Legend: unrounded • rounded
66-563: Tuvaluan can mean: The Tuvaluan language , an Austronesian language spoken in Tuvalu, Fiji, Kiribati, Nauru and New Zealand Anything to do with the Oceanian island nation of Tuvalu Tuvaluan people Topics referred to by the same term [REDACTED] This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the title Tuvaluan . If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change
132-528: A spectrogram . The vocal tract acts as a resonant cavity , and the position of the jaw, lips, and tongue affect the parameters of the resonant cavity, resulting in different formant values. The acoustics of vowels can be visualized using spectrograms, which display the acoustic energy at each frequency, and how this changes with time. The first formant, abbreviated "F1", corresponds to vowel openness (vowel height). Open vowels have high F1 frequencies, while close vowels have low F1 frequencies, as can be seen in
198-428: A back vowel, the more intense is the rounding. However, in some languages, roundedness is independent from backness, such as French and German (with front rounded vowels), most Uralic languages ( Estonian has a rounding contrast for /o/ and front vowels), Turkic languages (with a rounding distinction for front vowels and /u/ ), and Vietnamese with back unrounded vowels. Nonetheless, even in those languages there
264-404: A direct mapping of tongue position." Nonetheless, the concept that vowel qualities are determined primarily by tongue position and lip rounding continues to be used in pedagogy, as it provides an intuitive explanation of how vowels are distinguished. Theoretically, vowel height refers to the vertical position of either the tongue or the jaw (depending on the model) relative to either the roof of
330-666: A language's writing system , particularly if the language uses an alphabet . In writing systems based on the Latin alphabet , the letters ⟨a⟩ , ⟨e⟩ , ⟨i⟩ , ⟨o⟩ , ⟨u⟩ , ⟨y⟩ , ⟨w⟩ and sometimes others can all be used to represent vowels. However, not all of these letters represent the vowels in all languages that use this writing, or even consistently within one language. Some of them, especially ⟨w⟩ and ⟨y⟩ , are also used to represent approximant consonants . Moreover,
396-417: A lesser extent [ɨ, ɘ, ɜ, æ] , etc.), can be secondarily qualified as close or open, as in the traditional conception, but this refers to jaw rather than tongue position. In addition, rather than there being a unitary category of back vowels, the regrouping posits raised vowels , where the body of the tongue approaches the velum ( [u, o, ɨ ], etc.), and retracted vowels , where the root of the tongue approaches
462-490: A narrower constriction of the vocal tract than vowels, and so may be considered consonants on that basis. Nonetheless, the phonetic and phonemic definitions would still conflict for the syllabic /l/ in table or the syllabic nasals in button and rhythm . The traditional view of vowel production, reflected for example in the terminology and presentation of the International Phonetic Alphabet ,
528-421: A result of differences in prosody . The most important prosodic variables are pitch ( fundamental frequency ), loudness ( intensity ) and length ( duration ). However, the features of prosody are usually considered to apply not to the vowel itself, but to the syllable in which the vowel occurs. In other words, the domain of prosody is the syllable, not the segment (vowel or consonant). We can list briefly
594-465: A simple plot of F1 against F2. In fact, this kind of plot of F1 against F2 has been used by analysts to show the quality of the vowels in a wide range of languages, including RP, the Queen's English, American English, Singapore English, Brunei English, North Frisian, Turkish Kabardian, and various indigenous Australian languages. R-colored vowels are characterized by lowered F3 values. Rounding
660-403: A single phenomenon and posit instead three independent features of rounded (endolabial), compressed (exolabial), and unrounded. The lip position of unrounded vowels may also be classified separately as spread and neutral (neither rounded nor spread). Others distinguish compressed rounded vowels, in which the corners of the mouth are drawn together, from compressed unrounded vowels, in which
726-475: A sound produced with no constriction in the vocal tract) does not always match the phonological definition (i.e. a sound that forms the peak of a syllable). The approximants [j] and [w] illustrate this: both are without much of a constriction in the vocal tract (so phonetically they seem to be vowel-like), but they occur at the onset of syllables (e.g. in "yet" and "wet") which suggests that phonologically they are consonants. A similar debate arises over whether
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#1732766024650792-440: A two-syllable pronunciation of the word flower ( /ˈflaʊər/ ) phonetically form a disyllabic triphthong but are phonologically a sequence of a diphthong (represented by the letters ⟨ow⟩ ) and a monophthong (represented by the letters ⟨er⟩ ). Some linguists use the terms diphthong and triphthong only in this phonemic sense. The name "vowel" is often used for the symbols that represent vowel sounds in
858-672: A vowel might be represented by a letter usually reserved for consonants, or a combination of letters, particularly where one letter represents several sounds at once, or vice versa; examples from English include ⟨igh⟩ in "thigh" and ⟨x⟩ in "x-ray". In addition, extensions of the Latin alphabet have such independent vowel letters as ⟨ä⟩ , ⟨ö⟩ , ⟨ü⟩ , ⟨å⟩ , ⟨æ⟩ , and ⟨ø⟩ . The phonetic values vary considerably by language, and some languages use ⟨i⟩ and ⟨y⟩ for
924-433: A word like bird in a rhotic dialect has an r-colored vowel /ɝ/ or a syllabic consonant /ɹ̩/ . The American linguist Kenneth Pike (1943) suggested the terms " vocoid " for a phonetic vowel and "vowel" for a phonological vowel, so using this terminology, [j] and [w] are classified as vocoids but not vowels. However, Maddieson and Emmory (1985) demonstrated from a range of languages that semivowels are produced with
990-650: Is a Polynesian language closely related to the Ellicean group spoken in Tuvalu . It is more or less distantly related to all other Polynesian languages, such as Hawaiian , Māori , Tahitian , Samoan , Tokelauan and Tongan , and most closely related to the languages spoken on the Polynesian Outliers in Micronesia and Northern and Central Melanesia . Tuvaluan has borrowed considerably from Samoan,
1056-463: Is a syllabic speech sound pronounced without any stricture in the vocal tract . Vowels are one of the two principal classes of speech sounds, the other being the consonant . Vowels vary in quality, in loudness and also in quantity (length) . They are usually voiced and are closely involved in prosodic variation such as tone , intonation and stress . The word vowel comes from the Latin word vocalis , meaning "vocal" (i.e. relating to
1122-488: Is able to speak Tuvaluan. Native speakers of Tuvaluan have various names for their language. In the language itself, it is often referred to as te ggana Tuuvalu which translates to "the Tuvaluan language", or less formally as te ggana a tatou , meaning "our language". The dialects of Vaitupi and Funafuti are together known as a standard language called te 'gana māsani , meaning ‘the common language’. Formerly,
1188-427: Is an exolabial (compressed) back vowel, and sounds quite different from an English endolabial /u/ . Swedish and Norwegian are the only two known languages in which the feature is contrastive; they have both exo- and endo-labial close front vowels and close central vowels , respectively. In many phonetic treatments, both are considered types of rounding, but some phoneticians do not believe that these are subsets of
1254-485: Is disputed to have phonemic voiceless vowels but no language is confirmed to have them phonemically. Modal voice , creaky voice , and breathy voice (murmured vowels) are phonation types that are used contrastively in some languages. Often, they co-occur with tone or stress distinctions; in the Mon language , vowels pronounced in the high tone are also produced with creaky voice. In such cases, it can be unclear whether it
1320-437: Is generally realized by a decrease of F2 that tends to reinforce vowel backness. One effect of this is that back vowels are most commonly rounded while front vowels are most commonly unrounded; another is that rounded vowels tend to plot to the right of unrounded vowels in vowel charts. That is, there is a reason for plotting vowel pairs the way they are. In addition to variation in vowel quality as described above, vowels vary as
1386-438: Is highly unusual in contrasting true mid vowels with both close-mid and open-mid vowels, without any additional parameters such as length, roundness or ATR. The front vowels, /i ɪ e e̞ ɛ/ , along with open /a/ , make a six-way height distinction; this holds even for the nasal vowels. A few varieties of German have been reported to have five contrastive vowel heights that are independent of length or other parameters. For example,
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#17327660246501452-548: Is important for foreign communications and is often the language used in business and governmental settings. The sound system of Tuvaluan consists of five vowels ( /i/, /e/, /a/, /o/, /u/ ). All vowels come in short and long forms, which are contrastive. There are no diphthongs so every vowel is sounded separately. Example: taeao ‘tomorrow’ is pronounced as four separate syllables (ta-e-a-o). The sound system of Tuvaluan consists of 10 or 11 consonants ( /p/, /t/, /k/, /m/, /n/, /ŋ/, /f/, /v/, /s/, /h/, /l/ ), depending on
1518-400: Is known to contrast more than three degrees of backness nor is there a language that contrasts front with near-front vowels nor back with near-back ones. Although some English dialects have vowels at five degrees of backness, there is no known language that distinguishes five degrees of backness without additional differences in height or rounding. Roundedness is named after the rounding of
1584-578: Is low, consistent with the tongue being positioned towards the back of the mouth. The International Phonetic Alphabet defines five degrees of vowel backness (sorted according to backness, with the top-most one being the front-most back and the bottom-most being the back-most): To them may be added front-central and back-central, corresponding to the vertical lines separating central from front and back vowel spaces in several IPA diagrams. However, front-central and back-central may also be used as terms synonymous with near-front and near-back . No language
1650-414: Is not necessarily a direct one-to-one correspondence between the vowel sounds of a language and the vowel letters. Many languages that use a form of the Latin alphabet have more vowel sounds than can be represented by the standard set of five vowel letters. In English spelling, the five letters ⟨a⟩ ⟨e⟩ ⟨i⟩ ⟨o⟩ and ⟨u⟩ can represent
1716-416: Is one of articulatory features that determine a vowel's quality as distinguishing it from other vowels. Daniel Jones developed the cardinal vowel system to describe vowels in terms of the features of tongue height (vertical dimension), tongue backness (horizontal dimension) and roundedness (lip articulation). These three parameters are indicated in the schematic quadrilateral IPA vowel diagram on
1782-801: Is one of the most common morphological devices in Tuvalu, and works in a wide variety of ways. Firstly, it operates on verbs and adjectives. Jackson lists six ways it can function: filemu ‘peaceful, quiet’ → fifilemu ‘to be very peaceful, quiet’ filemu → fifilemu {‘peaceful, quiet’} {} {‘to be very peaceful, quiet’} fakalogo ‘to listen carefully, obey’ → fakalogologo ‘to listen casually’ fakalogo → fakalogologo {‘to listen carefully, obey’} {} {‘to listen casually’} tue ‘to shake, dust off’ → tuetue ‘to shake, dust off repeatedly’ tue → tuetue {‘to shake, dust off’} {} {‘to shake, dust off repeatedly’} masae ‘to be ripped, torn’ → masaesae Vowel A vowel
1848-497: Is spoken natively on Nui, and was important to Tuvaluans when its colonial administration was located in the Gilbert Islands . Samoan was introduced by missionaries, and has had the most impact on the language. During an intense period of colonization throughout Oceania in the nineteenth century, the Tuvaluan language was influenced by Samoan missionary-pastors. In an attempt to "Christianize" Tuvaluans, linguistic promotion of
1914-456: Is the tone, the voicing type, or the pairing of the two that is being used for phonemic contrast . The combination of phonetic cues (phonation, tone, stress) is known as register or register complex . Tenseness is used to describe the opposition of tense vowels vs. lax vowels . This opposition has traditionally been thought to be a result of greater muscular tension, though phonetic experiments have repeatedly failed to show this. Unlike
1980-474: Is usually some phonetic correlation between rounding and backness: front rounded vowels tend to be more front-central than front, and back unrounded vowels tend to be more back-central than back. Thus, the placement of unrounded vowels to the left of rounded vowels on the IPA vowel chart is reflective of their position in formant space. Different kinds of labialization are possible. In mid to high rounded back vowels
2046-456: Is very flexible, and there are more exceptions to the VSO standard than sentences which conform to it. Besnier (p. 134) demonstrates that VSO is statistically the least frequent word order, and OVS is the most frequent word order, but still believes VSO is syntactically the default. Often if emphasis is to be placed on a first person pronoun or personal name, then it may precede the verb so that
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2112-533: The Bavarian dialect of Amstetten has thirteen long vowels, which have been analyzed as four vowel heights (close, close-mid, mid, open-mid) each among the front unrounded, front rounded, and back rounded vowels, along with an open vowel for a fifth height: /i e ɛ̝ ɛ/, /y ø œ̝ œ/, /u o ɔ̝ ɔ/, /a/ . Apart from the aforementioned Kensiu language , no other language is known to contrast more than four degrees of vowel height. The parameter of vowel height appears to be
2178-631: The Khoisan languages . They might be called epiglottalized since the primary constriction is at the tip of the epiglottis. The greatest degree of pharyngealisation is found in the strident vowels of the Khoisan languages, where the larynx is raised, and the pharynx constricted, so that either the epiglottis or the arytenoid cartilages vibrate instead of the vocal cords. The terms pharyngealized , epiglottalized , strident , and sphincteric are sometimes used interchangeably. Rhotic vowels are
2244-715: The velum is lowered, and some air travels through the nasal cavity as well as the mouth. An oral vowel is a vowel in which all air escapes through the mouth. Polish and Portuguese also contrast nasal and oral vowels. Voicing describes whether the vocal cords are vibrating during the articulation of a vowel. Most languages have only voiced vowels, but several Native American languages , such as Cheyenne and Totonac , have both voiced and devoiced vowels in complementary distribution. Vowels are devoiced in whispered speech. In Japanese and in Quebec French , vowels that are between voiceless consonants are often devoiced. Keres
2310-783: The "R-colored vowels" of American English and a few other languages. Some languages, such as English and Russian, have what are called 'reduced', 'weak' or 'obscure' vowels in some unstressed positions. These do not correspond one-to-one with the vowel sounds that occur in stressed position (so-called 'full' vowels), and they tend to be mid-centralized in comparison, as well as having reduced rounding or spreading. The IPA has long provided two letters for obscure vowels, mid ⟨ ə ⟩ and lower ⟨ ɐ ⟩, neither of which are defined for rounding. Dialects of English may have up to four phonemic reduced vowels: /ɐ/ , /ə/ , and higher unrounded /ᵻ/ and rounded /ᵿ/ . (The non-IPA letters ⟨ ᵻ ⟩ and ⟨ ᵿ ⟩ may be used for
2376-522: The Samoan language was evident in its use for official government acts and literacy instruction, as well as within the church, until being replaced by the Tuvaluan language in the 1950s. English's influence has been limited, but is growing. Since gaining political independence in the 1970s, knowledge of the English language has gained importance for economic viability in Tuvalu. The ability to speak English
2442-412: The accompanying spectrogram: The [i] and [u] have similar low first formants, whereas [ɑ] has a higher formant. The second formant, F2, corresponds to vowel frontness. Back vowels have low F2 frequencies, while front vowels have high F2 frequencies. This is very clear in the spectrogram, where the front vowel [i] has a much higher F2 frequency than the other two vowels. However, in open vowels,
2508-453: The consonant [j] , e.g., initial ⟨i⟩ in Italian or Romanian and initial ⟨y⟩ in English. In the original Latin alphabet, there was no written distinction between ⟨v⟩ and ⟨u⟩ , and the letter represented the approximant [w] and the vowels [u] and [ʊ] . In Modern Welsh , ⟨w⟩ represents these same sounds. There
2574-524: The country of Tuvalu was known as the Ellice Islands and the Tuvaluan language is also therefore known as Ellice or Ellicean. Like all other Polynesian languages, Tuvaluan descends from an ancestral language, which historical linguists refer to as " Proto-Polynesian ", which was spoken perhaps about 2,000 years ago. Tuvaluan has had significant contact with Gilbertese , a Micronesian language ; Samoan ; and, increasingly, English . Gilbertese
2640-444: The dialect. All consonants also come in short and geminated (long) forms, which are contrastive. The phoneme /ŋ/ is written ⟨g⟩ . All other sounds are represented with letters corresponding to their IPA symbols. Like most Polynesian languages, Tuvaluan syllables can either be V or CV. Both vowels and consonants can be long or short. There is no restriction on the placement of consonants, although they cannot be used at
2706-584: The effect of prosody on the vowel component of a syllable. A vowel sound whose quality does not change throughout the vowel is called a monophthong . Monophthongs are sometimes called "pure" or "stable" vowels. A vowel sound that glides from one quality to another is called a diphthong , and a vowel sound that glides successively through three qualities is a triphthong . All languages have monophthongs and many languages have diphthongs, but triphthongs or vowel sounds with even more target qualities are relatively rare cross-linguistically. English has all three types:
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2772-448: The end of words (as per the syllabic restrictions). Consonant clusters are not present in Tuvaluan. None of the units in the Tuvaluan phonemic inventory are restricted to loanwords only. English is the only language from which loanwords are currently being borrowed – loans from Samoan and Gilbertese have already been adapted to fit Tuvaluan phonology. More established, conventional English borrowings are more likely to have been adapted to
2838-576: The features are concomitant in some varieties of English. In most Germanic languages , lax vowels can only occur in closed syllables . Therefore, they are also known as checked vowels , whereas the tense vowels are called free vowels since they can occur in any kind of syllable. Advanced tongue root (ATR) is a feature common across much of Africa, the Pacific Northwest , and scattered other languages such as Modern Mongolian . The contrast between advanced and retracted tongue root resembles
2904-406: The final silent ⟨e⟩ , as in mate . Lax vowels occur in words without the silent ⟨e⟩ , such as mat . In American English , lax vowels [ɪ, ʊ, ɛ, ʌ, æ] do not appear in stressed open syllables. In traditional grammar, long vowels vs. short vowels are more commonly used, compared to tense and lax . The two sets of terms are used interchangeably by some because
2970-399: The fourth edition, he changed to adopt a simple plot of F1 against F2, and this simple plot of F1 against F2 was maintained for the fifth (and final) edition of the book. Katrina Hayward compares the two types of plots and concludes that plotting of F1 against F2 – F1 "is not very satisfactory because of its effect on the placing of the central vowels", so she also recommends use of
3036-583: The high F1 frequency forces a rise in the F2 frequency as well, so an alternative measure of frontness is the difference between the first and second formants. For this reason, some people prefer to plot as F1 vs. F2 – F1. (This dimension is usually called 'backness' rather than 'frontness', but the term 'backness' can be counterintuitive when discussing formants.) In the third edition of his textbook, Peter Ladefoged recommended using plots of F1 against F2 – F1 to represent vowel quality. However, in
3102-596: The language of Christian missionaries in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The population of Tuvalu is approximately 10,645 people (2017 Mini Census), but there are estimated to be more than 13,000 Tuvaluan speakers worldwide. In 2015 it was estimated that more than 3,500 Tuvaluans live in New Zealand , with about half that number born in New Zealand and 65 percent of the Tuvaluan community in New Zealand
3168-442: The latter to avoid confusion with the clearly defined values of IPA letters like ⟨ ɨ ⟩ and ⟨ ɵ ⟩, which are also seen, since the IPA only provides for two reduced vowels.) The acoustics of vowels are fairly well understood. The different vowel qualities are realized in acoustic analyses of vowels by the relative values of the formants , acoustic resonances of the vocal tract which show up as dark bands on
3234-496: The link to point directly to the intended article. Retrieved from " https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Tuvaluan&oldid=856651545 " Category : Disambiguation pages Hidden categories: Short description is different from Wikidata All article disambiguation pages All disambiguation pages Language and nationality disambiguation pages Tuvaluan language Tuvaluan ( / ˌ t uː v ə ˈ l uː ə n / ), often called Tuvalu ,
3300-495: The lips are compressed but the corners remain apart as in spread vowels. The conception of the tongue moving in two directions, high–low and front–back, is not supported by articulatory evidence and does not clarify how articulation affects vowel quality. Vowels may instead be characterized by the three directions of movement of the tongue from its neutral position: front (forward), raised (upward and back), and retracted (downward and back). Front vowels ( [i, e, ɛ] and, to
3366-413: The lips are generally protruded ("pursed") outward, a phenomenon known as endolabial rounding because the insides of the lips are visible, whereas in mid to high rounded front vowels the lips are generally "compressed" with the margins of the lips pulled in and drawn towards each other, a phenomenon known as exolabial rounding. However, not all languages follow that pattern. Japanese /u/ , for example,
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#17327660246503432-401: The lips in some vowels. Because lip rounding is easily visible, vowels may be commonly identified as rounded based on the articulation of the lips. Acoustically, rounded vowels are identified chiefly by a decrease in F2, although F1 is also slightly decreased. In most languages, roundedness is a reinforcing feature of mid to high back vowels rather than a distinctive feature. Usually, the higher
3498-419: The mouth or the aperture of the jaw . In practice, however, it refers to the first formant (lowest resonance of the voice), abbreviated F1, which is associated with the height of the tongue. There are two terms commonly applied to refer to two degrees of vowel height: in close vowels , also known as high vowels , such as [i] and [u] , the first formant is consistent with the tongue being positioned close to
3564-412: The other features of vowel quality, tenseness is only applicable to the few languages that have this opposition (mainly Germanic languages , e.g. English ), whereas the vowels of the other languages (e.g. Spanish ) cannot be described with respect to tenseness in any meaningful way. One may distinguish the English tense vs. lax vowels roughly, with its spelling. Tense vowels usually occur in words with
3630-449: The palate, high in the mouth, whereas in open vowels , also known as low vowels , such as [a] , F1 is consistent with the jaw being open and the tongue being positioned low in the mouth. Height is defined by the inverse of the F1 value: the higher the frequency of the first formant, the lower (more open) the vowel. In John Esling 's usage, where fronted vowels are distinguished in height by
3696-618: The pharynx ( [ɑ, ɔ] , etc.): Membership in these categories is scalar, with the mid-central vowels being marginal to any category. Nasalization occurs when air escapes through the nose. Vowels are often nasalised under the influence of neighbouring nasal consonants, as in English hand [hæ̃nd] . Nasalised vowels , however, should not be confused with nasal vowels . The latter refers to vowels that are distinct from their oral counterparts, as in French /ɑ/ vs. /ɑ̃/ . In nasal vowels ,
3762-448: The position of the jaw rather than the tongue, only the terms 'open' and 'close' are used, as 'high' and 'low' refer to the position of the tongue. The International Phonetic Alphabet has letters for six degrees of vowel height for full vowels (plus the reduced mid vowel [ə] ), but it is extremely unusual for a language to distinguish this many degrees without other attributes. The IPA letters distinguish (sorted according to height, with
3828-407: The primary cross-linguistic feature of vowels in that all spoken languages that have been researched till now use height as a contrastive feature. No other parameter, even backness or rounding (see below), is used in all languages. Some languages have vertical vowel systems in which at least at a phonemic level, only height is used to distinguish vowels. Vowel backness is named for the position of
3894-554: The right. There are additional features of vowel quality, such as the velum position (nasality), type of vocal fold vibration (phonation), and tongue root position. This conception of vowel articulation has been known to be inaccurate since 1928. Peter Ladefoged has said that "early phoneticians... thought they were describing the highest point of the tongue, but they were not. They were actually describing formant frequencies." (See below.) The IPA Handbook concedes that "the vowel quadrilateral must be regarded as an abstraction and not
3960-445: The sentence structure becomes SVO . In Tuvaluan, there is virtually no inflectional or derivational morphology – Tuvaluan uses markers to indicate case, tense, plurality, etc. The table below, adapted from Jackson's An Introduction to Tuvaluan , outlines the main markers, although there are also negative and imperative derivatives. Vowel gemination can also sometimes illustrate semantic change. 2. 'and', 'so that...' Reduplication
4026-405: The standard phonology than those that have been adopted more recently. Stress is on the penultimate mora . Geminated consonants have the following main functions: Long vowels can be used to indicate pluralisation or a differentiation of meaning. Like many Polynesian languages, Tuvaluan generally uses a VSO word order, with the verb often preceded by a verb marker . However, the word order
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#17327660246504092-546: The tense-lax contrast acoustically, but they are articulated differently. Those vowels involve noticeable tension in the vocal tract. Pharyngealized vowels occur in some languages like Sedang and the Tungusic languages . Pharyngealisation is similar in articulation to retracted tongue root but is acoustically distinct. A stronger degree of pharyngealisation occurs in the Northeast Caucasian languages and
4158-410: The tongue during the articulation of a vowel relative to the back of the mouth. As with vowel height, however, it is defined by a formant of the voice, in this case the second, F2, not by the position of the tongue. In front vowels, such as [i] , the frequency of F2 is relatively high, which generally corresponds to a position of the tongue forward in the mouth, whereas in back vowels, such as [u] , F2
4224-488: The top-most one being the highest and the bottom-most being the lowest): The letters ⟨ e, ø, ɘ, ɵ, ɤ, o ⟩ are defined as close-mid but are commonly used for true mid vowels . If more precision is required, true mid vowels may be written with a lowering or raising diacritic: ⟨ e̞, ɘ̞, ø̞, ɵ̞, ɤ̞, o̞ ⟩ or ⟨ ɛ̝ œ̝ ɜ̝ ɞ̝ ʌ̝ ɔ̝ ⟩. The Kensiu language , spoken in Malaysia and Thailand,
4290-443: The voice). In English, the word vowel is commonly used to refer both to vowel sounds and to the written symbols that represent them ( ⟨a⟩ , ⟨e⟩ , ⟨i⟩ , ⟨o⟩ , ⟨u⟩ , and sometimes ⟨w⟩ and ⟨y⟩ ). There are two complementary definitions of vowel, one phonetic and the other phonological . The phonetic definition of "vowel" (i.e.
4356-412: The vowel sound in hit is a monophthong /ɪ/ , the vowel sound in boy is in most dialects a diphthong /ɔɪ/ , and the vowel sounds of flower , /aʊər/ , form a triphthong or disyllable, depending on the dialect. In phonology , diphthongs and triphthongs are distinguished from sequences of monophthongs by whether the vowel sound may be analyzed into distinct phonemes . For example, the vowel sounds in
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