In phonetics, vowel reduction is any of various changes in the acoustic quality of vowels, which are related to changes in stress, sonority, duration, loudness, articulation, or position in the word (e.g. for Creek language), and which are perceived as "weakening". It most often makes the vowels shorter as well.
Such a vowel may be called reduced or weak. An unreduced vowel may be contrasted as full or strong.
Read more about Vowel Reduction: Weakening of Vowels
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