DEFINITIONCHARACTERISTICS CLASSIFICATION

ENGLISH PURE VOWELS ENGLISH DIPHTHONGS

ENGLISH TRIPHTHONGS

SESSION 3: ENGLISH VOWELS

“Vowel sounds differ from consonant sounds in

that they are produced not by blocking air in

its passage from the lungs but by passing air

through different shapes of the mouth and

different positions of the tongue and lips

unobstructed by narrow passages (except at

the glottis).” [Finegan, 1994: 39]

DEFINITION

“Vowels are differentiated from consonants

by the relatively wide opening in the

mouth as air passes from the lungs out of

the body. This means that there is

relatively little obstruction of the

airstream in comparison to consonants. [Avery & Ehrlich, 1995: 28]

DEFINITION

Oral, i.e. the air flows out of the oral cavity (with the velum raised).

Voiced, i.e. vowels are produced with the vibration of the vocal cords.

Syllabic, i.e. a vowel can form a syllable itself.

Determined by the shape and size of the oral cavity (the positions of the tongue and lips), especially by the tongue height and the tongue part.

CHARACTERISTICS

Avery & Ehrlich (1995: 28) classify vowels in terms of:

Tongue Height — whether the tongue is high or

low in the mouth.

Frontness/Backness — whether the front or the

back of the tongue is involved.

Tenseness/Laxness — whether the muscles are

tense or lax.

Lip Rounding — whether the lips are rounded.”

Peter Roach (2000) would distinguish vowels in terms

of length – whether the pronunciation of vowels is

long or short – rather than tenseness/laxness.

CLASSIFICATION

The height of the tongue allows us to distinguish high

(close), low (open), or mid vowels:

The high/close vowels in beat /i:/, bit /I/, boot /u:/

and book /U/ are made with the tongue raised above

its rest position.

The low/open vowels in bat /{/, bar /A:/, and botch

/Q/ are made with the tongue below its rest position.

The mid vowel in bet /e/, but /V/ and bought /O:/ are

made with the tongue neither high nor low in the

mouth.

TONGUE HEIGHT

The tongue part allow us to classify vowels

either front, back or central:

The front vowels in beat /i:/ or bat /{/ are

made with the front part of the tongue.

The back vowels in boot /u:/ or botch /Q/ are

made with the back part of the tongue.

The central vowels in but /V/ or birth /3:/ are

made with neither the front nor the back

part of the tongue.

TONGUE PART

The tension (tenseness) of a vowel allows us to

classify it either tense or lax:

The tense vowels in beat /i:, boot /u:/, birth /3:,

and bought /O:/ are produced with extra muscle

tension.

The lax vowels in bit /I/, book /U/, botch /Q/,

bet /e/, and but /V/ are produced without this

tension.

Tense vowels are produced with much more effort

than lax vowels.

TENSION/TENSENESS

The back vowels in boot /u:/, book /U/, bought

/O:/, and botch /Q/ are all pronounced with the

lips rounded, i.e. with the corners of the lips

brought towards each other and the lips often

pushed forwards, resulting in some protrusion.

The low back vowel in bar /A:/is the only English

back vowel that occurs without lip rounding.

All non-back vowels are unrounded.

LIP ROUNDING

The front vowels in beat /i:/, bit /I/, bet /e/,

and bat /{/ are all pronounced with the lips

more or less spread, i.e. with the corners

of the lips moved away from each other as

for a smile.

All English front vowels are more or less

spread.

LIP ROUNDING

The central vowels in but /V/ and birth /3:/

are all pronounced with the neutral lips,

i.e. with the lips neither rounded nor

spread.

All English central vowels are neutral.

LIP ROUNDING

The length of a vowel allows us to classify it

either long or short. The pronunciation of long

vowels is held longer than that of short

vowels.

The seven English short vowels /I, e, {, V, U,

Q, and @/ are only relatively short. The five

English long vowels /i:, 3:. O:, A:, and u:/ tend

to be longer than short vowels in similar

context.

LENGTH

It is believed that English long vowels are

produced with greater tension of the tongue

muscles than their short counterparts.

Therefore they are referred to as tense vowels.

It is also believed that English short vowels

are produced with much lesser tension of the

tongue muscles and thus tend to be lax.

LENGTH

English long vowels differ from English short

vowels not only in length but also in quality.

Distinct differences in quality result from

differences in the tongue height, the tongue

part, the lip-rounding and the tenseness of the

vowels. Therefore, English long and short vowel

symbols should be different from each other.

LENGTH

It is necessary to say that the length of all

English vowels varies very much according to:

context: compare vowels in beat, bit, and bet

vs. vowels in bead, bid and bed.

presence or absence of stress: compare the

vowel in to record vs. the vowel in a record.

LENGTH

“A vowel which remains constant and do not glide is called a pure vowel.”

[Roach, 2000: 21]There are twelve pure vowels in English: /I,

e, {, V, U, Q, @, i:, 3:. O:, A:, u:/.

Classified according to the tongue part, English vowels fall into sets: front vowels, back vowels and central vowels

PURE VOWELS

/i:/ long, tense, high/close, front, spread vowel

FRONT VOWELS

/I/ short, lax, high/close, front, slightly spread vowel

/e/ short, lax, mid, front, slightly spread vowel

FRONT VOWELS

/{/ short, low/open, front, slightly spread vowel, a bit tenser than /e/

/u:/ long, tense, high/close, back, rounded, slightly protruded vowel

/U/ short, lax, high/close (a bit lower than /u:/), back, slightly rounded and protruded vowel

BACK VOWELS

/O:/ long, tense, mid, back, rounded but not protruded vowel

/Q/ short, lax, low/open, back, slightly rounded but not protruded vowel

/A:/ long, tense, fully low/open, back, neutral vowel

BACK VOWELS

/@/ short, lax, mid, central, neutral vowel, only occurs in unstressed syllables

/3:/ long, tense, between mid and open-mid, central, neutral vowel

/V/ short, lax, fairly low/open, central, neutral vowel

CENTRAL VOWELS

PURE VOWELS

Diphthongs are “sounds which consists of

a movement or glide from one vowel to

another.”

The first part is much longer and stronger

than the second part.

[Roach, 2000: 21]

In terms of length, diphthongs are like

long vowels.

DIPHTHONGS

DIPHTHONGS

The English eight diphthongs are usually divided into two main groups:

Centring diphthongs glide towards /@/ (the schwa)

/ I@/ the starting point is a little bit closer than /I/: beard, Ian, fierce

/e@/: aired, cairn, scarce

/U@/ the starting point is slightly closer than /u:/: moored, tour, pour

CENTRING DIPHTHONGS

Closing diphthongs all glide from a relatively more open vowel towards a relatively more close vowel. Three dipthongs glide towards /I/ are:

/eI/: paid, pain, face

/aI/ the starting point is between front and central: tide, cycle, nice

/OI/: boy, coin, voice

CLOSING DIPHTHONGS

Two diphthongs glide towards /U/, so that as the tongue moves closer to the roof of the mouth, there is at the same time a rounding movement of the lips.

/@U/: load, some, most

/aU/ the starting point is quite similar to /A:/: loud, gown, house

CLOSING DIPHTHONGS

DIPHTHONGSIt is believed that English long vowels and diphthongs are tense, and short vowels are lax.

A triphthong is a glide from one vowel to another and then to a third, all produced rapidly and without interruption.

Five English triphthongs are composed of the five closing diphthongs plus the “schwa” /@/ at the end.

/eI/ + /@/ = /eI@/: layer, player /aI/ + /@/ = /aI@/: liar, fire /OI/ +/@/ = /OI@/: loyal, royal /@U/ + /@/ = /@U@/: lower, mower /aU/ + /@/ = /aU@/: power, hour

TRIPHTHONGS

In English triphthongs, the extend of the vowel movement is very small, except in very careful pronunciation. The middle of the three vowel qualities of the triphthong can hardly be heard and the resulting sound is difficult to distinguish from some of the diphthongs and long vowels.

There is also a problem of whether a triphthong is felt to contain one, or two syllables.

TRIPHTHONGS