English Vowels

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LNG 2243

PHONETICS AND
PHONOLOGY

TOPIC 3:
ENGLISH VOWELS
Table of contents
English Vowels - Sounds and Symbols

01 02 03
Syllable Monophthongs Diphthongs

04 05
Position of the tongue Roundedness
● Tongue Height
● Tongue Advancement
Tenseness/ Laxness
VOWELS IN IPA
Syllable
Definition
• A unit of pronunciation that can join other
syllables to form longer words or be a word in Examples
and of itself.
• The indefinite article "a" is a syllable
• Syllables must contain a singular vowel sound (one vowel sound, with no consonants).
and may or may not have consonants before,
after, or surrounding the vowel sound
• The word "oven" has two syllables
(pronounced as a unit)
because it has two vowel sounds –
• For instance, the word 'butter' contains two "ov" /-ʌv/ + "en" /-ən/ (each of these
syllables: 'but' and 'ter'. Book' has one syllable, syllables includes a vowel sound and
and ' reading' has two syllables. a consonant).
.
Syllable (cont.)
Below are some examples of words with different numbers of
syllables:

• 'Tie' has one syllable (monosyllabic)


• 'Rescue' has two syllables - Res + cue (disyllabic)
• 'Alphabet' has three syllables - Al + pha + bet (trisyllabic)
• 'Activity' has four syllables - Ac + tiv + i + ty (quadrisyllabic)
• 'Electricity' has five syllables - E + lec + tri + ci + ty
Traits of a Syllable (cont.)
• A syllable is made up of one or more letters with a vowel sound at its
core. This does not necessarily mean that every syllable contains a
vowel, but it will include a vowel sound when pronounced.

• Eg: Rhythm - which has two syllables, does not contain any vowels, but
it is said with two vowel sounds.

• Therefore, spelling is not a good indication of how many syllables a


word has. The pronunciation of a word determines the number of
syllables.

• Examples: Straights, Strengths, Stretched


VOWELS
• A sound that is pronounced with opened mouth, no contact between the tongue and the
top of the mouth or teeth and no obstruction to the flow of air.

• Vowel, in human speech, sound in which the flow of air from the lungs passes through
the mouth, which functions as a resonance chamber, with minimal obstruction and
without audible friction (e.g., the i in “fit,” and the a in “pack.”)

• We can use five letters of English represent the vowel sound: a, e, i, o, u.


Even though the English writing system only
20 vowels in total: has five vowel letters - (a, i, u, e, o), there are
actually 20 different vowel sounds that you
• 7 short vowels: /ɪ/ /ʊ/ /ə/ /e/ /ɒ/ /ʌ/ /æ/ will need to master to speak English with a
good accent
• 5 long vowels: /iː/ /uː/ /ɑː/ /ɔː/ /ɜː/
• 8 diphthongs: /eɪ/ /aɪ//ɔɪ/ /əʊ/ /aʊ/ /ɪə/ /eə/ /ʊə/
SCHWA
The mouth position for /ə/ is neutral – the lips are
The schwa sound /ə/ - the sound relaxed, not rounded, the jaw is roughly half way
open, and the tongue is flat, not forward or back.
/uh/ (like the sound someone makes
when trying to think of a word) is It is very similar to the long thinking vowel sound
/ɜː/ as in BIRD, but it is always weak, so it’s
the most common vowel sound in short and soft.
English; about one in three vowels a
native speaker pronounces.

Criteria:
• It has a neutral mouth position
• It only appears on unstressed
syllables It takes very little time to say in a word – skip right over it
• Can be spelt with any vowel when saying a word (e.g. the second ‘o’ in ‘chocolate’ or the
first ‘e’ in ‘different’) or don’t even represent it when
letter. spelling (e.g. the vowel sound between ‘-th-‘ and ‘-m’ in
‘rhythm’).
SCHWA (cont)
• The English language is stress-timed (a language where the stressed syllables are said at
approximately regular intervals, and unstressed syllables shorten to fit this rhythm)

• In an English sentence, the words that communicate the most important parts of a message
(the nouns, main verbs, adjectives and adverbs) are stressed.

The ground is wet

• Function words (auxiliary verbs, pronouns, articles, conjunctions and prepositions) are not
usually stressed, in order to maintain a regular rhythm in the language. For the same reason,
words of more than one syllable have both stressed (strong) and unstressed (weak) syllables.
Ba-na-na

the second syllable is stressed and, consequently, louder.


MONOPHTHONGS
• From the Greek: mono = single, phthong = sound.

• Vowels are produced with the vocal tract open. Said to be articulated with
an open articulation in opposition to consonants.

• Sometimes called pure vowel sounds and have no restriction to the air
through the mouth.

• They are all produced with vibration of the vocal folds = voiced sounds.

• The escape of the airflow coming from the lungs is always made through
the mouth only, because the soft palate is in its raised position = oral
sounds.

• The sound of each vowel is made by the shape and volume of the space in
the mouth, which is shaped by the tongue, the lips and the jaw.
LONG VOWELS
• Long vowels sound the same as their spoken name. For example, the vowel /a/
in bake sounds the same as the letter /a/ in the alphabet.

• Easy to identify because they sound like their name, but they can be tricky to learn, as
there are various spellings for each long vowel sound. Examples of long vowel words
include

• Long vowels are vowel sounds that are pronounced for a longer duration compared to
their short counterparts. In English, there are five primary long vowel sounds: /ɑː/,
/iː/, /ɜː/, /ɔː/, and /uː/.
LONG VOWELS
Here are the longer vowel forms in more detail:

• /ɑː/ - This sound is commonly represented by the letters ‘a’


(e.g., name, gate) and ‘ai’ (e.g., rain, paint).

• /iː/ - The long ‘ee’ sound can be represented by the letters


‘ee’ (e.g., bee, tree) and ‘ea’ (e.g., sea, heat).

• /ɜː/ - This sound is usually represented by the letters ‘er’


(e.g., her, term) and ‘ir’ (e.g., bird, firm).

• /ɔː/ - The long ‘o’ sound can be represented by the letters ‘o’
(e.g., go, hope) and ‘oa’ (e.g., boat, coal).

• /uː/ - This sound is commonly represented by the letters ‘u’


(e.g., mule, music) and ‘oo’ (e.g., moon, soon).
SHORT VOWELS
• Unlike long vowels that sound more drawn out, short vowels sound quick and concise.

• Short vowels are vowel sounds that are pronounced briefly and do not have an extended duration
like long vowels. In English, there are five primary short vowel sounds.

• These are sometimes represented by these symbols: /æ/, /ɛ/, /ɪ/, /ɒ/, and /ʌ/

• /æ/ - Represented by the letter ‘a’ (e.g., cat, hat) and occasionally by ‘ai’ (e.g., rain, said).
• /e/ - Represented by the letter ‘e’ (e.g., bed, red) and ‘ea’ (e.g., head, bread).
• /ɪ/ - Represented by the letter ‘I’ (e.g., sit, hit) and occasionally by ‘y’ (e.g., gym, symbol).
• /ɒ/ - Represented by the letter ‘o’ (e.g., dog, hot) and occasionally by ‘a’ (e.g., watch, want).
• /ʌ/ - Represented by the letter ‘u’ (e.g., bus, sun) and occasionally by ‘o’ (e.g., come, love).

• It's important to note that the pronunciation of short vowels can vary depending on the word and
regional accents.
Basic rules for Using Long and Short Vowels
• Here are some basic long and short vowel rules to help you understand the concept well. Do remember
that rules have exceptions too.
1. When a word has only one vowel and ends with a consonant, the vowel makes a short sound.

‘a’ in ‘jam’
‘e’ in ‘west’
‘o’ in ‘hot’
‘i’ in ‘fish’
‘u’ in ‘cup’

2. When a word has two vowels separated by two or more letters, the first vowel makes a short sound

as in ‘apple’
as in ‘octopus’
as in ‘basket’
as in ‘elephant’
Basic rules for Using Long and Short Vowels
• Here are some basic long and short vowel rules to help you understand the concept well. Do remember
that rules have exceptions too.

3. When a word has two vowels walking together the first one does the talking. The first
vowel makes a long sound and the second vowel remains silent.

In the word ‘beat’, the ‘e’ is long while the ‘a’ is silent.
In the word ‘goat’, the ‘o’ represents a long ‘o’ sound while ‘a’ stays silent.

4. A vowel at the end of a syllable is almost always long such as try, potato and tomato.
Short Vowel Sound Phonetic Symbol Example Short Vowel Words

a /æ/ cat, man, dad, tap, rat, sad, tax, cap

e /ɛ/ hen, wet, pet, fed, leg, set, bed, ten

i /ɪ/ win, hit, pip, kid, sit, nit, did, six, wit

o /ɒ/ hot, pop, dot, sob, cod, lot, fox, rob

u /ʌ/ sun, bus, pun, mum, run, mud, cub, gun

oo /ʊ/ foot, book, could, should, look, took

uh /ə/ paper, support, dollar, hotter


DIPHTHONGS
• The word "diphthong" comes from the Greek
and means "two voices" or "two sounds." In
phonetics, a diphthong is a vowel in which there
is a noticeable sound change within the same
syllable.

• The process of moving from one vowel sound to


another is called gliding (sound created by two
adjacent vowels in the same syllable) which is
why another name for a diphthong is a gliding
vowel

• The rule of thumb is: If the sound moves, it’s a


diphthong; if it's static, it’s a monophthong.
Each of the following diphthongs is represented
by its phonetic symbol.
Diphthong Similar sound Occurences Examples
/aɪ/ eye most often occurs with crime, like, lime
DIPHTHONGS letter combinations that
include i/, /igh/, and /y.
/əʊ/ boat most often occurs with slow, moan, though
letter combinations that
include /ow/, /oa/ and /o/.
/aʊ/ “ow!” most often occurs with brown, hound, now
letter combinations that
include /ou/ and /ow/.
/eə/ air most often occurs with lair, stair, bear
letter combinations that
include /ai/, /a/, and /ea/.
/ɪə/ ear most often occurs with beer, near, pier
letter combinations that
include /ee/, /ie/ and /ea/.
/ɔɪ/ boy most often occurs with oil, toy, coil
letter combinations that
include /oy/ and /oi/.
/ʊə/ sure most occurs with letter lure, pure, fur
combinations that
include /oo/, /ou/, /u/,
and /ue/.
DIPHTHONGS IN DIALECTS
The variation of English pronunciations as a result of geographic proximity, or commonly
known as regional dialects is a literary phenomenon that occurs worldwide.
• The influence of the Terengganu dialect on English
• One of the most interesting ways in
which diphthongs relate to spoken
pronunciation
language is in how they’ve evolved
into regional accents and dialects from • Most native Terengganu Malay (TrgM) speakers experience
their languages of origin. difficulties in employing Standard English (SE) in a
conversation. These dialectal features in English which are
• In the borough Brooklyn, for example, caused by mother tongue interference become more
when someone says, “Let the dog out,” apparent when the speakers utilise their first language,
the word dog contains a distinctive influenced by the Terengganu dialect in most parts of their
“aw” sound so that “the dog” becomes lifestyles, limiting the significance of English usage. .
a “dawg.”
Class exercise

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