In phonetics, vowel roundedness refers to the amount of rounding in the lips during the articulation of a vowel. When pronouncing a rounded vowel, the lips form a circular opening, while unrounded vowels are pronounced with the lips relaxed. In most languages, front vowels tend to be unrounded, while back vowels tend to be rounded, but some languages, such as French and German, distinguish between rounded and unrounded vowels at the same height and backness.
There are two types of vowel rounding: endolabial and exolabial. In endolabial rounding, the corners of the mouth are drawn slightly together to form a circular opening, but the lips do not protrude and only the outer surface of the lips is exposed. In exolabial rounding, the lips are thrust forward to form a tunnel, as when kissing; the inner surface of the lips is exposed. Usually, back rounded vowels are exolabial, while front rounded vowels are endolabial. Swedish is uncommon in that it makes a phonemic distinction between the two types, having unrounded, endolabial, and exolabial front close-mid vowels.
In tonal languages, in most cases the tone of a syllable is carried by the vowel, meaning that the relative pitch or the pitch contour that marks the tone is superimposed on the vowel.
Vowels are especially important to the structures of words in languages that have very few consonants (like Polynesian languages such as Maori and Hawaiian), and in languages whose inventory of vowels is larger than its inventory of consonants.
Furthermore, in English some vowel sounds are represented by combinations of vowel letters, such as the ea in beat or by a vowel letter and an approximant letter, as the ow in how, or the er in her.
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