Corsican phonology

Vowels
As in Italian, the grapheme $\langlei\rangle$ appears in some digraphs and trigraphs in which it does not represent the phonemic vowel. All vowels are pronounced except in a few well-defined instances. $\langlei\rangle$ is not pronounced before $\langlea\rangle$, $\langleo\rangle$, $\langleu\rangle$ after $\langlesc\rangle$, $\langlesg\rangle$, $\langlec\rangle$ and $\langleg\rangle$: sciarpa ; or initially in some words: istu.

Vowels may be nasalized before $\langlen\rangle$ (which is assimilated to $\langlem\rangle$ before $\langlep\rangle$ or $\langleb\rangle$) and the palatal nasal consonant represented by $\langlegn\rangle$. The nasal vowels are represented by the vowel plus $\langlen\rangle$, $\langlem\rangle$ or $\langlegn\rangle$. The combination is a digraph or trigraph indicating the nasalized vowel. The consonant is pronounced in weakened form. The same combination of letters might not be the digraph or trigraph but might be just the non-nasal vowel followed by the consonant at full weight. The speaker must know the difference. Example of nasal: $\langlepane\rangle$ is pronounced and not.

The vowel inventory, or collection of phonemic vowels (and the major allophones), transcribed in IPA symbols, is:

Consonants

 * Notes
 * As in the other Romance languages, and  occur only in the consonant clusters /ɲj/ (spelled $\langlegn\rangle$, as in Italian and French) and /ʎj/ (spelled $\langlegl\rangle$, as in Italian).