Vowel Sounds

Front, central, and back vowel sounds

/e/

Front, mid, tense, unrounded

• “ey” sound

• EX: safe

Commonly occurs in dipthong form (/eꞮ/)

• like in the word “vacation”

/u/

Back, high, tense, rounded

• “oo” sound

• EX: boo

/ʊ/

Back, high-mid, lax, rounded

• “ugh” sound

• looks like a horseshoe

• EX: book

/o/

Back, mid, tense, rounded

• “oh” sound

• EX: boat

/ɑ/

Back, low, tense, unrounded

• ONLY unrounded back vowel

• “aa” sound

• EX: bot, rock, hot

/ɔ/

Back, low-mid, tense, rounded

• “awh” sound

• backwards letter c

• EX: ball, walk, caught

/æ/ (/ae/)

Front, low, lax, unrounded

• “ah” sound

• EX: sat

/ɛ/

Front, low-mid, lax, unrounded

• “eh” sound

• backwards number 3

• EX: set

/Ɪ/

Front, high-mid, lax, unrounded

• “ih” sound

• capital letter i

• EX: sit

/i/

Front, high, tense, unrounded

• “ee” sound

• EX: seat

/ə/

Schwa - most common vowel sound in the English language

• Any vowel letter can make the schwa sound

Central, mid, lax, unrounded

• “uh” sound in the unstressed position in a word

• EX: about, item, easily, police, circus

/^/

Central, low-mid, lax, unrounded

• Used when the “uh” sound is in the stressed position in a word

• EX: butter, up

/3^/ or /ɝ/

Central, mid, tense, rounded

• “er” sound in stressed position

• EX: bird, her

/ə^/ or /ɚ/

Central, mid, lax, rounded

• “er” sound in the unstressed position

• EX: better, mother

Back Vowels

/u, ʊ, o, ɔ, ɑ/

• All rounded EXCEPT ɑ

Front Vowels

/i, Ɪ, e, ɛ, æ/

• ALL unrounded

• Kind of pronounced like a,e,i,o,u Spanish vowel sounds (not in same order as in vowel quad)