Front vowel

The front vowels that have dedicated symbols in the International Phonetic Alphabet are: • close front unrounded vowel • close front compressed vowel • near-close front unrounded vowel • near-close front compressed vowel • close-mid front unrounded vowel • close-mid front compressed vowel • open-mid front unrounded vowel • open-mid front compressed vowel • near-open front unrounded vowel • open front unrounded vowel • open front rounded vowel There also are front vowels without dedicated symbols in the IPA: • close front protruded vowel • near-close front protruded vowel • close-mid front protruded vowel • mid front unrounded vowel or • mid front compressed vowel or • mid front protruded vowel or • open-mid front protruded vowel As above, other front vowels can be indicated with diacritics of relative articulation applied to letters for neighboring vowels, such as , or for a near-close front unrounded vowel. ==Articulatory Characteristics==

In articulatory phonetics, fronted vowels contrast with raised vowels and retracted vowels. In this conception, fronted vowels are a broader category than those listed in the IPA chart, including central vowels . Within the fronted vowels, vowel height (open or close) is determined by the position of the jaw, not by the tongue directly. Phonemic raised and retracted vowels may be phonetically fronted by certain consonants, such as palatals and, in some languages, pharyngeals. For example, may be fronted to next to or . == Acoustic Characteristics ==

Acoustically, front vowels have a higher second formant (F2)—the second harmonic from the fundamental frequency—than central and back vowels. The second formant corresponds with how far forward the tongue can be positioned relative to the very back of the mouth. Open-front vowels have a lower F2 than close-front vowels because there is less room for the tongue to move forward when the jaw is hinged open. ==Effect on preceding consonant==

In many languages, front vowels influence the place of articulation of surrounding consonants. In the following examples, front vowels have altered preceding velar and alveolar consonants, bringing their place of articulation towards palatal or postalveolar. These changes often start as allophonic variation, but may become phonemic. This historical palatalization is reflected in the orthographies of several European languages, including the and of almost all Romance languages, the and in Norwegian, Swedish, Faroese and Icelandic, and the , and in Greek. English follows the French pattern, but without as much regularity. However, for native or early borrowed words affected by palatalization, English has generally altered the spelling after the pronunciation (Examples include cheap, church, cheese, churn from , and yell, yarn, yearn, yeast from .) ==See also==