Central vowel

A central vowel is a type of vowel sound used in some spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a central vowel is that the tongue is positioned halfway between a front vowel and a back vowel. The central vowels identified by the International Phonetic Alphabet are:

• close central unrounded vowel [ɨ]\n* close central rounded vowel [ʉ]\n* close-mid central unrounded vowel [ɘ]\n* close-mid central rounded vowel [ɵ]\n* mid central vowel [ə]\n* open-mid central unrounded vowel [ɜ]\n* open-mid central rounded vowel [ɞ]\n* near-open central vowel [ɐ]