Central vowel

Encyclopedia : C : CE : CEN : Central vowel

Vowels

[Edit] - 2×

Front

N.-front

Central

N.-back

Back

Close

•

Near-close

Close-mid

Mid

Open-mid

Near-open

Open

Where symbols appear in pairs, the one to the right
represents a rounded vowel.

A central vowel is a type of vowel sound used in some spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a central vowel is that the tongue is positioned halfway between a front vowel and a back vowel. The central vowels identified by the International Phonetic Alphabet are:

close central unrounded vowel [ɨ]
close central rounded vowel [ʉ]
close-mid central unrounded vowel [ɘ]
close-mid central rounded vowel [ɵ]
mid central vowel [ə]
open-mid central unrounded vowel [ɜ]
open-mid central rounded vowel [ɞ]
near-open central vowel [ɐ]

Occasionally the ad hoc symbols ᵻ, ᵿ (ɪ, ʊ) for near-close central vowels will be seen.

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