Articulatory and physiological classification of English vowels.

Vowels are normally made with the air stream that meets no closure or narrowing in the mouth, pharyngal or nasal cavities. That’s why they have no noise component. On the articulatory level the description of vowels is based on the fololowing criteria:

1. the stability of articulation

2. the tongue position

3. the lip position

4. the character of the vowel end

5. the length

6. the tenseness

1. All English vowels are devided into three groups according to the stability of their articulation: pure vowels (or monophtongs) – vowels the articulation of which is almost unchanging, the tongue position is stable; diphtongs – in their pronounciation the organs of speech glide from one vowel position to another within one syllable, the starting point (or nucleus) is strong and distinct and the glide, which shows the direction of quality change is weak. There are no diphtongs in Russian; and diphtongoids – their articulation is slightly changing and the difference between the starting point and the end is not so distinct: [i:, u:].

2. The changes in the position of the tongue determine the shape of the mouth and pharingal cavity:

(a) According to forward and backward movements plus raising in the direction of the hard or soft palate:

When the tongue is in the front part of the mouth and its front part is raised towards the hard palate a FRONT VOWEL is pronounced [i:, e, æ]. When the tongue is in the front part of the mouth, but slightly retracted and the part of the tongue nearer to center than to front is raised, it’s a FRONT-RETRACTED VOWEL [ı]. There are no such vowels in Russian. When the front of the tongue is raised towards he back part of the hard palate, the vowel is called CENTRAL [э:, ə ٨], in Russian [a, ы]. When the tongue is in the back part of the mouth and the back of it is raised towards the soft palate a BACK VOWEL is pronounced [a:, u:, ﺮ:, ס:], in Russian [o, y]. When the tongue is in the back part of the mouthbut is slightly advanced and the central part of it is raised towards the front part of the soft palate – it’s a BACK-ADVANCED VOWEL [υ].

(b) According to the movements of the tongue to diferent height towards the roof of the mouth.

When the front or the back of the tongue is raised high towards the palate, the vowel is called CLOSE: [i:, ı, υ, u:] and Russian [и, ы, у].

When the front or the back of the tongue is as low as possible in the mouth OPEN VOWELS are pronounced [æ, a:, ס, ﺮ:] in Russian [a].

When the highest part of the tongue ocupies the position imtermediate between the close and the open one, a MID VOWEL is pronounced [e, ٨, э:, ə], in Russian [e, o].

But to make the classification more precise it’s necessary to distinguish BROAD and NARROW variants of CLOSE, OPEN and MID VOWELS.

Close vowels	Narrow variant	[i:, u:] – [и, ы, у]
	Broad variant	[ı, υ]
Mid vowels	Narrow variant	[e, э:, э] – [e]
	Broad variant	[٨, ə, ε] – [o]
Open vowels	Narrow variant	[ﺮ:, ﺮ]
	Broad variant	[æ, a:, a] – [a]

3. The shape of the mouth cavity is also depdendent on the position of the lips.

When then lips are neutral or spread, the vowelsa re termed UNROUNDED [i:, ı, e, æ, a:, ٨, э:, ə] – [и, е, ы, а].

When the lips are drawn together so that the opening between them is more or less round the vowel is called ROUNDED [ס, ﺮ:, υ, u:] – [o, y], plus in Russian lips are somewhat protruded.

4. Character of vowel end – in th stress position the quality of all English monophtongs is strongly affected by the following consonant of the same syllable.

If a stressed vowel is followed by a strong voiceless consonant it is cut off by it. The end of the vowel then is strong and the vowel is called CHECKED: better, cart.

If a vowel is followed by a weak voiced consonant or by no consonant at all the end of it is very weak, in this case the vowel is called FREE: before, money, beggar, sead. All Russian vowels tend to be free.

5. Vowel length. Vowels are capable of being continued during a longer or a chorter period, so they are divided into LONG [i:, a:, ﺮ:, u:, э:] and SHORT [ı, e, ס, υ, ٨, ə]. The vowel [æ] is not included in the chategory of short vowels because of the specific length associated with it.

Plus, the length of one and the same vowel may vary depending on the position in the word and surrounding sounds. Whereas all Russian vowels are equally long in all phonetic conditions. For example, in the similarly accented positions vowels are fully long when they are final, almost as long as that when a weak voiced consonant follows them (seed, arm, form, big, song), they are considerably shorter before strong voiceless consonants (seat, lark, first). The vowels are always longer when they are strongly stressed or appear in the nuclear syllable. Diphtongs vary in lengh in the same way, only variations affect mainly the nucleus, not the glide.