Open Front Rounded Vowel

The open front rounded vowel, or low front rounded vowel, is a type of vowel sound, not confirmed to be phonemic in any spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ⟨ɶ⟩, and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is &. The letter ⟨ɶ⟩ is a small caps rendition of ⟨Œ⟩. Note that ⟨œ⟩, the lowercase version of the ligature, is used for the open-mid front rounded vowel.

The IPA prefers terms "close" and "open" for vowels, and the name of the article follows this. 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.

Read more about Open Front Rounded Vowel:  Features, Occurrence

Famous quotes containing the words open, front, rounded and/or vowel:

    “Technological change defines the horizon of our material world as it shapes the limiting conditions of what is possible and what is barely imaginable. It erodes ... assumptions about the nature of our reality, the “pattern” in which we dwell, and lays open new choices.”
    —Shoshana Zuboff (b. 1951)

    “She’s in the house.
    She’s at turn after turn.
    She’s behind me.
    She’s in front of me.
    She’s in my bed.
    She’s on path after path,
    and I’m weak from want of her.
    O heart,
    there is no reality for me
    other than she she
    she she she she
    in the whole of the reeling world.
    And philosophers talk about Oneness.”
    —Amaru (c. seventh century A.D.)

    “I was not unemployed in my profession by the late John Jacob Astor; a name which, I admit, I love to repeat, for it hath a rounded and orbicular sound to it, and rings like unto bullion.”
    —Herman Melville (1819–1891)

    “Brute animals have the vowel sounds; man only can utter consonants.”
    —Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834)