English How to Pronounce OW a diphthong American Accent
The ‘ow’ as in ‘now’ diphthong. The first
sound of this diphthong does not appear on
its own as a vowel in American English. To
make this sound, aa, ow, the back part of
the tongue stretches a bit towards the soft
palate, aa, and you can see the corners of
the lips pull a bit and the top lip pulls
up, showing a little bit more of the top teeth,
aa, aa. The second half of the diphthong is
the ‘uh’ as in ‘pull’ vowel sound. In this
vowel sound, the back of the tongue will stretch
even further up towards the soft palate, ow,
ow. And you can see the lips will come in
and round for the second part of the diphthong,
ow, now. Here we see both sounds of the diphthong.
In the first sound, you can see the jaw is
dropped more. Here are the two sounds in profile.
Here parts of the mouth are drawn in. In the
first sound on the left, the tongue is raised
and pulls back, slightly higher in the back.
In the second sound the tongue stretches up
towards the soft palate. The tip of the tongue
is touching the bottom front teeth in the
first sound, but is not quite touching in
the second sound. The ‘ow’ as in ‘now’ diphthong.
Sample words: cow, bow, sound. Sample sentence:
I found my flowers dead and brown when
I came back to town. Now you will see this
sentence up close and in slow motion, both
straight on and from an angle, so you can
really study how the mouth moves when making
this sound. I, with the ‘ai’ as in ‘buy’ diphthong.
Lip up to make the F in found, and here we
have the ‘ow’ as in ‘now’ diphthong. The space
in the mouth gets darker as the tongue is
moving back. My flowers, again, the ‘ow’ as
in ‘now’, and again, you can see the tongue
moves back as the space in the mouth gets
darker. Teeth come together for the Z in flowers,
also for the D in dead with the ‘eh’ as in
‘bed’ vowel sound. Tongue tip up for the D.
And brown, lips together for the B and again
the ‘ow’ as in ‘now’ diphthong. Tongue up
to make the N. The lips form the tight circle
for the W, when, tongue tip up for the N.
I came, lips together for the M sound. Back,
the tongue up in the back to make the K sound.
To town, with the ‘ow’ as in ‘now’ diphthong,
lips rounding at the end, tongue tip up for
the N. And now from the angle. I found, the
‘ow’ as in ‘now’ diphthong. You can see the
tongue moving back as the lips come forward
and round. My flowers, again, the ‘ow’ as
in ‘now’. The lips come in to round for the
second half of the diphthong. Teeth make the
Z position. Dead, tongue tip up for the D.
And brown, again, the ‘ow’ as in ‘now’ diphthong.
The tongue there coming forward from being
back for the R. When with the ‘eh’ as in ‘bed’,
tongue up for the N. When I came, lips together
for the M. Back, you can see the tongue moving
up in the back for the K sound. To with the
schwa, town. Again the ‘ow’ as in ‘now’ diphthong,
see the tongue moving back and the lips rounding.
Tongue tip up for the N. That’s it, and thanks
so much for using Rachel’s English.