UNIVERSITY GOCE DELCEV-STIP

FACULTY OF PHILOLOGY
PHONETICS

SEMINAR PAPER
Phonetics
SUBJECT
Classification of diphthongs
Mentor:
Tatijana Ulanska
161862

Made by:
Aleksandra Krstova
Anita Jovanovska

161723
Ivana Nakova 161722
Maja Ristevska

Content:
Diphthongs
3
Classification of
Diphthongs.
4
English
Diphthongs
.5
Difference from a vowel and
semivowel.7
Definition of
RP
.7
Diphthongs
chart
..8
Sources
.9

Diphthongs
A diphthong (/df/ or /dp/ ) also known as a gliding vowel, refers to two
adjacent vowel sounds occurring within the same syllable.Technically, a diphthong is
a vowel with two different targets: that is, the tongue moves during the pronunciation
of the vowel. For most dialects of English the phrase "no highway cowboys" contains
five distinct diphthongs.
Diphthongs contrast with monophthongs , where the tongue or other speech organs
do not move significantly and the syllable contains only a single vowel sound. For
instance, in English, the word ah is spoken as a monophthong //, while the
word ow is spoken as a diphthong /a/. Where two adjacent vowel sounds occur in
different syllablesfor example, in the English word re-electthe result is described
as hiatus, not as a diphthong.
Diphthongs often form when separate vowels are run together in rapid speech during
a conversation. However, there are also unitary diphthongs, as in the English
examples above, which are heard by listeners as single-vowel sounds (phonemes).
A diphthong is also defined as a sound made by gliding from one vowel to another,
represented phonetically by sequence of two letters. A sound realised as a
diphthong marks a change from one vowel quality to another, and the limits of the
change are roughly indicated by the two vowel symbols. It is important to note that

even though a diphthong is phonetically a vowel glide or a sequence of two vowel

segments.
The movement in a diphthong starts from the first element, which is usually a pure
vowel and reaches an approximate value of a vowel indicated by the second element
or the point in the direction of which the glide is made.

Classification of diphthongs
The point of direction, whether on the cardinal vowel diagram, or the tongue in the
mouth, enables classification of the diphthongs into two groups: closing, opening
and centring.
In closing diphthongs, the second element is more close than the first (e.g. [ai]);
in opening diphthongs, the second element is more

open (e.g. [ia]).Closing

diphthongs tend to be falling ([ai]), and opening diphthongs are generally rising ([ia]),
as open vowels are more sonorous and therefore tend to be more prominent.
However, exceptions to this rule are not rare in the world's languages.
A third, rare type of diphthong that is neither opening nor closing is heightharmonic diphthongs, with both elements at the same vowel height.These were
particularly characteristic of Old English, which had diphthongs such as / /, /eo/.
A centering diphthong is one that begins with a more peripheral vowel and ends
with a more central one, such as [], [], and []. Many centering diphthongs are
also opening diphthongs ([i], [u]).
Another classification of diphthongs is: falling and rising.
Falling (or descending) diphthongs start with a vowel quality of higher prominence
(higher pitch or volume) and end in a semivowel with less prominence,
like [a] in eye, while rising (or ascending) diphthongs begin with a less prominent
4

semivowel and end with a more prominent full vowel, similar to the [ja] in yard.The
less prominent component in the diphthong may also be transcribed as an
approximant, thus [aj] in eye and [ja] in yard. However, when the diphthong is
analysed as a single phoneme, both elements are often transcribed with vowel
letters (/a/, /a/). Note also that semivowels and approximants are not equivalent in
all treatments, and in the English and Italian languages, among others, many
phoneticians do not consider rising combinations to be diphthongs, but rather
sequences of approximant and vowel. There are many languages (such
as Romanian) that contrast one or more rising diphthongs with similar sequences of
a glide and a vowel in their phonetic inventory (see semivowel for examples).

English Diphthongs
Diphthong /e/
Diphthong /e/ starts from slightly below the half-close front position and moves in
the direction of RP // (Received Pronunciation).The beginning of this diphthong is
between cardinals [e] and []. The first element of the diphthong /a/ varies from
central to front or, it is slightly behind the front open position i.e. C[]. The glide
ends with RP // position.

Diphthongs // and //
The first element of // in RP (Received Pronunciation) is pronounced very close to
cardinal [] and the second, after the configuration changes, is close towards the
pronunciation of // . In this glide the range of closing is not as great as in /a/. This
diphthong can be seen as asymmetrical on the RP system, since it is the only glide
of this type with a back starting point.

Diphthong //

The realisation of diphthong // starts with the articulators positioned for typical RP
(Received Pronunciation) [:] position, while afterwards the tongue moves slightly
up and back to RP [], but the starting point may vary In conservative
pronunciation this diphthong starts in a more retracted region, near centralised (or
centralised-open) [o], and the whole glide is accompanied by increasing liprounding. In an affected variant, the diphthong starts with more centralised-closed
[] position. Also, in many speakers of general RP, the 1st (central) element is so
long that there may rise for a listener a confusion between // an /:/, especially
when [] follows, e.g. goal, girl

Diphthong //
The diphthong // starts further back than /a/ and changes towards RP // it is
described

as starting slightly more fronted than RP /:/. Another dominant

diphthong in the back region is //, so // has to be pronounced with a perceivable

difference for this reason no raising is possible without losing the contrast, and so
fronting or retraction prevails in the variants of //.

Diphthong //
This is one of the centring diphthongs (//, // and //). Diphthong //, starts with
the tongue positioned for //. In the second part of the pronunciation, the movement
has two types. The first is the more open variety of // when // is final in the
words, while in the second type, in non-final positions, the movement is not so
extensive. The two pronunciations are, in essence, two main allophones of // in
RP, corresponding to those of //.

Diphthong //
Diphthong // starts at cardinal // or below and moves to more central but equally
open position. When final // acquires a more open position, while in the cases

when // is closed by a consonant, // it is of mid type. The variants are mostly in

the degree of openness of the first element.

Diphthong //
The glide // has coalesced with /:/ for most RP speakers and [a]
monophthongal pronunciation is found regularly before /r/ in, e.g. alluring, furious,
having the quality of the diphthongs beginning point.

An overview of the

monophthongal pronunciation is given, such as in the words your, Shaw or sure, but
warns that such lowering of monophthongization of // is rarer in case of less
commonly used monosyllabic words such as moor, tour, dour. The diphthong is
pronounced with the first element around //, while the second element reaches a
more open type of //.

Difference from a vowel and semivowel

While there are a number of similarities, diphthongs are not the same as a
combination of a vowel and an approximant or glide. Most importantly, diphthongs
are fully contained in the syllable nucleus [ while a semivowel or glide is restricted to
the syllable boundaries (either the onset or the coda). This often manifests itself
phonetically by a greater degree of constriction though this phonetic distinction is not
always clear. The English word yes, for example, consists of a palatal glide followed
by a monophthong rather than a rising diphthong. In addition, the segmental
elements must be different in diphthongs so that [ii] , when it occurs in a language,
does not contrast with [i] though it is possible for languages to contrast [ij] and [i].

Definition of Received Pronunciation

RP (Received Pronunciation) is traditionally described as having a large inventory
of vowels that can be grouped into short vowels, long vowels and diphthongs.

Diphthongs chart

Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diphthong
http://www.languagebits.com/phonetics-english/englishdiphthongs/