Ğ

Letter "Ğ"

Ğ, or ğ, is a letter, known as g-breve in English, used in Turkish, Azerbaijani, Crimean Tatar, and Laz.

Turkish use

In Turkish, the ⟨ğ⟩ /ɰ/ is known as yumuşak ge [jumuʃak ɟe] (soft g) and is the ninth letter of the Turkish alphabet. It is very similar to the blødt g 'soft g' in Danish and comparable to the '-gh' sound in the Arabic letter ghayn. It has more than one function; it may lengthen the preceding vowel, which is normally short in Turkish without the ⟨ğ⟩ (for example, dağ (mountain) is pronounced similar to [daː], with just a small fluctuation in sound in the end), it may be used before a vowel in ‿ or ʲ form as sandhi for back vowels and front vowels respectively and it often creates a small fluctuation in sound even in cases where it lengthens the preceding vowel. The ⟨ğ⟩ must follow a vowel, and thus cannot be the initial letter of a word. Its exact function varies throughout Turkey and with regard to the particular vowel with which it is used: it adds a rising of the back of the tongue (as for /g/ or /k/) to /a/ and /ı/, a /j/ glide to /e/ or /i/, and a /β/ glide to the rounded vowels /o/, /u/, /ö/ and /ü/.

The letter provides a smooth transition between vowels since they do not occur consecutively in native Turkish words (in loanwords they are separated by a glottal stop). Sometimes ⟨g⟩ is used incorrectly instead of ⟨ğ⟩. In the case of Turkish words borrowed into other languages, the letter may become a [ɡ], as in yogurt (also spelled yoghurt; Turkish yoğurt). In rare cases, the phonetic /ɣ/ (gamma) or the Greek letter ⟨γ⟩ is used. Some webpages may also use ⟨Ð⟩ and ⟨ð⟩ because of improper encoding; see Turkish characters for the reasons of this.

Azerbaijani and Crimean Tatar use

In Azerbaijani and Crimean Tatar, ğ represents /ɣ/, the voiced velar fricative.

Laz use

Laz is written using two alphabets: the Georgian script and an extended Turkish Latin alphabet. In the Latin alphabet, ğ represents /ɣ/, the voiced velar fricative, and corresponds to the Georgian letter Ghani.

Character encoding

See also

• Ǧ (g with caron)
• Ġayn (Arabic)
• Ghayn (Cyrillic)