Why “vowel” is being discussed
The most recent Hacker News stories and comments contributing to this topic's mentions.
That is probably on of the most confusing things about English. What do you mean "sounds like a vowel"? All vowels sound like vowels, what else would they sound like? While we'r…
by mrweasel · Sep 20, 2026
Funny how that short article has a sentence where an article that should be there is omitted. "The word <unicorn> starts with vowel letter..." When I see this, I always assume t…
by antfarm · Sep 20, 2026
It’s actually something that is changing in English right now. In some languages like German all word-initial vowel sounds are pronounced with a glottal stop at the start (a so-…
by mathieuh · Sep 20, 2026
To keep it simple, you use an when the first letter of the next word sounds like a vowel when pronounced (vowel sound) and appplies to ancronyms too. Otherwise you use a.
by ExoticPearTree · Sep 20, 2026
My speaking only got better after speaking a lot with native speakers, just, a lot. And focusing hard on vowel sounds. In Norwegian specifically those kill a lot of understandin…
by birdsongs · Sep 20, 2026
Non-native speaker here. To me in spoken language both "unicorn" and "hour" have a combination of 2 vowels in the beginning. Let me transcribe them as "ee-oo" and "aa-oo" here.…
by mh-cx · Sep 20, 2026
Interest
Proportion of Hacker News items mentioning "vowel" over time.
Mentions
Total number of Hacker News items mentioning "vowel" over time.
A vowel is a speech sound pronounced with minimal to no stricture in the vocal tract. Vowels are one of the two principal classes of speech sounds, the other being the consonant. Vowels vary in quality, loudness, and length. They are usually voiced and are closely involved in prosodic variation such as tone, intonation and stress. The nucleus, or "center", of a syllable typically consists of a vowel sound. Read more on Wikipedia