A monophthong (in Greek μονόφθογγος = single note) is a "pure" vowel sound, one whose articulation at both beginning and end is relatively fixed, and which does not glide up or down towards a new position of articulation; compare diphthong. Note: This page contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. ... In phonetics, a diphthong (Greek and ending tongue positions. ...

In the English language, there are in practice relatively few monophthongs. The position, beginnings, and endings of vowel articulation are perhaps the chief distinguishing feature among the various dialects of English; the differences between the pronunciations of British English and American English is largely a result of the different realization of vowel sounds. The conversion of monophthongs to diphthongs, or of diphthongs to monophthongs, is a major element of language change and is likely the cause of further changes. Some sounds that may be perceived by native speakers as monophthongs in both these varieties of English are, in fact, diphthongs; the vowel sound in pay — IPA /peɪ/ is an example of this. Some dialects of English make monophthongs out of former diphthongs. In British English, the vowel boat is generally realized as a diphthong [əʊ]; American English has either [oʊ] with much less change of articulation or a pure vowel [oː] in this position. Also, the speech of the southern United States tends to alter the diphthong /aɪ/ as in eye to an [aː] somewhere between /ɑ/ and /æ/. On the other hand, former monophthongs have become diphthongs in American English such as the /ɪ/ in words like pin changing to [ɪə] in some American dialects. The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ... A dialect (from the Greek word διάλεκτος, dialektos) is a variety of a language used by people from a particular geographic area. ... British English (BrE) is a term used (especially by Americans) to differentiate between the form of the English language used in the United Kingdom and those used elsewhere. ... American English (AmE) is the dialect of the English language used mostly in the United States of America. ... Language change is the manner in which the phonetic, morphological, semantic, syntactic, and other features of a language are modified over time, it is the topic addressed by historical linguistics which looks at the past states of a language and seek to explain how the present state came about. ... The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is a system of phonetic notation devised by linguists to accurately and uniquely represent each of the wide variety of sounds (phones or phonemes) used in spoken human language. ...

Historically, some languages treat vowel sounds that were formerly diphthongs as monophthongs. Such is the case in Sanskrit, in whose grammar the sounds now realised as /e/ and /o/ are conceptually ai and au, and are written that way in the Devanagari and related alphabets. The sounds /ai/ and /au/ exist in Sanskrit, but are written as if they were āi and āu, with long initial vowels. Similar processes of the creation of new monophthongs from old diphthongs are preserved in the traditional spellings of languages as diverse as French and modern Greek. Sanskrit ( संस्कृतम् ; pronunciation: ) is an Indo-European classical language of India and a liturgical language of Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism. ... Rigveda manuscript in Devanagari (early 19th century) DevanāgarÄ« (देवनागरी — in English pronounced ) (ISCII – IS13194:1991) [1] is an abugida alphabet used to write several Indian languages, including Sanskrit, Hindi, Marathi, Kashmiri, Sindhi, Bihari, Bhili, Konkani, Bhojpuri and Nepali from Nepal. ...

See also

• vowel
• diphthong
• triphthong
• list of vowels
• list of phonetics topics