Open back unrounded vowel.html



Vowels

v • d • e

See also: IPA, Consonants

[  • discuss • enlarge ]	Front	Near- front	Central	Near- back	Back
Close	i · y ɨ · ʉ ɯ · u ɪ · ʏ ʊ e · ø ɘ · ɵ ɤ · o ə ɛ · œ ɜ · ɞ ʌ · ɔ æ ɐ a · ɶ ɑ · ɒ
Near-close
Close-mid
Mid
Open-mid
Near-open
Open

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

IPA – number	305
IPA – text	ɑ
IPA – image
Entity	ɑ
X-SAMPA	A
Kirshenbaum	A
Sound sample (help·info)

The open back unrounded vowel is a type of vowel sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ɑ, and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is A. The symbol ɑ is called script a because it lacks the extra hook on top of a printed letter 'a', which corresponds to a different vowel, the open front unrounded vowel. Script a, which has its linear stroke on the bottom right, should not be confused with turned script a ɒ, which has its linear stroke on the top left and corresponds to a rounded version of this vowel, the open back rounded vowel.

Features

• Its vowel height is open, which means the tongue is positioned as far as possible from the roof of the mouth.
• Its vowel backness is back, which means the tongue is positioned as far back as possible in the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant
• Its vowel roundedness is unrounded, which means that the lips are not rounded.

Occurrence

See also

• List of phonetics topics

References

Bibliography

• Fougeron, Cecile & Caroline L Smith (1993), "Illustrations of the IPA:French", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 23 (2): 73-76
• Jones, Daniel & Ward Dennis (1969), The Phonetics of Russian, Cambridge University Press
• Shosted, Ryan K. & Chikovani Vakhtang (2006), "Standard Georgian", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 36 (2): 255-264
• Thelwall, Robin (1990), "Illustrations of the IPA: Arabic", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 20 (2): 37-41