2B Thesoundsystemof English

The description of English Yowels

ln this section we desciibe the articula
Vowels, unlike consonants,exhibit a
variation can depend on factors such
educational background, age, and gen
an effect on all of p"ro.,,r.rátio.r, not just on thc Plolunci.ation of
"r"p".,, English is the most
.ro*.1r. It is just ,h", *i,h the vowels the variation in
General American
noriceable.) ihe vowels we describe below are those of
re national media in the USA and bY a
rkers. Occasionally, *ve will point out

the mouth. If You are not a sPeak

dilfercnces may be even greater'
from consbnaq!!rylbe relativelywide
arediFferentiated
that there
the mouth asair
q91L¡n comParison to consonants'
Different vowel ,offi positions of the tongue and
characteristtcs:
tips. tn describing vowels, it is necessaryto discussfour
in the mouth-
I Tongue Height-whether the tongue is high or low
2 Fron"tness/Bicknessof Tong,.r.-*h..her the front or the back of the
tongue is involved.
3 Terrs.rr.rs/f:xness-whether the musclesare tense or lax'
4 Lip Rounding-*6tther the lips are rounded'

Figure 2.14: Thepositionof r\ tonguem Figure2. l5: Tbepositionof thetonguein

ille pronunciatioi of thehighfont uowel thl pronunciationof the l-owfont uouel
in the ttord'beat' in the word'bat'

Photocopiable @ Oxford UniversicyPress

 [ndiuidual soundsof English 29

,.,
I ongue hetgltt
Pronouncethe vowel sound'in the word'beat' followed immediatelyby the
's vowel sound in the word 'bat'.,You will Feelyour jaw dropping and your
rongue lowering asyou move to the vowel in'bat'. Now Pronouncethe rwo
I lrololl, in the .irr..r" order. This rime you will feel your tongue and jaw
f rising as you move to the vowel in 'beatl.
'bat' in sequence.
Pronounce the vowels in 'beat', 'bit', 'bait', 'bet', and
'f

Notice that your tongue lowersand your jaw drops as you move from one
I

vowel ro rhe.,e*c.The vowelsin'beat' and'bit'are troth consideredto be

high uoue/s becausethey are made with the rongue raised above its rest
L

pÁi,io.r. The vowels of 'bait' and 'bet' are consideredto be mid uouels
'bat'
L..",.rr. the tongue is neither high nor low in the mouth' The vowel of
is considered ro be a lota uowelbecauseit is made with the rongue below its
rest position.

If you pronounce the vowelof the {Vo¡d'boot' immediately Followedby the

vowel of 'por" you will againfeelyour rongueand your jaw dropping asyou
did with rhe vowelsof 'beat'atrd'bar'

Now pronounce the vowelsof rhe following words in sequence,Feelingthe

'boot', 'book', 'boat', 'bought',
,o.rg,r. gradually lowering with each vowel:
'por-. TI-,. ,".r-,. relationship that exists among the previous sequenceoF
uo*.l, also exists with these five vowels: your tongue lowers and your jaw
drops as you move From one vowel to the next. The vowels in'boot' and
'boák' are both considered to be high vowels- The vowels in 'boat' ani
.bought'
are mid vowels and rhe vowel in 'pot' is a low vowel.

Ir should be noted thar for many American and most Canadian speakersoF
English,the words 'pot' and'bought' are Pronouncedwith the samevowel,
the"low vowel of 'poi'. Thus, the overwhelming majoriry oFNorth American
English speakerswill pronounce pairs such as'c3g€h-iand'cot' in the same
*"i. Fo. others, the word'caughr' is pronounced with the m;"dvowel as in
'bo,rght' and the word 'cot' iS Pronounced with the low vowel as in 'pot''
'tyg-
Spof,.r, with this distinction will pronounce words such as'taught',
.riant', 'awfrtl', 'ought','talk', 'f[aw" 'dawn', and'saw' with the mid vowel of
.bought', *orás suchas'nof','Don', 'tock', 'got', 'top', and'stop' *i:l
"ard
,h" tá* vowel of 'pot'. In contrasr, speakerswithout this distinction will
pronounceatt of thesewords with rhe samevowel, the low vowel oF'pot''
Tabte2.1l: Clnsstfcationof English
high beat boot
uoutelsby tongueheight
bit book

mid bait boat

ber bought

low bat Por

 EngLish
30 Thesound'ttsrcmof

ss of tongue
Fr ontness/ bacbne
Inpronouncing-thesequ e n c e , o f * * d s in t h e c h a rt a b o r, e , y o u . ma y h a v e
second column'
noticedthataáiFF.,.,,.pa rt o f t h e t o n gáu : thevowels rlothe
wa s ' . i' " ¿ o in we re d wit h t h e
or
u'1;;;owelin'boot''Both
colurn:' *""n*"d
vowels in the first
Savthe""*l;d;J r"r"i':tiH;l;;'+
high
is ra is e di'"* retht'rongue
e it sof
thesearehighvowelsl:* *.theto
'U.".ii-, n g u e*"itt"ht
**jt a b o vf"'t
Ho*.u"., .li. uo*.Iof t'o*ti oi'boot' i' rn"Jt *i"n tf" backpart
s t P o s t t lo n .
of the e
tt't
in the *o"tf" while ';::r;]fr
,onsue'.'";:+;::*ig;#:il::.:t:*:*f í\Y: é
É
c
foit uoweland the vowel É,
tigt"t' 2'l4 and2'16') É,
É

q
q
(
t
t
(
of thennguein
tn Figure2- 17:.Theposition (
of th.etu,ngue t'o'wbackuouel
Figure2-16: Theposition bachuowel thepronunc.tdttn:of the {
htgh
thepronuncta.t',n,'fitt' ¡n tbe word'Pot' i

¡o íhe word'boot'
@ Oford University Press
the vowelsof 'bar
Photocopiable
bewveen
This samedifference"t*i':' ftiü*t¿ by th'e'vowelof '
vowel of 'b* immediately of
ib"t' is made wl
Tht
vowels ""*a
"""b;^;;;;t''
lo*'i" the mouth'-while r
tongue
lowinthe mo ack vowel.(SeeFigures
p*i"f the tongue vowe
is a low t'ot" uá*tl
and the p'o"unciation of
ri'itthe pronun
ff"re is consid
2'15 andZfZ')
thevowel of'pot''5""'^"""v iT:*t15":tT":ffi*,'L: ;
i...:.:;*;:**:':.i:,li:'"l,'Hll"jli;;
"i.'5'* p'""a i'lasrarback
"*
D2cKvowels'
other back
as the other
vr
^' 'ht
in the words-b;5
The vowelsounds
vowcl S(rurrs"' rhe'g**
;;;.i ^- '"'"f:? the
';;ds- :rds' Pronounce '-
, volvels or UIJUL'
K,
arebackvow€lsuur
arebackvowelsoul ^^-ino I¡hem ro the
comParlng
.hern
'bat' in sequence again'
 Indiuidu¿lsoands of English 3I

.boar,, .bought" and 'por'. \lirh the first sequence,the front part of the
sequence,the
;ó g.ad"uallylo*"* in rhe mouth, while with the second
back part of rhe tongue lowers'
re
the front nor the back
t. There are also vowels in English made with neither
.r as cental uotaeh-Pronounce the
¡ r nor low in the mouth when this
'the Front nor the back Parr of the
:n
:enral uouel. The Position of the
position that the tongue occuPies
-l
when it is at rest-
central position is
Another vowel sound made with che tongue in the mid
'machine'. This vowel is called
the inirial vowelsound le! ína word such as
vowel in English and
scbua. The schwa is rhe most frequently occurring
It will.be discussedin more
pt"y, a major role in the English stresssyst_qm--
(seepage63)-
i.át in Ch.pter 5, 's(/ord rir.r, and vowel reduction'

i foUtt 2. I2: Ckssifcation of English

front central back
uotaelsby height andfontness
high beat boot

bit book

mid bait machine boar

bet but bought

Photocopiable
low bat Pot @ Oxford UniversitYPress

Tenseness/laxness
muscle tension in the
Anorher way in which vowels'candifter is in terrns of
tension arcllase 3nd-
mouth- ,V. r"y that vowelsproduced with extra muscle
the vowels of
that vowels p.od,r.ed withiur this te.nsionare lax. compare
'bear' and 'bit'. Borh of these vowels are ,rr"&ñhlh. f.ott part of the
r in the degreeof muscletension with
feel that your facial musclesare more
than in 'bit'. This cáusesa greater
:tive way oFdetecting the difference in
(thevowel of
3h pitch- The tensevowel
'beat') will feel as iFir is being p.od,r..d *ith much more effort than the lax
one (the vowel of 'bit').
vowels of 'beat' and
There are three rense/laxvowel pairs in English: the
,bir,, 'bair'
and'ber" and'boor' In all oFthesepairs,ir-isthe first
^.rd'book'. with the tongue
member rhat is rense.The tense vowels are Pronounced
In addition, the
stightly higher in the mouth rhan their lax counterParts-
32 The sound rystemof English

fronr rensevowels are pronounced with the ro¡gue fiurther forward than
rheir lax counterpar,r;,h. back tensevowel is pronounced wirh the tongue
furcher back rhan its lax counrerpart. The rensevowels are longer and also
involve someronguemovemenr during their pronunciarion (seedescription
of Off-glides on page33).

The vowel sound in 'boar' is also a rense vowel but there is no directly
'caught/cot'
corresponding tax vowel. For rhose speakcrs who have the
'bought', which might be
disrinidon diicussedabove, the vowel sound of
considered the corresponding lax vowe[, is, in Fact,somewhat tens€.A survey
of North American i.,,rodrr..ory linguistics textbool<sshows considerable
'bought'. some authors
variarion in rhe rrearmenr oF the mid vowel of
'boat'
consider rhe vowel to be the lax counrerpart of the mid vowel in
whereasothersconsider it to be tenseand low. This is probably becausethere
is a good dealof dialectalvariation in the pronunciation oFthis vowel'

Table 2.13 shows how English voweis can be classifiedby tenseness.It is

'bought' is
useful ro remember, l-ro*e',r.r,rhaf in manv dialects the vowel in
iower and more centraiized.
Table2.13: Ckssifcation of
front central back Englíshuowelsby tenseness
high
-
rcftte
--l
\Áx l bit
1 beat ____l boot

book

mid tente jll boar

-
bet but bought Photocopiable
Ilx
@ Oxford UniversitY Press

Lip rounding
In addition to tongue height, Frontness/backness, and muscle tension, /zp
rounding is also importa.tt in the articulation of vowels' If you pronounce
rh..ro*il in the *ord'boor' and compare it to the vowel in the word'beat',
in
you will feel that your lips are rounded in the first case,but spread-aPart
',h.r..o.,d.
English has Fourvowelsmadewith lip rounding: the backvowels
is
in'boor', 'boof,', 'boat', and'bought'. (Note that the vowel in'bought'
'caught'/'cot' distinction.)
rounded only for those speakerswho have the
'beat', 'bit', 'bait"
Compare the,no*els of thesethree words to the vowels of
spread
rrrd'üet', payingattention ro the formation oFyour lips' Your lips are
in the pronunci"tion of the lait Fourvowels'

Phoneticrymbolsfor uouels
lfle haveseenrhar vowels can be described in terms of four basic character-
'F-orexample, the vowel in a word such as 'beat' is made with the front
isrics-
 )a
lndiuidual soundsof Englkh J)

part oFrherongue high in the mouth. The lips are unrounded and the facial
L,rr.l., are relativelytense.Thus, it is referredto as a high, front, tense'
unrounded vowel.

In Table 2-I4 and Figure 2.18 below we Presentthe phonecicsymbolsfor

each of the vowel sounds discussedabove. The symtrols for vowels rarely
correspondto Englishspellingbecausethereare many more vowel soundsin
Enelish than there are vowel letters.

front cent¡al back

Table2.14:
(unrounded) (unroundzd) (rounded) Theuouelsof
English
high tewe iy (beat) uw (boor)
l"ax (bit) u 6ook)
mid tense ey (bait) a (machine) ow (boat)

lax e (bet) n (but) r (bought)

low T, (bat) a( rot)

ü

relation n the inside of the

mouth

Photocopiable
O Oxford University Press

Off-glides
Notice that the symbols used here to representthe tensevowels of English,
liy| , leyI , /uw/, and/ow/, !ry+arus: The fronrvowelsliy I andley I
are composedof the p,rr. r,o*ls /i/ and /e/ followed by the semi-vowel/y/.
The ba& vowels luw I and /ow/ are composedoF the pure vowels/u/ and
/o/ followed by the semi-voweI lw | . These semi-vowels are usually referred
to as offglidzs and reflect the Factthat there is movement oithe tongue dur-
ing th. p-ronunciationof eachoFthe tensevowels-In many languagesof the
*-t¿, ,i.r" ..rrr. vowels are not Followedby off-glides, but are Pure vowels-
Thus, when ESL studenmPronouncethe tensevowels of English,they oFten
omit rhe semi-vowel,producing vowels that sound to the English ear more
like the lax counterpartsof the tensevowels,that is, I tl, I t l' md I o | -