Myth 5 MYTH 5 English speakers know there are five, sometimes six vowels. These letters most often represent vowels, but they are certainly not vowels themselves. For example, beat, bit, bait, bet, bat, boot, but, bite, bout, and bought Vowels are also sounds.
More different vowels sounds exist than different vowel letters.
The exact number of vowels in American English is difficult to determine, since there is a great deal of variation from one language dialect to another, even differences from one speaker to another. Vowels are described according to the position of the body of the tongue as they are being articulated. If all possible combinations of one, two, or three consonants were permitted to begin an English word, there would be more than 12,000 different combinations. The actual number is fewer than 60. The other 11,040 possibilities are prohibited by the rules of English phonology.