LingoflyИ и — i
«i» is a vowel of the Kazakh script, read as “iy or uhy — two sounds”. A short vowel with a y-glide after it — uhy in back words, iy in front words. In loanwords such as "taxi" it is a plain ee. For example, in the word “кино” — cinema. The Kazakh alphabet has 42 letters in total, and this character can be played right here. Do not confuse it with dotted i: this one is two sounds in a row, the dotted one a single short vowel.
In short
| Character | И и |
| Name | i |
| Sound | iy or uhy — two sounds |
| What it is | a vowel |
In our course the character comes 12th of 42, its neighbours in the course are з and й, appears in 381 words of this site.
How to type И и
- On a phone: add the Kazakh keyboard in the keyboard settings (Gboard on Android; Keyboards in the iPhone settings).
- In Word on Windows: type U+0438 and press Alt+X right after it — the code turns into the character.
- On a Mac: switch to the Unicode Hex Input source, hold Option and type 0438.
- Unicode code points: и — U+0438, И — U+0418. With them, the characters can be found in the character map of any system.
How it sounds
A short vowel with a y-glide after it — uhy in back words, iy in front words. In loanwords such as "taxi" it is a plain ee
The character in a word
A lone character is hard to remember: memory holds on to meaning, and a letter has none. The word it stands in provides that anchor.
- киноcinema
The character in the “letters for two sounds” group
Each of them hides a second sound. е gets a y before it at the start of a word, and ю and я are y plus a vowel. и is a short vowel plus y, and у is w, or a short vowel plus w.
Words with this character
How to remember this character
A single letter is the hardest thing to remember: memory has nothing to hold on to — a character has no meaning. A three-step loop works: see the character, try to recall the sound (for «i» it is “iy or uhy — two sounds”, as in the word “кино”), see the right answer.
And come back to it the next day, not in an hour: a check a day or two later beats a check the same day. Nobody holds the whole alphabet — 42 letters — at once.
- It is better to test yourself the next day than at the end of the same session. That is why a word comes back to you tomorrow.checked many timesAdesope, Trevisan & Sundararajan, 2017, Review of Educational Research 87(3) · g = 0.82 when tested a day or two later, against 0.56 on the same day.
- Studying a little every day gets more into your head than spending the same total time in one sitting.checked many timesDonovan & Radosevich, 1999, Journal of Applied Psychology 84(5) · 63 studies compared, difference d = 0.46 — a sizeable figure for a learning effect.
Frequently asked
How does the Kazakh character и read?
As “iy or uhy — two sounds” — it is a vowel of the Kazakh script. A short vowel with a y-glide after it — uhy in back words, iy in front words. In loanwords such as "taxi" it is a plain ee. For example, in the word “кино” — cinema.
What is the letter и called?
I. A character's name and its sound are different things in the Kazakh script: it is called “i” and reads as “iy or uhy — two sounds”. Learn the second one: the name only helps when the alphabet is recited aloud.
What can и be confused with?
Do not confuse it with dotted i: this one is two sounds in a row, the dotted one a single short vowel. Similar characters are best studied side by side and deliberately compared: learned on different days, they stay separate and get mixed up at their first meeting inside a word.