Central vowel

Central vowels are vowels in which the tongue is in the middle of the oral cavity - exactly between the position of the front and rear tongue vowels .

The central vowels are:

• Unrounded closed central vowel [ɨ]
• Rounded closed central vowel [ʉ]
• Unrounded, semi-closed central vowel [ɘ]
• Rounded semi-closed central vowel [ɵ]
• Middle central vowel ( Schwa ) [ə]
• Unrounded half-open central vowel [ɜ]
• Rounded half-open central vowel [ɞ]
• Almost open central vowel [ɐ]
• Unrounded open central vowel - There is no official IPA symbol for this. Usually one of the following three characters is used:
  • Small caps -A
  • Unrounded open front tongue vowel [a] (ie there is no distinction between these two vowels)
  • Unrounded open front tongue vowel with the diacritic for centralization [ä] ( risk of confusion with umlaut ä [ɛ])

Web links

Wiktionary: Central vowel  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations