American English - AA [æ] Vowel - How to make the AA Vowel

In this American English pronunciation

video, we’re going to learn how to

pronounce the AA as in BAT vowel.

This is a sound that changes depending

on the following sound. So, it can either

be a pure vowel or a modified vowel.

We’ll go over both in this video.

To make the pure AA vowel, the jaw

drops quite a bit, AA.

The tip of the tongue stays forward; it’s

touching the back of the bottom front

teeth, AA. The back part of the tongue

stretches up.

The tongue is wide, AA. Because the

tongue is high in the back and low in

the front, you can see a lot of it. This is

different from the 'ah' as in 'father'

vowel, for example, where the tongue

presses down in the back and you see

more dark space in the mouth. AA, AH.

You can also see the corners of the

mouth pull back and up a little bit. AA.

Let’s take a look at the pure AA vowel

up close and in slow motion.

The tongue tip is down and the back of

the tongue lifts. Here’s the word ‘sat’.

The tongue position is easy to see

because of the jaw drop needed for this

vowel.

When AA is in a stressed syllable, the

vowel will go up and come down in

pitch, AA. Sat, AA. In an unstressed

syllable, the vowel is flatter and lower

in pitch, quieter, aa. This vowel is

unstressed in the second syllable of

‘backtrack’. Let’s look up close and

in slow motion.

In the first, stressed syllable, the jaw

drops, and we see the corners of the

lips pull back and up for the stressed

AA. In the unstressed syllable, the jaw

drops less. Let’s compare them.

On top is the stressed AA. You can see

the jaw drops more. For the unstressed

AA, the corners of the lips are a little

more relaxed than in the stressed

version, where they pull slightly back

and up.

Generally, the unstressed version of a

vowel or diphthong is more relaxed and

doesn’t take the full mouth position, in

this case, a little less jaw drop, and

relaxed lips. This is because unstressed

syllables are shorter, so we don’t take

the time to make the full position.

At the beginning of this video, I said the

AA vowel is not always a pure AA. This

vowel changes when it’s followed by a

nasal consonant. When it’s followed by

the M or N sounds, the tongue relaxes

in the back, making an UH sound after

AA. AA-UH. It’s not a pure AA sound.

Unfortunately, this change is not

represented in the International

Phonetic Alphabet. It’s still written with

the same AA symbol. So, you just have

to know when it’s followed by [m] or

[n], it’s different.

We don’t say ‘man’, aa, ‘man’, with a

pure AA. We say ‘man’, aa-uh, aa-uh,

relaxing the tongue and corners of the

lips before the consonant. You can

think of this UH relaxation as the ‘uh’ as

in ‘butter’ sound or schwa sound. Let’s

look up close and in slow motion at the

word ‘exam’.

First we see the familiar shape of the

mouth, when the AA is in a stressed

syllable. Watch how the relaxation

happens: the corners of the lips relax

in. The tongue will relax down in the

back. And the lips close for the M

consonant.

This relaxation of the corner of the lips

and back of the tongue happens when

the AA vowel is followed by the N

consonant as well. For example, the

word ‘hand’. Haa-uhnd. Hand.

So, when you see this symbol followed

by this symbol or this symbol, it’s no

longer a pure AA. Think of relaxing out

of the vowel, AA-UH.

If the next sound is the NG consonant,

it’s a little different. Rather than ‘aa-

uh’, the vowel changes into AY. It’s

really like the AY as in SAY diphthong.

First, the middle part of the tongue lifts

towards the roof of the mouth, then the

front part of the tongue. Let’s watch

‘gang’ up close and in slow motion.

The position for the first sound looks a

lot like AA, but the part of the tongue

lifting up is more forward. Gaaaang.

Then the front part of the tongue

arches up towards the roof of the

mouth, while the tongue tip remains

down.

When you see this symbol followed by

this symbol, it’s no longer a pure AA.

It’s more like AY. Gang. Thanks.

Pure stressed AA: Sat, aa

Pure unstressed AA: backtrack, aa

AA, aa, AA, aa.

AA vowel modified by M: exam, aa-uh

AA vowel modified by N: man, aa-uh

AA vowel modified by NG: gang, ay

Example words. Repeat with me: