What is vowel harmony?

Definition
	Vowel harmony is a type of assimilation which takes place when vowels come to share certain features with contrastive vowels elsewhere in a word or phrase (Crystal 1992 168 ).

Example
	A front vowel in the first syllable of a word would require the presence of a front vowel in the second syllable.

See also
	Options for symbolizing vowel harmony

Context for this page:

Concept module: vowel harmony
In overview module: Glossary (Linguistics): V
In modular book: Glossary of linguistic terms, by Eugene E. Loos (general editor), Susan Anderson (editor), Dwight H., Day, Jr. (editor), Paul C. Jordan (editor), and J. Douglas Wingate (editor)
In bookshelf: Linguistics

This page is an extract from the LinguaLinks Library, Version 5.0 published on CD-ROM by SIL International, 2003. [Ordering information.]

Page content last modified: 5 January 2004

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