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Unit 16: Varieties of English Cardinal Vowel System

2. Spread, with the corners of the lips moved away from each other, as for a smile. This is most Notes
clearly seen in cardinal vowel no. 1 [i].
3. Neutral, where the lips are not noticeably rounded or spread. The noise most English people
make when they are hesitating (written ‘er’) has neutral lip position.
Now, using the principles that have just been explained, we will examine some of the English vowels.
English short vowels
English has a large number of vowel sounds; the first ones to be examined are short vowels. The
symbols for these short vowels are: w , e, æ , Λ , Z, • . Short vowels are only relatively short; as we shall
see later, vowels can have quite different lengths in different contexts.
Each vowel is described in relation to the cardinal vowels.

I 
e

Õ v α

Figure 16.1: English short vowels

w (example words: ‘bit’, pin’, ‘fish’) The diagram shows that, though this vowel is in the close front
area, compared with cardinal vowel no. 1 [i] it is more open, and nearer in to the centre. The lips are
slightly spread.
e (example words: ‘bet’, ‘men’, ‘yes’) This is a front vowel between cardinal vowel no. 2 [e] and no. æ
[ ε ]. The lips are slightly spread.
æ (example words: ‘bat’, ‘man’, ‘gas’) This vowel is front, but not quite as open as cardinal vowel no.
4 [a]. The lips are slightly spread.
• (example words: ‘cut’, ‘come’, ‘rush’) This is a central vowel, and the diagram shows that it is
more open than the open-mid tongue height. The lip position is neutral.
Z (example words: ‘pot’, ‘gone’, ‘cross’) This vowel is not quite fully back, and between open-mid
and open in tongue height. The lips are slightly rounded.
• (example words: ‘put’, ‘pull’, ‘push’) The nearest cardinal vowel is no. 8 [u], but it can be seen that
• is more open and nearer to central. The lips are rounded.
There is one other short vowel, for which the symbol is . This central vowel - which is called schwa
- is a very familiar sound in English; it is heard in the first syllable of the words ‘about’, ‘oppose’,
e
‘perhaps’, for example. Since it is different from the other vowels in several important ways.
One of the most difficult aspects of phonetics at this stage is the large number of technical terms that
have to be learned. Every phonetics textbook gives a description of the articulators. Useful introductions
are Ladefoged, Ashby, and Ashby and Maidment.
An important discussion of the vowel-consonant distinction is by Pike. He suggested that since the
two approaches to the distinction produce such different results we should use new terms: sounds
which do not obstruct the airflow (traditionally called “vowels”) should be called vocoids, and sounds
which do obstruct the air-flow (traditionally called “consonants”) should be called contoids. This
leaves the terms “vowel” and “consonant” for use in labelling phonological elements according to
their distribution and their role in syllable structure. While vowels are usually vocoids and consonants
are usually contoids, this is not always the case; for example, j in ‘yet’ and w in ‘wet’ are (phonetically)
vocoids but function (phonologically) as consonants. A study of the distributional differences between
vowels and consonants in English is described in O’ Connor and Trim; a briefer treatment is in
Cruttenden. The Handbook of the International Phonetic Association (1999: Section 2.6) explains the IPA’s
principles of vowel classification. The distinction between primary and secondary cardinal vowels is

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