diphthongchar

Diphthong characteristics

As diphthongs are gliding sounds, they are described on the basis of the tongue movement from a beginning to an end position. The phoneme is a rising diphthong, starting from the position of the vowel /a/ and ending in the position of the vowel /u/. As /a/ is not rounded, the diphthong starts with spread lips, but there is increasing lip rounding as the glide approaches /u/, which is pronounced with rounded lips. In practice the glide is hardly ever long enough for the full second sound to be reached, and in front of Fortis consonants the glide is particularly short. When followed by Lenis consonants, the first element of the diphthong is considerably lengthened. In the pronunciation of diphthongs, therefore, the Fortis/Lenis contrast is particularly important, and Norwegians should take great care to observe this phenomenon. The illustrations serve as a reminder of the vocal organs, and diphthongs must be envisaged as resulting from the tongue and lip movement from an initial position to a position approaching the position of the second sound element.