Wikipedia / Open front unrounded vowel
Wikipedia / Open front unrounded vowel
The open front unrounded vowel, or low front unrounded vowel, is a type of vowel sound used in some spoken languages. It is one of the eight primary cardinal vowels, not directly intended to correspond to a vowel sound of a specific language but rather to serve as a fundamental reference point in a phonetic measuring system.
The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) that represents this sound is , a double-story lowercase a. In the IPA vowel chart it is positioned at the lower-left corner. However, the accuracy of the quadrilateral vowel chart is disputed, and the sound has been analyzed acoustically as extra-open at a position where the front/back distinction has lost its significance. There are also differing interpretations of the exact quality of the vowel: the classic sound recording of by Daniel Jones is slightly more front but not quite as open as that by John Wells.
In practice, the symbol is often used to represent an open central unrounded vowel. This is the usual practice, for example, in the historical study of the English language. The loss of separate symbols for open and near-open front vowels is usually considered unproblematic, because the perceptual difference between the two is quite small, and very few languages contrast the two. If there is a need to specify the backness of the vowel as fully front one can use the symbol , which denotes a lowered near-open front unrounded vowel, or with the IPA "advanced" diacritic.
Features
This subsumes central open (central low) vowels because the tongue does not have as much flexibility in positioning as it does in the mid and close (high) vowels; the difference between an open front vowel and an open back vowel is similar to the difference between a close front and a close central vowel, or a close central and a close back vowel.
Occurrence
Many languages have some form of an unrounded open vowel. For languages that have only a single open vowel, the symbol for this vowel may be used because it is the only open vowel whose symbol is part of the basic Latin alphabet. Whenever marked as such, the vowel is closer to a central than to a front . However, there may not actually be much of a difference. (See Vowel#Acoustics.)
Language | Word | Meaning | Notes | |
Standard | 'roof' | Near-front. See Afrikaans phonology | ||
Standard | (anā) | 'I' 1st person singular pronoun | See Arabic phonology | |
Standard | 'sound' | Typically transcribed with . | ||
(nay) | 'most' | Near-front. | ||
'bag' | Majorcan -fronting. More central ( and/or ) or back () in other dialects; fully front in Majorcan Catalan. It can be higher (). See Catalan phonology | |||
Many dialects | 'ray' | Allophone of in contact with palatal consonants. It can be higher (). See Catalan phonology | ||
() | 'safe' | Allophone of before . See Standard Chinese phonology | ||
'winter' | See Czech phonology | |||
Standard | 'bait' | Ranges from front to central. See Dutch phonology | ||
'bath' | Corresponds to in Northern Standard Dutch. See Dutch phonology | |||
'hat' | Most common pronunciation among younger speakers. Older speakers typically use . See Australian English phonology | |||
Less open in other North American varieties. See English phonology and Canadian Shift | ||||
Some Central Ohioan speakers | ||||
Some Texan speakers | ||||
Closer in General South African English. See South African English phonology | ||||
Closer in Conservative Received Pronunciation. See English phonology | ||||
'bra' | Realized as central by middle-class speakers. | |||
Less front [ ~ ] in other American dialects. See Northern Cities Vowel Shift | ||||
One realization of /a/ and /aː/ (corresponding to /ʌ/ and /ɑː/ respectively in other dialects). Varies between open near-front , open central , near-open near-front and near-open central . May be transcribed in IPA with . See New Zealand English phonology | ||||
Conservative Parisian | 'paw' | Contrasts with , but many speakers have only one open vowel (phonetically central ). See French phonology | ||
'stopping' | Contrasts with . See Quebec French phonology | |||
Altbayern accent | 'water masses' | Also illustrates the back , with which it contrasts. See Standard German phonology | ||
Many Austrian accents | 'near' | Less front in other accents. See Standard German phonology | ||
बाप(baap) | 'father', 'dad' | Allophone of . See Hindustani phonology. | ||
باپ(baap) | ||||
'kernel' | ||||
() | 'to disappear' | See Khmer phonology | ||
() | 'bottom' | |||
(gen) | 'bad' | Equal to Sorani (Central) near-front . See Kurdish phonology | ||
Many dialects | 'boss' | Near-front; realized as central in some other dialects. The example word is from the Maastrichtian dialect. | ||
/ | 'day' | Backness may vary among dialects. | ||
'cap' | Near-front; sometimes fronted and raised to . See Luxembourgish phonology | |||
'shelf' | Can be central . See Malay phonology | |||
'hat' | ||||
'leather' | ||||
'egg' | Allophone of between palatal or palatalized consonants. See Polish phonology | |||
'the mothers' | Corresponds to in other dialects, but in these dialects they are distinct. See Spanish phonology | |||
Central Standard | 'bank' | The backness has been variously described as front , near-front and central . See Swedish phonology | ||
'paper' | Only occurs with â (a with "circumflex"), which is not originally in the Turkish alphabet. Also described as central . | |||
Aastersk | 'ship's biscuit' | Contrasts with a back . See West Frisian phonology |
Notes
References
External links