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recognition is implied in phoneticians’ general practice of talking about central vowels or
centralization of certain vowels.
Before speech sounds are articulated due to the intervention of various speech organs
such as have been mentioned above, movement of an airstream is required; this airstream
is then variously modified by speech organs into speech sounds.
There are three types of airstream mechanism. First, there is the pulmonic airstream
mechanism. This is initiated by the lungs, and in normal speech the airstream is
egressive, that is, the air is pushed out from the lungs. Vowels and many of the
consonants require this type of airstream mechanism. Second, there is the velaric
airstream mechanism. This is initiated by velar closure, i.e. the closure between the
back part of the tongue and the soft palate, and the airstream is always ingressive. Clicks
require this type of airstream mechanism. Third, there is the glottalic airstream
mechanism. This is initiated by the glottis, which may be firmly or loosely closed, and
the airstream is either egressive or ingressive. Ejectives (egressive) and implosives
(ingressive) require this type of airstream mechanism, the firmly closed glottis for the
former and the loosely closed glottis for the latter. Certain combinations of two of these
types of airstream mechanism also occur.
In classifying speech sounds from the articulatory point of view, phoneticians
frequently operate with the division between vowels and consonants. The so-called
semivowels, e.g. [j w ], are, articulatorily speaking, vowels.
Vowels are speech sounds in whose articulation (1) the highest part of the tongue
which varies is located within a certain zone in the oral cavity which may be described as
the vowel area (cf. the cardinal vowels discussed below) and (2) the egressive airstream
from the lungs issues into the open air without meeting any closure or such constriction
as would cause audible friction in the oral cavity as well as the pharyngeal cavity. Note
that the occurrence of audible friction between the vocal folds, i.e. voice or vocal
vibration, does not disqualify sounds as vowels provided there occurs at the same time no
closure or constriction in any of the above-mentioned cavities. Many phoneticians
assume a vowel to be voiced by definition; others consider that some languages have
voiceless vowels—indeed it is possible to argue that [h] in English is a voiceless vowel.
The soft palate, when raised (cf. velic closure), prevents the airstream from entering the
nasal cavity, and oral vowels are produced, e.g. [i]; but when lowered, the soft palate
allows the airstream to enter the nasal cavity as well as the oral cavity, and nasalized
vowels result, e.g. [õ].
In describing a vowel from the point of view of articulatory phonetics, many
phoneticians customarily make use of a certain auditory-articulatory reference system in
terms of which any vowel of any language may be described. The auditory-articulatory
reference system in question is the cardinal vowel system devised by the English
phonetician, Daniel Jones (1881–1967). The cardinal vowel system consists, as shown in
Figure 2, of eight primary cardinal vowels, numbered from 1 to 8, and ten secondary
cardinal vowels, numbered from 9 to 18; all of these eighteen cardinal vowels are oral
vowels.
The primary cardinal vowels are posited in such a way that no. 1, [i], is articulated
with the front of the tongue as high and front as possible consistently with its being a
vowel—i.e., without becoming a consonant by producing audible friction; no. 5, [ ], is
articulated with the back of the tongue as low and back as possible consistently with its