ABSTRACT
All vowels in Catalan are short, and are 'pure', which means that they do not have rounded endings, unlike what often happens in English. There are seven tonic vowels. It is important to bear in mind that Catalan does not consider it a diphthong when a consonant is followed by 'i' or 'u' and then another vowel. In such cases the vowels are two separate syllables. In reality and in spoken language, the vowel cluster is often being pronounced as a single syllable, especially when it appears after the word stress. Nevertheless, Catalan normally does consider it a diphthong when a consonant is followed by a vowel and then 'i' or 'u'. Catalan plosives are never pronounced as aspirated – aspiration is the puff of air escaping between the consonant sound itself and the beginning of the vowel in stressed syllables in English, as in tea, pea, cake.
