vocale

Vocale is the term for the vowel sound or vowel letter in many languages, most prominently Italian, where vocale means "vowel." In linguistic usage, a vowel is a sound produced with an open vocal tract, typically forming the nucleus of a syllable. The word derives from Latin vocalis, from vox, "voice."

Phonetics describes vowels by height (high, mid, low), backness (front, central, back), and rounding. They are usually voiced and require less constriction than consonants. Some languages distinguish vowel length, nasalization, tone, or vowel quality, adding phonemic contrast to the vowel inventory.

Orthographically, vowels are represented by letters in Latin-based alphabets (a, e, i, o, u). Other scripts or systems may use diacritics to indicate vowel quality or length, or may omit vowels in certain contexts (as in some abjads). Vowels typically form the syllable nucleus and influence prosody and rhyme.

Cross-linguistically, vowel systems vary greatly. Italian has five vowel phonemes with stable quality; English features many vowels and diphthongs; Finnish and Japanese distinguish vowel length phonemically; vowel harmony and vowel shifts are found in various language families. The concept of "vocale" thus encompasses both sound and written representation.