Vowels Flashcards
Name and describe the vowel height.
High: tongue body is raised
Mid: tongue body neither raised or lowerd
Low: tongue body is lowered
How many vowels english has?
15 (with turned c)
Name the high vowels
i,I,u,ʊ
What are the mid vowels
ej, ɛ, ʌ, ə, ɔ, oj, ow
What are the minor diphtongs
ej, ow
What are the major diphtongs
aj, aw, oj
What is a tense vowel
More constriction, more peripheral articulation, longer
What is a lax vowel
Less, constriction, shorter, more central
Where do tense vowels appear
Within and end of words
Where do lax vowels appear
Only within a word except schwa
Where is the name Schwa taken from
Hebrew
Is schwa tense or lax, high,low or mid, front,central back
Mid central lax (MCL)
Is schwa stressed or unstressed
always unstressed
Where does schwa appear
can appear within and finally
Why is schwa a reduced vowel
it went through vowel reduction process
What are the rounded vowels
u, ʊ, ow,oj, ɔ
What are the vowel backness. Describe.
Front: Tongue close to teeth central: Tongue close to palate
back: Tongue close to velum
Monophthong vs Diphtong
Monophthong: simple vowels
Diphthong: complex vowels = change of articulation.
Are diphthong always lax or tense.
Tense
what is the merger?
ɑ, ɔ (mostly in UK). the same in Western US and Canada
Is ɑ rounded?
No
Is ɔ rounded
Yes. And mid, back, lax
ɔ is a variant of [?]. When does it happen?
ow, before [r]
Cross-linguistically how many vowels are there?
5 vowels (a,e,i,o,u)
Do vowels tend to spread out as much as possible in the vowel space?
Yes
What are the major diphthongs
aj, aw, oj
What are the minor diphthongs
ej, ow
What is the order of vowel description
height, backness, rounding
