Close-mid front unrounded vowel - Definition and Overview

IPA - Unicode	e
IPA - image
X-SAMPA	e
Kirshenbaum	e
Sound sample

The close-mid front 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 e, and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is e.

Features of this vowel:

• Its vowel height is close-mid, which means the tongue is positioned halfway between close vowel and a mid vowel.
• Its vowel backness is front, which means the tongue is positioned as far forward 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.

Discussion of this vowel can easily become confusing for English speakers, as the English name of the symbol, the letter e, is pronounced with a different vowel, [i], the close front unrounded vowel. This idiosyncrasy is a result of the Great Vowel Shift. This vowel does not occur by itself in English, but it forms the first part of the diphthong [eɪ], which is the sound of the name of the letter A—another result of the Great Vowel Shift. [eɪ] is also the sound of the letters ay in play or the letters ai in bait.

This vowel occurs in Spanish, and is the sound represented by the letter e in bebé (="baby").