In the pronunciation of the Russian language, several ways of vowel reduction (and its absence) are distinguished between the standard language and dialects. Russian orthography most often does not reflect vowel reduction, which can confuse foreign-language learners, but some spelling reforms have changed some words. Other types of reduction are phonetic, such as that of the high vowels (/i/ and /u/), which become near-close. Thus, игра́ть ('to play') is pronounced [ɪˈɡratʲ], and мужчи́на ('man') is pronounced [mʊˈɕːinə].