Vowels in English and Arabic

1. Vowels in English and Arabic

2. What is a vowel sound? • Consonant sounds are mostly articulated via closure or obstruction in the vocal tract, • vowel sounds are produced with a relatively free flow of air. They are all typically voiced.

4. Front • /iː/ as in cream, seen, sea, see, 2. /ɪ/ as in bit, silly, pin, sit 3. /e/ as in bet, head, get, beg 4. /æ/ as in cat, dad, act, fact

5. Central 5. /ɜː/ as in earth, burn, firm 6. /ə/ as in about, clever, ago, teacher 7. /ʌ/ as in cut, nut, note: the vowel sound in not and what is not the same as that in cut and nut

6. Back Vowels 8. /u:/ as in boot, glue, moon 9. /ʊ/ as in put, soot, would, wood 10. /ɔː/ as in corn, born, horse 11. /ɒ/ as in pot, dog, plot, what, not 12. /ɑː/ as in hard, far, car, farm

7. Diphthongs & Triphthongs

8. Diphthongs: • The term diphthong is derived from Greek. • It means “double sound” which is a glide from one vowel to another in the same syllable. • It behaves like a simple vowel in other respects. • They are called falling diphthongs because in them, the first element is more prominent. • Like long vowels, all of them are relatively longer when they occur before voiced sounds or finally.

9. There are 8 English diphthongs: They can be subdivided into 2 categories: 1- Closing diphthongs: Those diphthongs which have the close vowels /ᶷ/ & /ᴵ/ 2- Centering Diphthongs: Those diphthongs which have the central vowel /ᵊ/

11. Examples:

12. Triphthongs: -A triphthong is a vowel glide with three distinguishable vowel qualities. - Triphthongs can be looked on as being composed of the five closing diphthongs described with /ᵊ/ added at the end.

13. Triphthong ( Closing Diphthong + /ᵊ/) Ending in/ᴵ/+ /ᵊ/ Ending in /ᶷ/+/ᵊ/

14. - In English, there are, said to be, fivetriphthongs formed by adding /ᵊ/ to the closing diphthongs. Layer, player, mayor Fire, higher, liar royal, loyal Lower, mower Power, hour

15. English vowels vs Arabic vowels • Short vowels • English /i/ • This short vowel is produced when the front of the tongue is in the half-close position, and the lips are spread .We find it in the word "hit". • Arabic /i/ • This vowel is called "kasrah" in Arabic. It appears under the alphabet in this shape ( ِ ) as in, سِر "secret". The tongue in the half-close position forms /i/ vowel in Arabic. Here the lips are unrounded. This short vowel refers to the genitive case.

16. English /ʊ/ • It is a short vowel. The central-back of the tongue is in half-close position and the lips are slightly rounded. It occurs in words like "book". • Arabic /u/ • This is the Arabic ضمة, which is produced by the tongue in the half -close position with the rounded lips. In Arabic it is written as ( ُ ) above the alphabet like the word صُم "deaf". It is used to express the nominative case.

17. -Arabic /a/ • This short vowel is represented byفتحة ( َ ) in Arabic. It signals accusative case as in أكل التفاحةَ

18. Long vowels • English /iː/ • If the front of the tongue is in close position, lips are unrounded. This comes out with the long vowel / iː/ that occurs in the word “see, sea, police". • Arabic- /ii/ • This vowel is formed when we have the letter (y) ي preceded by the notation (ِ ) "kasrah'. For example, "fiil"فيل "elephant".

19. English-/uː/ • This is a long vowel as in moon, rude. • Arabic-/uu/ • This long vowel is formed by the prolongation letter (w) و preceded by the notation ( ُ ) ḍِammah. We find it in the word "ṭuul" طول "length". • Arabic /aa/ • The third Arabic long vowel is formed by the prolongation letter (a)ا preceded by the notation ( َ ) fathah. It occurs in the word "qabala" قابل "met

20. Arabic diphthongs • /ay/ -َ ي as in بيت, أين, ليل • /aw/ -َ و as in يوم, صوم, صوت

21. Exercise 1: • Write the symbol for the underlined vowel sounds:

22. Exercise 2: • How many centering diphthongs are there in English? • Give two examples of the two back closing diphthongs? • Give two example of two Arabic long vowels which correspond to two English long vowels.