A front vowel is a type of vowel sound used in some spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a front vowel is that the tongue is positioned as far in front as possible in the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant. Front vowels are sometimes also called bright vowels because they are perceived as sounding brighter than the back vowels. The front vowels identified by the International Phonetic Alphabet are:
- close front unrounded vowel
- close front rounded vowel
- close-mid front unrounded vowel
- close-mid front rounded vowel
- open-mid front unrounded vowel
- open-mid front rounded vowel
- near-open front unrounded vowel
- open front unrounded vowel
- open front rounded vowel
Read more about Front Vowel: Effect On Preceding Consonant
Famous quotes containing the words front and/or vowel:
“Radio put technology into storytelling and made it sick. TV killed it. Then you were locked into somebody else’s sighting of that story. You no longer had the benefit of making that picture for yourself, using your imagination. Storytelling brings back that humanness that we have lost with TV. You talk to children and they don’t hear you. They are television addicts. Mamas bring them home from the hospital and drag them up in front of the set and the great stare-out begins.”
—Jackie Torrence (b. 1944)
“Brute animals have the vowel sounds; man only can utter consonants.”
—Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834)