala Letters: Intro Sinhala Letters: Intro Reviewed by Riveen Kumanayaka on August 07, 2023 Rating: 5

No comments:

Powered by Blogger.