Open front unrounded vowel
a
Image
IPA number	304
Encoding
Entity (decimal)	a
Unicode (hex)	U+0061
X-SAMPA	a
Kirshenbaum	a
Sound
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The open front unrounded vowel, or low front unrounded vowel, is a type of vowel sound, used in many spoken languages. According to the official standards of the International Phonetic Association, the symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ⟨a⟩.

In practice, however, it is very common to approximate this sound with ⟨æ⟩ (officially a near-open (near-low) front unrounded vowel),^{[citation needed]} and to use ⟨a⟩ as an open (low) central unrounded vowel. This is the normal 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, since the perceptual difference between the two is quite small, and very few, if any, languages contrast the two. See open central unrounded vowel for more information.

The IPA prefers terms "close" and "open" for vowels, and the name of the article follows this. However, a large number of linguists, perhaps a majority, prefer the terms "high" and "low", and these are the only terms found in introductory textbooks on phonetics such as those by Peter Ladefoged.

Features[link]

IPA vowel chart
Front Near-​front Central Near-​back Back Close •iy •ɨʉ •ɯu •ɪʏ •ɪ̈ʊ̈ •ʊ •eø •ɘɵ •ɤo •e̞ø̞ ə •ɤ̞o̞ •ɛœ •ɜɞ •ʌɔ •æ ɐ •aɶ •ä •ɑɒ Near-close Close-mid Mid Open-mid Near-open Open
Paired vowels are: unrounded • rounded
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• Its vowel height is open, also known as low, which means the tongue is positioned as far as possible from the roof of the mouth – that is, as low as possible in the mouth.
• Its vowel backness is front, which means the tongue is positioned as far forward as possible in the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant. 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.
• Its vowel roundedness is unrounded, which means that the lips are not rounded.

Occurrence[link]

Most, if not all, languages have some form of an unrounded open vowel. For languages that have only a single low vowel, the symbol for this vowel <a> may be used because it is the only low vowel whose symbol is part of the basic Latin alphabet. Whenever marked as such, the vowel is closer to a central [ä] than to a front [a].

Language		Word	IPA	Meaning	Notes
Arabic	Levantine[1]	بان	[baːn]	'he/it appeared'	See Arabic phonology
Bengali		পা/pa	[pa]	'leg'	See Bengali phonology
Catalan	Majorcan	sac	[sac]	'sack'	Corresponds to [ä] in other varieties. See Catalan phonology
Chinese	Cantonese	沙/saa1	[saː˥]	'sand'	See Cantonese phonology
	Mandarin	他/tā	[tʰa˥]	'he'	See Mandarin phonology
English	Inland Northern American	stock	[stak]	'stock'	See Northern cities vowel shift
	Canadian	stack	[stak]	'stack'	Depending on the region, the quality may vary from front to central or even further back (in some Scottish and Ulster accents for example); the length may also vary (for example, it is shorter in Scottish than in Canadian); many speakers may have [æ] instead. For the Canadian vowel, see Canadian Shift and English phonology
	Northern English
	Irish
	Jamaican
	Scottish
	Welsh
German		Rat	[ʀaːt]	'advice'	In some dialects, this may actually be a back vowel. See German phonology
Greek		ακακία/akakía	[akaˈcia]	'acacia'	See Modern Greek phonology
Gujarati		શાંતિ/shanti	[ʃanti]	'peace'	See Gujarati phonology
Lithuanian		namas	[ˈnaːmas]	'house'
Macedonian		маса	[masa]	'table'	See Macedonian phonology
Malay		api	[api]	'fire'
North Frisian		braan	[braːn]	'to burn'
Russian		там	[tam] (help·info)	'there'	See Russian phonology
Vietnamese		xa	[saː]	'gauze'	See Vietnamese phonology
Welsh		mam	[mam]	'mother'	See Welsh phonology
West Frisian		laad	[ɫaːt]	'drawer'
Zapotec	Tilquiapan[2]	na	[na]	'now'

References[link]

Bibliography[link]

• Merrill, Elizabeth (2008), "Tilquiapan Zapotec", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 38 (1): 107–114, DOI:10.1017/S0025100308003344 
• Thelwall, Robin; Sa'Adeddin, M. Akram (1990), "Illustrations of the IPA: Arabic", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 20 (2): 37–41, DOI:10.1017/S0025100300004266 

v t e   International Phonetic Alphabet   IPA topics IPA International Phonetic Association History of the IPA Kiel convention (1989) Journal of the IPA (JIPA) Naming conventions Phonetics Diacritics* Segments Tone letter Place of articulation Manner of articulation Special topics Case variants of IPA letters Extensions to the IPA Obsolete and nonstandard symbols IPA chart for English dialects Encodings SAMPA X-SAMPA Conlang X-SAMPA Kirshenbaum TIPA Phonetic symbols in Unicode WorldBet   Consonants v t e IPA pulmonic consonants chartchart image • audio Place → Labial Coronal Dorsal Radical Glottal ↓ Manner Bila​bial Labio​dental Den​tal Alve​olar Post​alv. Retro​flex Pal​a​tal Ve​lar Uvu​lar Pha​ryn​geal Epi​glot​tal Glot​tal Nasal m̥ m ɱ n̪ n̥ n n̠ ɳ ɲ̥ ɲ ŋ̊ ŋ ɴ Stop p b p̪ b̪ t̪ d̪ t d ʈ ɖ c ɟ k ɡ q ɢ ʡ ʔ Fricative ɸ β f v θ ð s z ʃ ʒ ʂ ʐ ç ʝ x ɣ χ ʁ ħ ʕ ʜ ʢ h ɦ Approximant ʋ ɹ ɻ j ɰ Trill ʙ r ɽ͡r ʀ я * Flap or tap ⱱ̟ ⱱ ɾ ɽ ɢ̆ ʡ̯ Lateral Fric. ɬ ɮ ɭ˔̊ ʎ̥˔ ʟ̝̊ ʟ̝ Lateral Appr. l ɭ ʎ ʟ Lateral flap ɺ ɺ̠ ʎ̯ Non-pulmonic consonants Clicks ʘ ǀ ǃ ǂ ǁ ʘ̃ ʘ̃ˀ ʘ͡q ʘ͡qʼ Implosives ɓ ɗ ʄ ᶑ ɠ ʛ Ejectives pʼ tʼ cʼ ʈʼ kʼ qʼ fʼ θʼ sʼ ɬʼ xʼ χʼ tsʼ tɬʼ cʎ̝̥ʼ tʃʼ ʈʂʼ kxʼ kʟ̝̊ʼ Affricates p̪f b̪v ts dz tʃ dʒ tɕ dʑ ʈʂ ɖʐ tɬ dɮ cç ɟʝ cʎ̥˔ kʟ̝̊ Co-articulated consonants Fricatives ɕ ʑ ɧ Approximants ʍ w ɥ ɫ Stops k͡p ɡ͡b ŋ͡m These tables contain phonetic symbols, which may not display correctly in some browsers. [Help] Where symbols appear in pairs, left—right represent the voiceless—voiced consonants. Shaded areas denote pulmonic articulations judged to be impossible. * Symbol not defined in IPA. Chart image Pulmonics Non-pulmonics Affricates Co-articulated   Vowels Front Near-​front Central Near-​back Back Close •iy •ɨʉ •ɯu •ɪʏ •ɪ̈ʊ̈ •ʊ •eø •ɘɵ •ɤo •e̞ø̞ ə •ɤ̞o̞ •ɛœ •ɜɞ •ʌɔ •æ ɐ •aɶ •ä •ɑɒ Near-close Close-mid Mid Open-mid Near-open Open Vowels: IPA help • chart •  chart with audio • view

IPA vowel chart
Front Near-​front Central Near-​back Back Close •iy •ɨʉ •ɯu •ɪʏ •ɪ̈ʊ̈ •ʊ •eø •ɘɵ •ɤo •e̞ø̞ ə •ɤ̞o̞ •ɛœ •ɜɞ •ʌɔ •æ ɐ •aɶ •ä •ɑɒ Near-close Close-mid Mid Open-mid Near-open Open
Paired vowels are: unrounded • rounded
This table contains phonetic symbols. They may not display correctly in some browsers (Help).
IPA help • IPA key • chart •  chart with audio • view

In phonetics, vowel roundedness refers to the amount of rounding in the lips during the articulation of a vowel. That is, it is vocalic labialization. When pronouncing a rounded vowel, the lips form a circular opening, while unrounded vowels (also called spread vowels) are pronounced with the lips relaxed. In most languages, front vowels tend to be unrounded, while back vowels tend to be rounded. But some languages, such as French and German, distinguish rounded and unrounded front vowels of the same height, while Vietnamese distinguishes rounded and unrounded back vowels of the same height. Gahuku has all unrounded vowels.

In the International Phonetic Alphabet vowel chart, rounded vowels are the ones that occur on the right in each pair of vowels. There are also diacritics, ⟨  ̹  ⟩ (U+0339  ̹ combining right half ring below)^[1] and ⟨  ̜  ⟩ (U+031C  ̜ combining left half ring below)^[1], to indicate greater or lesser degrees of rounding. These 'more' and 'less rounded' diacritics are sometimes also used with consonants to indicate degrees of labialization.

Types of rounding[link]

Compressed rounding (example 1)	Protruded rounding (example 1)
Compressed rounding (example 2)	Protruded rounding (example 2)

There are two types of vowel rounding: protruded and compressed.^[2] In protruded rounding, the corners of the mouth are drawn together and the lips protrude like a tube, with their inner surface visible. In compressed rounding, the corners of the mouth are drawn together, but the lips are also drawn together horizontally ("compressed") and do not protrude, with only their outer surface visible. That is, in protruded vowels the inner surfaces of the lips form the opening (thus the alternate term endolabial), while in compressed vowels it is the margins of the lips which form the opening (thus exolabial). Catford (1982:172) observes that back and central rounded vowels, such as German /o/ and /u/, are typically protruded, while front rounded vowels such as German /ø/ and /y/ are typically compressed. Back or central compressed vowels and front protruded vowels are uncommon,^[3] and a contrast between the two types has been found to be phonemic in only one instance.^[4] There are no dedicated IPA diacritics to represent the distinction.

The distinction between protruded [u] and compressed [y] holds for the semivowels [w] and [ɥ] as well as labialization. In Akan, for example, the [ɥ] is compressed, as are labio-palatalized consonants as in Twi [tɕᶣi̘] "Twi" and adwuma [adʑᶣu̘ma] "work", whereas [w] and simply labialized consonants are protruded.^[5] In Japanese, the /w/ is compressed rather than protruded, paralleling the Japanese /u/. The distinction applies marginally to other consonants. In Southern Teke, the sole language reported to have a phonemic /ɱ/, the labiodental sound is "accompanied by strong protrusion of both lips",^[6] whereas the [ɱ] found as an allophone of /m/ before /f, v/ in languages such as English is not protruded, as the lip contacts the teeth along its upper or outer edge. And in at least one account of speech acquisition, a child's pronunciation of clown involves a lateral [f] with the upper teeth contacting the upper-outer edge of the lip, but in crown a non-lateral [f] is pronounced with the teeth contacting the inner surface of the protruded lower lip.^[7]

Some vowels transcribed with rounded IPA letters may not be rounded at all. An example is /ɒ/, which in English has very little if any rounding of the lips. The "throaty" sound of English /ɒ/ is instead accomplished with sulcalization, a furrowing of the back of the tongue also found in non-rhotic /ɜː/ (Lass 1984:124).

Roundedness and labialization[link]

(Protrusion) roundedness is the vocalic equivalent of consonantal labialization. As such, rounded vowels and labialized consonants affect each other through phonetic assimilation: Rounded vowels labialize consonants, and labialized consonants round vowels.

In many languages such effects are minor phonetic detail, but in some cases they become significant. For example, in Mandarin Chinese, the unrounded diphthong /ɯ̯ʌ/ is pronounced [u̯ɔ] after labial consonants^{[citation needed]}, an allophonic effect salient enough to be encoded in pinyin transliteration: velar /xɯ̯ʌ/ he vs. labial /pu̯ɔ/ bo. In Vietnamese, the opposite assimilation takes place: velar codas /k/ and /ŋ/ are pronounced as labialized [kʷ] and [ŋʷ], or even labial-velar [kp] and [ŋm], after the rounded vowels /u/ and /o/^{[citation needed]}. In the Northwest Caucasian languages of the Caucasus and the Sepik languages of Papua New Guinea, historically rounded vowels have become unrounded, with the rounding being taken up by the consonant, so that, for example, Sepik [ku] and [ko] are phonemically /kwɨ/ and /kwə/^{[citation needed]}; similarly, Ubykh [ku] and [ko] are phonemically /kʷə/ and /kʷa/^{[citation needed]}.

Notes[link]

1. ^ ^{a b} The International Phonetic Alphabet in Unicode, UCL Division of Psychology & Language Sciences, http://www.phon.ucl.ac.uk/home/wells/ipa-unicode.htm 
2. ^ Endolabial: also called protruded, lip-pouting, horizontal lip-rounding, outrounding, and inner rounding (Trask 1996:180)
   Exolabial: also called compressed, pursed, vertical lip-rounding, inrounding, or outer rounding (Trask 1996:252)
   Henry Sweet noted in 1890 that "the term 'inner rounding' derives from the use of the inner surfaces of the lips; the synonymous 'outrounding' derives from the forward projection of the lips. Both terms are justifiable, but their coexistence is likely to lead to serious confusion." (Trask 1996:180.)
3. ^ Henry Sweet (A handbook of phonetics‎, 1877) noted that they are less distinctive from unrounded vowels than their counterparts.
4. ^ Japanese has a back compressed rather than protruded vowel u (Okada 1999:118); Swedish has a back compressed vowel <o> and both a front compressed <u> and a front protruded vowel <y> (Engstrand 1999:141); the front rounded vowels contrast in ryta 'roar' and ruta 'window pane' (Ladefoged & Maddieson 1996:295).
5. ^ The Akan (Twi-Fante) Language: Its Sound Systems and Tonal Structure. Florence Abena Dolphyne, Ghana Universities Press, Accra, 1988. ISBN 9964-3-0159-6
6. ^ Christiane Paulian (1975) Le kukuya, langue teke du Congo: phonologie, classes nominales
7. ^ Kelly & Local (1989) Doing phonology, p 41

References[link]

• Catford, J. C. (1982) Fundamental Problems in Phonetics. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
• Engstrand, O. (1999). Illustrations of the IPA: Swedish in IPA (1999).
• IPA – The International Phonetic Association (1999). Handbook of the International Phonetic Association. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Ladefoged, P. & Maddieson, I. (1996). The Sounds of the World's Languages. Oxford: Blackwell. ISBN 0-631-19814-8.
• Okada, H. (1999). Illustrations of the IPA: Japanese in IPA (1999).
• Trask, R. L. (1996). A dictionary of phonetics and phonology. Routledge: London & New York.

See also[link]

Look up unrounded, endolabial, or exolabial in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

• List of phonetics topics
• Close front compressed vowel
• Close central compressed vowel
• Close back compressed vowel

v t e   International Phonetic Alphabet   IPA topics IPA International Phonetic Association History of the IPA Kiel convention (1989) Journal of the IPA (JIPA) Naming conventions Phonetics Diacritics* Segments Tone letter Place of articulation Manner of articulation Special topics Case variants of IPA letters Extensions to the IPA Obsolete and nonstandard symbols IPA chart for English dialects Encodings SAMPA X-SAMPA Conlang X-SAMPA Kirshenbaum TIPA Phonetic symbols in Unicode WorldBet   Consonants v t e IPA pulmonic consonants chartchart image • audio Place → Labial Coronal Dorsal Radical Glottal ↓ Manner Bila​bial Labio​dental Den​tal Alve​olar Post​alv. Retro​flex Pal​a​tal Ve​lar Uvu​lar Pha​ryn​geal Epi​glot​tal Glot​tal Nasal m̥ m ɱ n̪ n̥ n n̠ ɳ ɲ̥ ɲ ŋ̊ ŋ ɴ Stop p b p̪ b̪ t̪ d̪ t d ʈ ɖ c ɟ k ɡ q ɢ ʡ ʔ Fricative ɸ β f v θ ð s z ʃ ʒ ʂ ʐ ç ʝ x ɣ χ ʁ ħ ʕ ʜ ʢ h ɦ Approximant ʋ ɹ ɻ j ɰ Trill ʙ r ɽ͡r ʀ я * Flap or tap ⱱ̟ ⱱ ɾ ɽ ɢ̆ ʡ̯ Lateral Fric. ɬ ɮ ɭ˔̊ ʎ̥˔ ʟ̝̊ ʟ̝ Lateral Appr. l ɭ ʎ ʟ Lateral flap ɺ ɺ̠ ʎ̯ Non-pulmonic consonants Clicks ʘ ǀ ǃ ǂ ǁ ʘ̃ ʘ̃ˀ ʘ͡q ʘ͡qʼ Implosives ɓ ɗ ʄ ᶑ ɠ ʛ Ejectives pʼ tʼ cʼ ʈʼ kʼ qʼ fʼ θʼ sʼ ɬʼ xʼ χʼ tsʼ tɬʼ cʎ̝̥ʼ tʃʼ ʈʂʼ kxʼ kʟ̝̊ʼ Affricates p̪f b̪v ts dz tʃ dʒ tɕ dʑ ʈʂ ɖʐ tɬ dɮ cç ɟʝ cʎ̥˔ kʟ̝̊ Co-articulated consonants Fricatives ɕ ʑ ɧ Approximants ʍ w ɥ ɫ Stops k͡p ɡ͡b ŋ͡m These tables contain phonetic symbols, which may not display correctly in some browsers. [Help] Where symbols appear in pairs, left—right represent the voiceless—voiced consonants. Shaded areas denote pulmonic articulations judged to be impossible. * Symbol not defined in IPA. Chart image Pulmonics Non-pulmonics Affricates Co-articulated   Vowels Front Near-​front Central Near-​back Back Close •iy •ɨʉ •ɯu •ɪʏ •ɪ̈ʊ̈ •ʊ •eø •ɘɵ •ɤo •e̞ø̞ ə •ɤ̞o̞ •ɛœ •ɜɞ •ʌɔ •æ ɐ •aɶ •ä •ɑɒ Near-close Close-mid Mid Open-mid Near-open Open Vowels: IPA help • chart •  chart with audio • view