Speak American English Like a Native Speaker – /æ/ Vowel Guide

Today’s lesson will cover the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) sound /æ/. This sound is nicknamed “ash,” and it is not found in many languages. It exists in Finnish, Arabic, Persian, and some other languages. It is also in the dialects of some speakers of Turkish and Swedish. For speakers of these languages, this sound will be as easy as pie. However, if your native language is Japanese, Spanish, or most of the world’s other languages that lack this weird sounding vowel, you’re going to have to put some effort into mastering its pronunciation.

Like most of the vowels in English, this one varies according to your dialect. This article is written for American English vowel pronunciation. Our British cousins use this far less than us yankees. Their vowel system is much more complicated than ours, though, from my American viewpoint.

The /æ/ sound has the following features according to the IPA:

• Low front unrounded vowel (pronounced with the tongue in a forward and down position)
• Same height as /ɑ/ (this sound will be discussed in depth later)
• Usually written as “a” in English. Found in words like cat, mattress, and talent.

If some of the above information didn’t make sense to you, it will be explained in a later part of the guide.

Exercise 1: Try saying the following monosyllabic words that contain the /æ/ vowel:

1) Cat

2) Fan

3) Stand

4) Lamb

5) Back

Exercise 2: Now record yourself pronouncing the following words. Some of them are pronounced with /æ/ while others are pronounced with /ɑ/, /e/, or schwa (I will explain these sounds in a later part of the guide!).

1) Grape

2) Staple

3) Palm

4) Apple

5) Table

6) Attic

7) Batter

8) About

9) Anticipate

10) Fantastic

I hope the information above helped you in improving your pronunciation of the English /æ/ vowel. As always, leave a link to a vocaroo with your pronunciation of today’s exercises to receive free feedback on your English vowels. You can also ask any questions about this guide in the comments section.