English Phonetics: Sounds, Symbols & Articulation
English Phonetics
Vowel Sounds
A (r), er, ear, al, au:
- Ae, a
ɜ: ir, er, ear, ur, or, our:
- ʌ, u (between 2 consonants), or, or, oo
i: ee, eo, ie, ei, and:
- e, e, o, u
ɔ: or, ore, oor, aw, oar, or ours:
- E-Schaw
u: oo, u, or, or, ew, ue, ui, oe:
- i, e, and
Others the, au, or:
- U.S. u, oo, or
Diphthongs:
- ai: a + i (e, i, ie, is, uy, eye)
- au: a + u (or, ow)
- ei: e + i (ei, ai, ai, a (between comfort and seguida of and (shwa) – (are, ear, air, ere))
- əu: (shwa + u.corta) – (a, oa, oe, ow, ou)
- iə: (i.breve + shwa) – (eer, ere, ear, ier, e)
- ɔi: o + i (hi, oy, awy)
- uə: (u.corta + shwa) – (or, ur, ure, I, oo)
Alveolar Ridge
The Alveolar Ridge is the bony ridge that forms the borders of the upper and lower jaws and contains the sockets of the teeth.
Phonetics Terminology
Phoneme: The abstraction of the individual sounds produced by speakers of a language. If a particular phoneme in a word is changed, the meaning of the word may change (e.g., ten-pen).
Allophones: Variants of a phoneme. A phoneme may take different forms depending on its position in a word. The meaning of a word does not change if an allophone is changed (e.g., canal-channel).
Minimal Pairs: Two words which share a set of phonemes, but differ by a change in one phoneme (e.g., ten-pen).
Homographs: Words which are written in the same way but have different meanings (e.g., bow-bow).
Homophones: Words which are pronounced in the same way but are spelled differently (e.g., bow-bough).
Consonant Features
Nasal Release: Happens when nasal phonemes immediately follow plosive phonemes:
- Plosive + nasal /m/ – /n/ – /ŋ/
Plosive Consonants: /p/, /t/, /k/, /b/, /d/, /g/
Lateral Release: Happens when the lateral phoneme /l/ immediately follows plosive phonemes.
Incomplete Plosion/Release: This happens when we find two closing sounds together, especially when they have the same point of articulation.
Vowel Descriptions
/i:/:
- Quality: Close, front
- Lip Position: Widely spread
- Quantity: Long
- Tenseness: Tense
- Prominence: Stressed
- Graphemes: ee, ea, ey, ie, ei, i
/ɪ/:
- Quality: Between close and half-close, between front and center
- Lip Position: Slightly spread
- Quantity: Short
- Tenseness: Lax
- Prominence: Unstressed
- Graphemes: i, e, y, u, ui, also in suffixes (e.g., -ing, -ed, -age)
/e/:
- Quality: Between half-close and half-open, front
- Lip Position: Slightly spread
- Quantity: Short
- Tenseness: Tense
- Prominence: Mainly stressed
- Graphemes: e, ea, a, ai, ay, u, i
/æ/:
- Quality: Between half-open and open, front
- Lip Position: Neutral
- Quantity: Short
- Tenseness: Tense
- Prominence: Mainly stressed
- Graphemes: a, ai
/ɑ:/:
- Quality: Open, back
- Lip Position: Neutral
- Quantity: Long
- Tenseness: Lax
- Prominence: Mainly stressed
- Graphemes: ar, a + consonant + l, a + n + consonant, a + ss/st, af/ff, a + th, au, er, ear
/ɒ/:
- Quality: Open, back
- Lip Position: Slightly rounded
- Quantity: Short
- Tenseness: Lax
- Prominence: Stressed
- Graphemes: o, a, au (yacht, wrath)
/ɔ:/:
- Quality: Between half-open and half-close, back
- Lip Position: Medium rounded
- Quantity: Long
- Tenseness: Tense
- Prominence: Stressed
- Graphemes: or, oor, ore, oar, al + consonant, war, quar, aw, au
/ʊ/:
- Quality: Between close and half-close, back
- Lip Position: Slightly rounded
- Quantity: Short
- Tenseness: Lax
- Prominence: Unstressed
- Graphemes: u, oo, ou, o, -ful, -hood
/u:/:
- Quality: Almost close, back
- Lip Position: Rounded
- Quantity: Long
- Tenseness: Tense
- Prominence: Usually stressed
- Graphemes: oo, ew, ue, ui, ou, u + consonant + consonant, ew
/ʌ/:
- Quality: Central, between open and half-open
- Lip Position: Neutral
- Quantity: Short
- Tenseness: Lax
- Prominence: Usually stressed
- Graphemes: u, o, ou, oo, -son
/ɜ:/:
- Quality: Central, between half-close and half-open
- Lip Position: Neutral
- Quantity: Long
- Tenseness: Tense
- Prominence: Always stressed
- Graphemes: ir, ur, ear, wor, er, air
/ə/:
- Quality: Central, between half-close and half-open
- Lip Position: Neutral
- Quantity: Short
- Tenseness: Lax
- Prominence: Never stressed
- Graphemes: a, ar, er, or, our, ous, -er, -ure, -sure, -age, -ation, -sion, -ious
Places of Articulation
- Lips: Both lips
- Teeth (sup.): Upper teeth
- Teeth (inf.): Lower teeth
- Alveoli: Alveolar ridge
- Hard Palate: Hard palate
- Velum (raised): Soft palate (raised)
- Velum (lowered): Soft palate (lowered)
- Nasal Cavity: Nasal cavity
- Tongue: Tongue
- Tip of the Tongue: Tip of the tongue
- Predorso: Blade of the tongue
- Front: Front of the tongue
- Postdorso: Back of the tongue
- Vocal cords and glottis: Vocal cords and glottis