3.0 Phonology and transcription
The following chart gives the Cebuano phonemes and the articulation:
| Consonants | |||||
| bilabial | apico-alveolar | palatal | dorsal | glottal | |
| voiceless stops | p | t | c | k | ʔ |
| voiced stops | b | d | j | g | |
| nasals | m | n | ŋ | ||
| spirants | s | h | |||
| liquids | w | l, r | y | ||
| Vowels | |||||
| high- or mid-front | low central | high- or mid-back | |||
| i | a | u | |||
In addition there is a fourth mid-central vowel which occurs dialectally (Bohol, Southern Leyte, Southern Cebu, and other scattered areas) but is not found in the dialect of Cebu City and is not transcribed here.[7] The palatal stop /j/ in many dialects does not contrast with the cluster /dy/. In the dialect of the Camotes Islands there is also a voiced spirant /z/ which derives historically from /y/ but contrasts with /y/ currently.
Vowels may be long or short. Contrast between long and short vowels occurs only in the final and the penultimate syllable of the word: káun [kā́ʔun] ‘eat’ and nagdá [nagdā́] ‘is bringing’. Further, there is only one long vowel per word. There is also a phoneme of stress which has a very low contrastive function. For the most part stress can be determined by the phonological make-up of the word: 1 stress falls on the long vowel of the word if the word has a long vowel: nagdá [nagdā́], káun [kā́ʔun]. 2 for words that have no long vowel, stress is on the penultimate if it is closed: tan-aw [tánʔaw] ‘see’; mugbù [múgbuʔ] ‘short’. If the penultimate is open and short, stress is on the ultimate: mala [malá] ‘dry’. Occasionally, in words with a closed penult the final syllable is stressed (marked here with a wedge): mandǎr [mandár] ‘order’; dughǐt [dughít] ‘instrument for poking’. In words with a long vowel in the ultimate syllable there is, in some dialects, a contrast between the stress on the first mora and stress on the second mora of the long vowel: nahū́g [nahúug] ‘fell’; húg [huúg] ‘woof’. This contrast does not obtain in all dialects.
3.2 Transcription
The transcription here adopted adheres as closely as possible to the spelling found in Cebuano publications and at the same time is strictly phonemic—that is, each phoneme is indicated, and no phoneme in a given environment is given more than one transcription. Our transcription follows the phonemic symbols given in the Chart 3.0 with the exceptions listed in the following sections.
3.21 Vowels
We write only three vowels: i, u, a. In Cebuano publications /i/ is sometimes written i, sometimes e, but with no consistency; and /u/ sometimes is written u, sometimes o (again with no consistency). But here the letters e and o are not used.
Long vowels are indicated with an acute accent: nagdá [nagdā́] ‘is bringing’, lána [lā́na] ‘coconut oil’. (Cebuano publications occasionally indicate long vowels by doubling them, but most frequently long vowels are ignored.)
Stress is not indicated if the placement is according to the rules given in Section 3.0, above. Where a word with a closed penult has a stress on the final syllable, this fact is indicated by a wedge: mandǎr [mandár] ‘order’. For words with a long vowel in the final syllable where the stress is on the final mora, the acute accent indicates the long vowel and stress on the final mora: húg [huúg] ‘woof, trák [traák] ‘bus’. For words with a long vowel in the final syllable where the stress is on the first mora, the stress on the first mora and length are indicated by a combination of a long mark and acute accent: nahū́g [nahúug] ‘fell’, ang-ā́ng [ʔangʔáang] ‘not quite’.
3.22 Glottal stop /ʔ/
In Cebuano publications /ʔ/ is only sometimes indicated.[8] Here we indicate /ʔ/ in word or syllable final position with a grave accent written over the vowel which precedes the glottal stop: walà /waláʔ/ ‘no’, bàbà /báʔbaʔ/ ‘mouth’, làhib /láʔhib/ ‘slice’. (In Cebuano publications the glottal stop of these words is never indicated.)
In post-consonantal position we indicate /ʔ/ with a hyphen, as is done in most Cebuano publications: tan-aw /tanʔaw/ ‘see’. In other positions—that is, intervocalically and in word initial position, glottal stop is not written, as is also the usual practice in Cebuano publications: writing of two adjacent vowels or initial vowel serves to indicate a glottal stop:[9] maáyu /maʔā́yu/ ‘good’, alas /ʔalás/ ‘ace’.
3.23 /ŋ/, /c/, /j/, /dy/, /ty/
The phoneme /ŋ/ is transcribed ng, as in Cebuano publications: bángun /báŋun/ ‘get up’. The sequence /ng/ is transcribed n-g: san-glas /sanglas/ ‘sunglasses’.
/c/ is transcribed ts, as in Cebuano publications: tsinílas /cinílas/ ‘slippers’[10]. The sequence /ty/ is transcribed ty (as in Cebuano publications): tyanggi /tyánggi/ ‘market’.
The phoneme /j/ is transcribed initially and medially as dy: dyíp /jíp/ ‘jeep’, dyus /jus/ ‘juice’. (In Cebuano publications /j/ is sometimes written dy, sometimes diy: diyip or dyip—i.e. the spelling of /j/ is no different from that of /dy/.) In final position /j/ is transcribed ds, following the usage in Cebuano publications: dyurds /jurj/ ‘a name—George’.[11] The sequence /dy/ is transcribed diy: diyus /dyus/ ‘god’. (This sequence is spelled diy or, alternatively, dy in Cebuano publications.)[12]
3.24 Ciy and Cy; Cuw and Cw; ayi and ay; awu and aw
The contrast between /Ciy/ and /Cy/ and between /Cuw/ and /Cw/ (where C is any consonant) obtains only in the position where the /y/ or /w/ precedes a vowel of the final syllable (e.g. paliya [paliyá] ‘k.o. vegetable’ vs. palya [pálya] ‘fail’). When the /y/ or /w/ precedes a vowel of the penultimate or earlier syllable, the contrast does not obtain. If one consonant precedes the /y/ or /w/ we write Cy and Cw; biyà ‘leftovers’ but hibyaan /hi-byà-an/ ‘be left behind’; guwà ‘go out’, higwaan ‘gone out from’. If two consonants precede the /y/ or /w/ we write Ciy and Cuw respectively: pinsiyunáda ‘one who receives a pension’, nagkuwarisma ‘have a sad expression’ (but Kwarisma ‘Lent’).
Similarly, the contrast between /Vyi/ and /Vy/ or /Vwu/ and /Vw/ (where V is any vowel) obtains only when the /y/ or /yi/, /w/ or /wu/ are final in the word: bay ‘term of address’ vs. bayi ‘female’; mabaw ‘shallow’ vs. hibawu (or hibáwu) ‘know’. In closed final syllables or penultimate or earlier syllables the contrast does not obtain. We write Vyi and Vwu in closed syllables and Viy and Vuw in open syllables: bayinti ‘twenty’ but ayta ‘give me’; dawunggan ‘ear’ but awtu ‘car’.