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rDEFINITION
rCHARACTERISTICSrCLASSIFICATION
rENGLISH PURE VOWELS
rENGLISH DIPHTHONGS
rENGLISH TRIPHTHONGS
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Vowelsounds differ from consonant sounds in
that they are produced not by blocking air in
its passage from the lungs but by passing airthrough 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
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Vowelsare 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
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Oral, i.e. the air flows out of the oralcavity (with the velum raised).Voiced, i.e. vowels are produced with
the vibration of the vocal cords.Syllabic, i.e. a vowel can form asyllable itself.Determined by the shape and size of
the oral cavity (the positions of thetongue and lips), especially by thetongueheightand the tonguepart.
CHARACTERISTICS
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Avery & Ehrlich (1995: 28) classify vowels in terms
of:
TongueHeightwhether the tongue is high or
low in the mouth.
Frontness/Backnesswhether the front or the
back of the tongue is involved.
Tenseness/Laxnesswhether the muscles are
tense or lax.
LipRoundingwhether the lips are rounded.Peter Roach (2000) would distinguish vowels in terms
of lengthwhether the pronunciation of vowels is
longor shortrather than tenseness/laxness.
CLASSIFICATION
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The height of the tongue allows us to distinguish high(close), low (open), or mid vowels:
The high/closevowels in beat /i:/, bit
/I/, boot/u:/ and book/U/are made
with the tongue raisedaboveits rest position.
The low/openvowels in bat /{/, bar /A:/, and
botch/Q/ are made with the tongue below its rest
position. The midvowel in bet /e/, but/V/ and bought
/O:/ are made with the tongue neither high
nor low in the mouth.
TONGUE HEIGHT
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The tongue part allow us to classify vowelseither front, backor central:
The frontvowels in beat/i:/ or bat
/{/are made with the front part of the
tongue.
The backvowels in boot/u:/ or
botch/Q/ are made with the back
part of the tongue.
The centralvowels in but/V/ or birth
TONGUE PART
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The tension (tenseness) of a vowel allows us to
classify it either tenseor lax:
The tensevowels in beat/i:, boot
/u:/, birth/3:, and
bought/O:/ are produced with extra
muscle tension.
The laxvowels in bit /I/, book
/U/, botch/Q/, bet /e/, andbut
/V/ are produced without this tension.
Tensevowelsare produced with much more
effortthan laxvowels.
TENSION/TENSENESS
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The backvowels 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 towardseach otherand the lips often pushed forwards,
resulting in some protrusion.
The lowbackvowel inbar/A:/is the onlyEnglish backvowel that occurs without lip
rounding.
All non-backvowels are unrounded.
LIP ROUNDING
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The frontvowels in beat /i:/, bit
/I/, bet /e/, and bat /{/are
all pronounced with the lips more or lessspread, i.e. with the corners of the lips
moved away from each other as for a
smile.
All Englishfrontvowels are more or less
spread.
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The centralvowels in but/V/and birth
/3:/ are all pronounced with the
neutrallips, i.e. with the lips neither
rounded nor spread.
All Englishcentralvowels are neutral.
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The lengthof a vowel allows us to classify it
either longor short. The pronunciation of
longvowelsis held longer than that of short
vowels.
The sevenEnglish shortvowels/I, e,
{, V, U, Q, and @/are
only relativelyshort. The fiveEnglish long
vowels/i:, 3:. O:, A:, and
u:/ tendto be longer than short vowels
LENGTH
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It is believed that English longvowels are
produced with greater tension of the tongue
muscles than their shortcounterparts.
Therefore they are referred to as tense
vowels.
It is also believed that English shortvowels
are produced with much lesser tension of the
tonguemuscles and thus tend to be lax.
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English longvowels differ from English short
vowels not only in lengthbut also in quality.
Distinct differences in qualityresult from
differences in the tongue height, the tongue
part, the lip-rounding and the tenseness of
the vowels. Therefore, English longand short
vowel symbols should be different from each
other.
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It is necessary to say that the length of all
English vowels variesvery much according
to:
context: compare vowels in beat, bit, and
betvs. vowels in bead, bid and bed.
presence or absence of stress: compare
the vowel in to record vs. the vowel in a
record.
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A vowel which remains constant and donot 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: frontvowels,backvowels and centralvowels
PURE VOWELS
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r/i:/ long,tense, high/close,front, spread vowel
FRONT VOWELS
r/I/ short,lax, high/close, front,slightly spread vowel
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r/e/ short, lax,mid, front, slightlyspread vowel
FRONT VOWELS
r/{/short, low/open,front, slightly spread vowel,
a bit tenser than /e/
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r/u:/ long,
tense, high/close,back, rounded,
slightly protrudedvowel
r /U/ short, lax,high/close (a bit lowerthan /u:/), back,slightly rounded andprotruded vowel
BACK VOWELS
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r/O:/ long,tense, mid, back,rounded but notprotruded vowel
r/Q/ short,lax, low/open,back, slightlyrounded but not
protruded vowel
r/A:/ long,tense, fully
low/open, back,
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r/@/short, lax,mid, central, neutralvowel, only occurs inunstressed syllables
r/3:/ long,tense, between midand open-mid, central,neutral vowel
r/V/ short, lax,fairly low/open,central, neutral vowel
CENTRAL VOWELS
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PURE VOWELS
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Diphthongs are sounds which consists ofa movementor glidefrom one vowel to
another.
The first part is much longerand stronger
than the second part.
[Roach, 2000: 21] In terms of length, diphthongsare like
longvowels.
DIPHTHONGS
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DIPHTHONGS
The English eightdiphthongs are usually divided intotwomain groups:
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Centringdiphthongs glide
towards /@/(theschwa)
r/ I@/ the
staqting pointis a littlebitcloseqthan/I/: beard, Ian,
fierce
r/e@/: aired,cairn, scarce
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Closingdiphthongs all glidefrom a relatively moreopen vowel towards arelatively more closevowel. Threedipthongsglide towards /I/are:
r/eI/: paid, pain,face
r/aI/ thestaqting pointis between front and
central: tide, cycle, nice
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Two diphthongs glide
towards/U/, so that asthe tongue moves closerto the roof of the mouth,there is at the same time
a roundingmovement ofthe lips.
r/@U/: load, some,
most
r/aU/ thestaqting point
is ruite
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DIPHTHONGS
It is believed that English longvowels and
diphthongsare tense, and shortvowels are lax.
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A triphthong is a glide from onevowel toanotherand then to a third, all producedrapidlyand without interruption.
Five English triphthongs are composed of
the five closingdiphthongsplus theschwa /@/at the end.
r/eI/ + /@/= /eI@/: layer,
playerr/aI/ + /@/= /aI@/:
liar, firer/OI/ +/@/ = /OI@/: loyal,
royal + =
TRIPHTHONGS
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In English triphthongs, the extend of the vowelmovement is very small, except in verycarefulpronunciation. The middleof the threevowel qualities of the triphthong can hardly
be heard and the resulting sound is difficultto distinguish from some of the diphthongsand long vowels.
There is also a problem of whether atriphthong is felt to contain one, or twosyllables.
TRIPHTHONGS
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