The Roman alphabet has five letters that represent vowels; a, e, i, o, & u, but in spoken American English there are approximately 15 vowel sounds. Linguists and many pronunciation teachers use phonetic symbols to represent these 15 sounds.
Dictionaries and pronunciation books do not all use the same phonetic symbols. However, each will have a symbol key that explains the symbols and sounds that they use. It’s a good idea to familiarize yourself with these symbols used when you start to use a new dictionary or pronunciation text.
Here are some examples of the American English vowel IPA symbols taken used in the great American English pronunciation book, Mastering the American Accent.
/i/ as in seat
/ɪ/ as in sit
/eɪ/ as in cake
/ɛ/ as in met
/æ/ as in cat
/ɑ/ as in father
/ə/ as in bun
/ɔ/ as in law
/oʊ/ as in boat
/ʊ/ as in wood
/u/ as in two
/ər/ as in heard
/aɪ/ as in mine
/aʊ/ as in mouse
/ɔɪ/ as in boy
The best place to see and hear the articulation of all the American English vowel sounds is on the University of Iowa’s Phonetics website.
Tags: American English Pronunciation, American English vowel sounds, american english vowels, ipa chart, mastering the american accent, Phonetic pronunciation
