Lección 1.1

Gramática: La pronunciación de las 5 vocales

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Spanish has 5 vowels which are pronounced shorter and tenser than their English equivalents:

 

a    as in father       hasta, nada

e    as in café        tres, ese

i     as in machine    sí, mi

o   as in open         no, ocho

u    as in lute          tú, un

 

Note that unlike English, these vowels are always pronounced roughly the same. They do not have the glide that many English vowels do, most notably the e and the o.

Sometimes, vowels are written with an accent mark (´). This means that the vowel is to receive a stronger stress than other vowels in the word. When identifying an accented vowel, you say “con acento” (“with an accent”).