Djinang sounds

The Djinang language is based on a set of 24 phonemes, of which only 3 of those phonemes are vowels; giving Djinang a high consonant-vowel ratio of 7 (Maddieson 2013). This differs from most Pacific languages as they tend to favor larger vowel variation along with a modest set of consonants. Thus most Pacific languages customarily have average to low consonant-vowel ratios.

Consonants
Djinang has 21 consonants /p, t, ṯ, tj, k, b, d, ḏ, dj, g, m n, ṉ, ny, ŋ, l, ḻ, w, rr, r, y/ the underlined letters have an /r/ sound in front of them, e.g. /ḏ/ = rd (Waters 1979). All languages in Australia share similar sound systems characteristic of few fricatives and sibilants, and the only allophones, are allophones of plosives. For example, the phonemes /b/, /d/, and /g/ could be sounded as /p/, /t/, and /k/ in certain Aboriginal languages (Capell 1979). However in Djinang there is a clear contrast between those phonemes along with the phonemes of tj/dj (Waters 1979).

Vowels
Of Djinang’s 24 phoneme set, only 3 are vowels, /a/, /i/, and /u/. In addition to the low vowel count, or because of it, there are also no instances of diphthongs or triphthongs. Moreover there is no distinction of vowel length; however there are instances of vowel lengthening when certain conditions are met, but they do not warrant a unique designation (Waters 1979). Syllable structure The syllable structure of the Djinang language would be classified as moderately complex (Maddieson 2013). It has three underlying syllable patterns CV, CVC, and CVCC (Waters 1979). Because of Djinang’s syllable patterns there are very few words that actually start with vowels or with consonant clusters e.g. ‘str’ in straight (Koch 2007).