Mansi phonology

The inventory presented here is a maximal collection of segments found across the Mansi varieties. Some remarks:
 * 1) /tsʲ/ was only found in Southern Mansi and corresponds to /sʲ/ in the other varieties.
 * 2) /ʃ/ is absent in most dialects of the Northern and Eastern groups, having merged into /s/.
 * 3) The voiceless velar fricatives /x/, /xʷ/ are only found in the Northern group and the Lower Konda dialect of the Eastern group, resulting from spirantization of *k, *kʷ adjacent to original back vowels.
 * 4) According to Honti, a contrast between *w and *ɣʷ can be reconstructed, but this does not surface in any of the attested varieties.
 * 5) The labialization contrast among the velars dates back to Proto-Mansi, but was in several varieties strengthened by labialization of velars adjacent to rounded vowels. In particular, Proto-Mansi *yK → Core Mansi *æKʷ (a form of cheshirization).

The vowel systems across Mansi show great variety. As typical across the Uralic languages, many more vowel distinctions were possible in the initial, stressed syllable than in unstressed ones. Up to 18–19 stressed vowel contrasts may be found in the Western and Eastern dialects, while Northern Mansi has a much reduced, largely symmetric system of 8 vowels, though lacking short ** and long **: