Himalayan Linguistics

This study investigates the acoustic features of the vowels of the eastern variety of Bodo. Data collected from 12 speakers in the field, reading a list of Bodo words revealed that Bodo has six unique vowel phonemes namely, , /i, u, e, ə, o, a/ where the vowel /ə/ is a higher than a normal mid, central vowel. While vowel F1 and F2 are distinct in Bodo, F3 does not play any role. The claims about Bodo vowels are further strengthened by normalized vowel plots and Euclidean distances calculated for vowel pairs.