Posted on by elenorig

English Pronunciation

English Pronunciation

International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is used to illustrate sounds

A phonetic language is one where each letter represents a single sound, making it easy to read and pronounce words.

Phonetic Languages: Spanish, Italian, Finnish, Turkish, Korean, Serbian, Esperanto, Japanese, Swahili, Polish, Tamil, Vietnamese, Filipino (Tagalog)

Middle (Somewhat Phonetic) Languages: German, Russian, Greek, Arabic, Hebrew, Portuguese, Bengali, Thai, Ukrainian, Dutch, Czech, Hindi, Bengali, Swedish, Norwegian

Not Phonetic Languages: English, French, Danish, Irish Gaelic, Chinese (Mandarin), Japanese (due to kanji), Welsh, Khmer, Burmese, Indonesian, Punjabi.

As a result, English has a lot of homophones – words that are written differently, but sound the same:

to – too – two, for – four, there – their – they’re, sun – son, bare – bear, flour – flower, cell – sell, knight – night, pair – pear, peace – piece, see – sea.

How do people live like that? What can I do?

  1. Spell.
  2. Use sentences.
  3. Use synonyms.

Vowels.

In English there are long and short vowel sounds. 

Vowel letters and vowel sounds in Spanish: 

A – /a/, E – /e/, I – /i/, O – /o/, U – /u/

There are 19 vowel sounds in English, 11 single and 8 combinations.

  1. /ɝ/ as in bird – fur, her, learn, church, Burlington, shirt

/a/

  1. /ɑ/ as in father – car, hot, dog, Mom
  2. /ʌ/ as in cup – bus, love, sun
  3. /aɪ/ as in my – fly, time, high (like /aɪ/ in hay)
  4. /aʊ/ as in how – now, out, loud (like /au/ in auto)

/e/

  1. /æ/ as in cat – man, black, sat, Dad, sad, Mass
  2. /ɛ/ as in bed – red, pen, left, said, mess
  3. /ə/ (schwa) as in sofa – about, problem, banana
    /ˈsoʊ.fə/ – /əˈbaʊt/, /ˈprɑː.bləm/, /bəˈnæn.ə/
    Does not exist in Spanish. The schwa sound appears in unstressed syllables, but Spanish tends to have more distinct vowel sounds in all syllables.
  4. /eɪ/ as in say – day, make, wait, eight, ate
  5. /eə/ as in air – fair, care, chair

/i/

  1. /ɪ/ as in sit – bit, hit, list, live, bin
  2. /iː/ as in see – tree, me, feet, leave, sea, leaf, leave, beans
  3. /ɪə/ as in here – beer, fear, clear

/o/

  1. /ɔ/ as in daughter – law, saw, caught, auto
  2. /ɔɪ/ as in boy – toy, coin, join (like /oi/ in hoy)
  3. /oʊ/ as in go – show, no, low, though

/u/

  1. /ʊ/ as in put – foot, good, look
  2. /uː/ as in blue – too, moon, food, through
  3. /ʊə/ as in tour – pure, sure, poor

Consonants.

English consonants can be together. You have to say them all!

Examples: questions, directions, tests, rents, circles, walked

Almost the same in English and Spanish:

  • /p/ as in pet – pen, happy (as in papa).
  • /b/ as in bat – ball, big (as in banco).
  • /t/ as in top – time, table (as in taco).
  • /d/ as in dog – done, dark (as in dedo).
  • /k/ as in cat – car, king, clock (as in casa).
  • /g/ as in go – game, big (as in gato).
  • /f/ as in fun – face, fast, fan (as in feliz).
  • /s/ as in sit – see, song, sign (as in sal).
  • /m/ as in man – mother, money, map (as in mamá).
  • /n/ as in net – no, nice, name (as in noche).
  • /tʃ/ as in chip – chat, cheese, chair (as in chico).
  • /j/ as in yes – yellow, you, year (as in yo)
  • /h/ as in happy – he, has, holiday, hotel, alcohol (as in jugar)

Different, but easy:

  • /ŋ/ as in sing – song, long, ring 
  • /ʃ/ as in she – shoe, shop, fish
  • /dʒ/ as in jam – job, joke, judge
  • /ʒ/ as in measure – leisure, treasure, vision
  • /l/ as in lip – look, love, lamp
  • /r/ as in red – rain, road, rose (different tongue position)

Need work:

  • /v/ as in van – very, vote, view (vaca is /ˈβa.ka/)
  • /w/ as in wet – win, why, wall, wait
  • /θ/ as in think (voiceless “th”) – think, thanks, bath
    Castilian Spanish use a similar sound, /θ/, as in cima, zapato.
    /s/ is the most similar
  • /z/ as in zip – zero, zoo, buzz
    /s/ is the most similar
  • /ð/ as in this (voiced “th”) – that, those, father.
    /z/ is the most similar 

Letter H.

/h/ – hat, hotel, alcohol, how, have, he, history

Combinations: th, sh, ch – this, that, she, think.

Silent: 

  • honor, hour, heir, school
  • enough, laugh, daughter, thought, bought, brought 
  • what, when, where, why, who 

Linking between words.

Same sounds link: all right, get together, had to see it, some money, big guy, black car, limited time, could take, stop playing.

Consonant sounds link with vowel sounds:

How is it going? Have a nice day! 

My car is new.

It’s five o’clock somewhere. Do you speak English?

She worked for ten hours. Just a little.