ABSTRACT
A consonant involves an obstruction to the airstream on its way through the vocal tract. A vowel is the opposite of a consonant: a sound made with no obstruction in the vocal tract to the air as it passes through it. Although the tongue and lips assume a wide range of complex shapes for the articulation of different vowels, a relatively simple system has been developed to describe them. This chapter illustrates the vowel diagram from the chart of the International Phonetic Association, which is based on this system of vowel description. The oval is too awkward a shape for practical purposes, and so in a schematic representation, its sides are straightened to give it the basic shape of the vowel quadrilateral. Pre-fortis clipping is important not only for the correct pronunciation and recognition of vowels but also as a cue to the identity of consonants. English voiced obstruents (plosives, affricates, and fricatives) are actually only potentially fully voiced.
