Vowels are sounds without closure of the throat or mouth, while consonants have one or more points of air stoppage. Most languages require at least one vowel per word. Vowels may not be crucial to a word’s meaning in some languages, but rather give specific inflection. Some letters can represent both consonant and vowel sounds, […]
Front vowels are produced with the tongue held far in front of the mouth, creating a clear and bright sound. There are nine recognized front vowel sounds, but only five are used in English. The long “e” and “a” and the short “i”, “e” and “a”. The position of the tongue is crucial for producing […]
A vowel shift is a change in the inflection or phonetics of a vowel sound over time in a language, which can be observed in the study of historical linguistics. Linguists study vowel changes in different languages, including the major vowel shift in English from the mid-15th to mid-18th century. Vowels can become diphthongs, longer […]
