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What are Diphthongs?

Brendan McGuigan
Brendan McGuigan

Diphthongs are types of vowels where two vowel sounds are connected in a continuous, gliding motion. They are often referred to as gliding vowels. Most languages have a number of diphthongs, although that number varies widely, from only one or two to fifteen or more.

A vowel is a specific type of sound, characterized by a lack of full obstruction to the air flow. Vowels can be contrasted with consonants, where there is such an obstruction. As air comes out when you are speaking a consonant, there is a build up of pressure as the air flow is constricted. When speaking a vowel, there is no built up pressure, the sound is simply shaped by the position of the tongue.

Two vowel sounds joined in a continuous motion are called diphthongs.
Two vowel sounds joined in a continuous motion are called diphthongs.

Vowels are generally characterized by three different criteria: the position of the tongue in the mouth relative to the roof of the mouth (height), the position of the tongue in either the front or back of the mouth (backness), and the shape of the lips as the vowel sound is being made (roundedness). There are other things that may characterize vowels, but they are not very common in English — things such as the position of the root of the tongue, for example, rarely affect English vowels, though they affect the vowels in many African languages.

Vowels are shaped by the position of the tongue.
Vowels are shaped by the position of the tongue.

When vowels come together, they may either be two distinct syllables, or may merge into one syllable. When they merge, they form what are known as diphthongs. If they stay separate they are simply two monophthongs. An example of two single syllable vowels can be seen in the word triage, in which the i and the a are both pronounced on their own. An example of a diphthong can be seen in the word mouse, in which the ou part of the word obviously consists of two distinct vowels, but there is no syllabic break between the two.

Diphthongs can usually be seen as having two distinct parts — the nucleus, and the off-glide. The nucleus of the diphthong is the vowel that is most stressed, and forms the center of the sound, while the off-glide is the vowel which seems to flow into or off of the nucleus vowel.

The three major diphthongs in Standard English, which are known as phonemic diphthongs, are ai, aw, and oy. All three of these diphthongs are very common, and many people simply think of them as single vowels in some contexts. For example, in the English word ride, the i would be transcribed phonetically as ai. Although it appears as a single letter in our writing, it actually consists of two vowels — if you say the word you should be able to hear the two. Similarly, the word how contains the diphthong aw at the end, and the word boy contains the diphthong oy.

Other diphthongs in Standard English are the ei sound in the word fame or the pronunciation of the letter a, and the ou sound in the word phone. Other languages have many more diphthongs aside from these, and other dialects of English may have more diphthongs as well. Languages such as Finnish have nearly twenty diphthongs, while the Received Pronunciation dialect of English has an extra five or so diphthongs not found in Standard English.

In addition to diphthongs and monophthongs, there are also what are called triphthongs. These are similar to diphthongs, but instead of moving simply from one vowel sound to another, a third sound is also added.

Discussion Comments

anon336815

"ei" in fame? That would confuse anyone. The ay (long A) is a-e and the oy sound comes from o-i-e.Some linguists see diphthongs where there are none.

orangey03

I've always found the diphthong definition confusing. It's supposed to relate to vowel sounds, yet you have 'w' and 'y' mixed in with them sometimes.

I would think a diphthong would be 'au' instead of 'aw' and 'oi' instead of 'oy,' since both of those would be pronounced the same. Grammar contains so many confusing rules!

anon218174

It was really instructive.

anon151842

would like to know why some diphthongs are physically joined together, such as the ae in leukemia and daemon.

anon146399

can you differentiate between monophthongs and diphthongs?

anon122028

would you please give me some examples for each diphthong?

anon97481

are diphthongs the same as vowel digraphs?

anon89758

as a filipino, and it's not difficult for me to say some diphthongs. but there are times that i had troubles in using them.

anon89066

As a Turkish American, I liked this website. How I can lose my accent in English? What is the best way for this?

anon34960

A ligature can be used to strangle a person, a diphthong cannot.

anon29204

Can you give a clear description of the movements of the articulators and respiratory system in producing the diphthong 'ai'?

glenCCC

Sorry, I'm still confused... Can you please tell me the difference between Diphthongs and Phonograms? ... Some of these things seem to overlap ... Or is it a case where Diphthongs are a kind of member of the Phonogram family?

brendan

good question. a ligature is a visual phenomenon, whereas a diphthong has to do with the sound made. ligature is when two letter forms are joined in some way, but this doesn't necessarily indicate a different way of pronouncing those two letters (as with a diphthong), rather it is simply a visual nicety.

anon11472

What are the differences between diphthong and ligatures?

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    • Two vowel sounds joined in a continuous motion are called diphthongs.
      By: Frank Jr
      Two vowel sounds joined in a continuous motion are called diphthongs.
    • Vowels are shaped by the position of the tongue.
      By: yanmingzhang
      Vowels are shaped by the position of the tongue.