Close-mid front unrounded vowel

Close-mid front unrounded vowel
e
Image
IPA number	302
Encoding
Entity (decimal)	e
Unicode (hex)	U+0065
X-SAMPA	e
Kirshenbaum	e
Sound

The close-mid front unrounded vowel, or high-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⟩.

The IPA prefers the terms "close" and "open" for vowels, and the name of this article follows this preference. However, a large number of linguists, perhaps a majority, prefer the terms "high" and "low", and these are the only terms found in introductory textbooks on phonetics such as those by Peter Ladefoged.

Features

IPA vowel chart
Front Near-​front Central Near-​back Back Close •iy •ɨʉ •ɯu •ɪʏ •ɪ̈ʊ̈ •ʊ •eø •ɘɵ •ɤo •e̞ø̞ ə •ɤ̞o̞ •ɛœ •ɜɞ •ʌɔ •æ ɐ •aɶ •ä •ɑɒ Near-close Close-mid Mid Open-mid Near-open Open
Paired vowels are: unrounded • rounded
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• Its vowel height is close-mid, also known as high-mid, which means the tongue is positioned halfway between a close vowel (a high 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.

Occurrence

Language		Word	IPA	Meaning	Notes
Arabic	Egyptian	ليه	[leː]	'why'	See Arabic phonology
Catalan		séc	[ˈsek]	'fold'	See Catalan phonology
Chinese	Cantonese	鼻/bei6	[pei˨˨]	'nose'	See Cantonese phonology
	Mandarin	飛/fēi	[feɪ̯˥]	'to fly'	See Mandarin phonology
	Wu	隑/ge	[ɡe˩˧]	'lean'
Danish		seng	[seŋ]	'bed'	See Danish phonology
Dutch	Standard	vreemd	[vreːmt]	'strange'	In the north of the Netherlands usually diphthongized to [eɪ]. See Dutch phonology
	Southern				See Dutch phonology
English	Australian	bed	[bed]	'bed'	See Australian English phonology
	North American	play	[pl̥eː]	'play'	Some dialects. Many speakers have a diphthong of the type [eɪ] instead. See English phonology
	Scottish
Faroese		eg	[eː]	'I'
French		beauté	[bote]	'beauty'	See French phonology
Galician		tres	[tres]	'three'
Georgian		მეფჱ	[mɛpʰej]	'king'
German		Seele	[ˈzeːlə]	'soul'	See German phonology
Italian		stelle	[ˈstelle]	'stars'	See Italian phonology
Korean		베다/beda	[ˈpeːda]	'to cut'	See Korean phonology
North Frisian		ween	[ʋeːn]	'blue'
Norwegian		le	[leː]	'laugh'	See Norwegian phonology
Polish		dzień	[dʑeɲ]	'day'	Allophone of /ɛ/ between palatal or palatalized consonants. See Polish phonology
Portuguese		mesa	[mezɐ]	'table'	See Portuguese phonology
Russian		шея	[ˈʂejə]	'neck'	Occurs only before soft consonants. See Russian phonology
Swedish		se	[seː]	'see'	See Swedish phonology
Vietnamese		tê	[te]	'numb'	See Vietnamese phonology
West Frisian		skeel	[skeːɫ]	'cross-eyed'
Zapotec	Tilquiapan	example needed	[]		Occurs mostly after [i], otherwise the vowel is central [ɘ]

Bibliography

• Carbonell, Joan F.; Llisterri, Joaquim (1992), "Catalan", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 22 (1-2): 53–56, doi:10.1017/S0025100300004618 
• Cruz-Ferreira, Madalena (1995), "European Portuguese", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 25 (2): 90–94, doi:10.1017/S0025100300005223 
• Fougeron, Cecile; Smith, Caroline L (1993), "Illustrations of the IPA:French", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 23 (2): 73–76, doi:10.1017/S0025100300004874 
• Jassem, Wiktor (2003), "Polish", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 33 (1): 103–107, doi:10.1017/S0025100303001191 
• Jones, Daniel; Dennis, Ward (1969), The Phonetics of Russian, Cambridge University Press 
• Merrill, Elizabeth (2008), "Tilquiapan Zapotec", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 38 (1): 107–114, doi:10.1017/S0025100308003344 
• Rogers, Derek; d'Arcangeli, Luciana (2004), "Italian", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 34 (1): 117–121, doi:10.1017/S0025100304001628 
• Shosted, Ryan K.; Vakhtang, Chikovani (2006), "Standard Georgian", Journal of the International Phonetic Association 36 (2): 255–264, doi:10.1017/S0025100306002659