Vowel reduction in Russian

In the pronunciation of the Russian language, several ways of vowel reduction (and its absence) are distinguished between the standard language and dialects. Russian orthography most often does not reflect vowel reduction, which can confuse foreign-language learners, but some spelling reforms have changed some words.

There are five vowel phonemes in Standard Russian. Vowels tend to merge when they are unstressed. The vowels and  have the same unstressed allophones for a number of dialects and reduce to an unclear schwa. Unstressed may become more central and merge with. Under some circumstances,, , and  may all merge. The fifth vowel,, may also be centralized but does not typically merge with any of the other vowels.

Other types of reduction are phonetic, such as that of the high vowels ( and ), which become near-close. Thus, игра́ть ('to play') is pronounced, and мужчи́на ('man') is pronounced.

General description
The five Russian vowels in unstressed position show two levels of reduction:
 * 1) The first-degree reduction in the first pretonic position (immediately before the stress).
 * 2) The second-degree reduction in positions other than the first pretonic position.

The allophonic result of the reduction is also heavily dependent on the quality or the nonexistence of the preceding consonant. Thus, the reduction is further grouped into three types according to the environment:
 * 1) After the hard (non-palatalized or velarized) consonants (including always hard ).
 * 2) After the hard retroflex sibilants  and.
 * 3) After the soft (palatalized) consonants (including the soft  and ) and semi-vowel.

The unstressed vowels also may be grouped in series that reflect similar patterns of reduction:
 * 1) High  and  (never reduced).
 * 2) Non-high,  and  (always reduced).
 * 3) Back  and  (both exhibit akanye).
 * 4) Front  and  (both exhibit ikanye).
 * 5) Back high  (never reduced).

High vowels
Two high vowels and  are usually thought to undergo no reduction. However, on the phonetic level, they show allophonic centralization, particularly under the influence of preceding or following consonants.

The unstressed high back vowel is either  (after hard consonants, written ) or  (after soft consonants, written, except , ).

The unstressed high front vowel is either  or  (after soft consonants, written ) or  or  (after hard consonants, written, except , ). Nevertheless, in rapid colloquial speech they both may be reduced to schwa, for example, до́брым ('kind', instrumental case, singular masculine neuter) versus до́бром  ('kind', prepositional case, singular masculine neuter). The case ending //-im// in the former case may surface as like the case ending //-om//, which thus leads to the merger of  and, or as де́лают  ('they do') versus де́лает  ('he/it does'). Both may surface as or.

Back vowels
Other than in Northern Russian dialects, Russian-speakers have a strong tendency to merge unstressed and. The phenomenon is called akanye (аканье), and some scholars postulate an early tendency towards it in the earliest known textual evidence of confusion between written "a" and "o" in a manuscript that was copied in Moscow in 1339. Akanye contrasts with okanye (оканье) pronunciations in Standard Russian as follows:
 * After hard (non- palatalised) consonants, the standard phonological rules prescribe a two-level reduction. The stressed vowel is normally the longest and the only place (with certain exceptions) that permits the . In the syllable immediately before the stress and in absolute word-initial position, both reduce to (sometimes also transcribed as ). In all other locations,  and  are reduced further to a short . For example, паро́м  ('ferry'), о́блако  ('cloud'), трава́  ('grass'). In practice, the second reduction has a gradient character: if the vowel in question is pronounced for enough time (such as by hyperarticulation), it may be pronounced as . Shorter durations have the effect of gradually transforming  into schwa. Recently, it has been argued that the change of sound quality during the second-degree reduction is merely an artifact of duration-dependent "phonetic undershoot",  when the speaker intends to pronounce, but the limited time reduces the likelihood of the tongue being able to arrive at the intended vowel target.
 * In fast speech, reduction ultimately may result in the vowel being dropped altogether, with the preceding consonant slightly lengthened or turned into a syllabic consonant: сапоги́, vs. ('boots'), потоло́к  ('ceiling'), де́сять  ('ten').
 * When $\langleаа\rangle$, $\langleао\rangle$, $\langleоа\rangle$, or $\langleоо\rangle$ is written in a word, it indicates so сообража́ть ('to realise') is pronounced.
 * With prepositions, the processes occur even across word boundaries, as in под мо́рем ('under the sea'), на оборо́те  ('on the reverse side', 'overleaf'). That does not occur with other parts of speech.
 * Both and  merge with  after palatalised consonants and  ( is written as $\langleе\rangle$ in those positions). This merger also occurs for  after retroflex consonants and $⟨ц⟩$. Examples: жена́  (phonetically ; 'wife'), язы́к  (phonetically ; 'tongue'), цена́ (phonetically ; 'price').

Across certain word-final suffixes, the reductions do not completely apply. In certain suffixes, after palatalised consonants and, and  (which is written as $\langleе\rangle$) can be distinguished from  and from each other: по́ле  ('field' nominative singular neuter) is different from по́ля  ('field' singular genitive), and the final sounds differ from the realisation of  in that position.

There are a number of exceptions to the above comments regarding the akanye:
 * is not always reduced in borrowing from foreign languages: ра́дио ('radio'). The common pattern for that exception is the final unstressed о being preceded by another vowel (Анто́нио, кака́о, сте́рео). Compare with мо́но, фо́то whose final unstressed о is reduced to.
 * Speakers with old Moscow dialect reflexes pronounce unstressed as  after retroflex consonants  and  and thereby imitate the reduction of . For other speakers, that pronunciation generally applies only to жале́ть  ('to regret'), к сожале́нию  ('unfortunately') and to oblique cases of ло́шадь  ('horse'), such as лошаде́й.
 * replaces after  in the oblique cases of some numerals: два́дцать  ('twenty').

Front vowels
The main feature of front vowel reduction is ikanye (иканье), the merger of unstressed with. Because has several allophones (depending on both stress and proximity to palatalised consonants), unstressed  is pronounced as one of those allophones, rather than the close front unrounded vowel. For example, семена́ ('seeds') is pronounced  and цена́  as ('price').

In registers without the merger (yekanye or еканье), unstressed is more retracted. Even then, however, the distinction between unstressed and unstressed  is most clearly heard in the syllable immediately before the stress. Thus, прида́ть ('to add to') contrasts with преда́ть ('to betray'). Both are pronounced and  respectively. The yekanye pronunciation is coupled with a stronger tendency for both unstressed and, which are pronounced the same as.

Speakers may switch between both pronunciations because of various factors, the most important factor likely being the speed of pronunciation.

Yakanye
Yakanye (яканье) is the pronunciation of unstressed and  after palatalised consonants preceding a stressed syllable as, rather than  (несли́ is pronounced , not ).

This pronunciation is observed in Belarusian and in most Southern Russian dialects, as is expressed in a quip (with liberal yakanye):
 * {| class="wikitable"

!Orthography !Standard pronunciation !Yakanye pronunciation !Translation
 * А у нас в Ряза́ни
 * And we have in Ryazan
 * пироги́ с глаза́ми.
 * Pies with eyes:
 * Их едя́т,
 * They are being eaten,
 * а они́ глядя́т.
 * and they look.
 * }
 * Pies with eyes:
 * Их едя́т,
 * They are being eaten,
 * а они́ глядя́т.
 * and they look.
 * }
 * а они́ глядя́т.
 * and they look.
 * }
 * and they look.
 * }
 * }

That example also demonstrates other features of Southern dialects: palatalised final in the third-person forms of verbs,  for  and  for  (in some places) and, clear unstressed  for  or.

Spelling
Generally, vowel reduction is not reflected in the Russian spelling. However, in some words, the spelling has been changed based on vowel reduction and so some words are spelled despite their etymology:


 * (instead of поро́м, meaning 'ferry'),
 * (instead of корова́й, meaning a special type of bread).

Spelling those words with $⟨а⟩$ was already common in the 18th century, but it co-existed with the spelling with $⟨о⟩$, conforming to etymology of those words. Dictionaries often gave both spellings. In the second half of the 19th century, Yakov Grot recommended spelling those words with $⟨о⟩$ (conforming to their etymology), but his recommendations were not followed by all editors. The Ushakov Dictionary (1935–1940) gives паро́м, корова́й and карава́й. Finally the spelling of those words with $⟨а⟩$ was set by the 1956 orthographic codification (orthographic rules and spelling dictionary). That is, in cases of doubt, codifiers of 1956 based their choice not on etymological conformity but on the spread of usage.


 * (instead of сведе́тель, meaning 'witness').

That spelling has a long history and is based on a folk etymology basing the word on ви́деть (to see,) instead of ве́дать (to know).

In the closely related Belarusian, the original has merged with, like in Standard Russian, but the reduced pronunciation is reflected in the spelling.