2018-04-02 Pronunciation: vowel overview

Greg Malivuk
[email protected]
http://www.pastebin.com/u/gmalivuk - notes from all classes
---
English (and every language) has several different “levels” of pronunciation:
- individual sounds
- combining sounds into syllables
- syllable sound and stress in words
- linking words together into phrases
- stress and intonation in thought groups
- thought groups together in sentences and longer speech
---
How many vowel sounds does English have? (Sounds are not the same as letters.)
- There are about 15 in (standard) American English
The five basic vowel letters each have a “long” and a “short” sound.
---
“Long” vowels sound like the name of the letter:
/eɪ/ long A: bait, make, eight
/i:/ long E: beet, beat, eke, sieze, weird
/aɪ/ long I: ice, fight, fly, I, eye
/oʊ/ long O: go, coat, note
/u:/ long U: cute, coot, Luke
“Short” vowels sound like that letter usually does when it’s the only vowel:
/æ/ short A: cat, hat, mad, jab, fast
/ɛ/ short E: Greg, med, head, said
/ɪ/ short I: it, hit, mid
/ɑ/ short O: cot, not, bot, odd
/ʌ/ short U: cut, nut, but, mud, hut, fudge (with ‘dge’, the silent ‘e’ affects the ‘g’, not the vowel)
There are also about five other vowel sounds in standard American English:
/ə/ or “schwa”: asylum, about, photography
/ɔ/: ought, bought, caught, taught
/ʊ/: good, book, could, look
/oɪ/: boy, oil
/aʊ/: house, how
---
You could argue that sometimes L and R can be syllables themselves
/l/ (sparkle, simple) and /r/ or /ɚ/ (fur, were, mother)
---
Handout p. 11 - Sample words for the “short” and “long” vowel sounds of American English.
p. 12 has a list of the vowel sounds. This list includes vocalic ‘r’ (6), but doesn’t count the schwa as a different sound from /ʌ/.
---
How many consonant sounds does English have? (Remember that some sounds need multiple letters, like ‘th’, and some letters don’t have their own sound, like ‘q’ or ‘x’.)
p. 14 of the handout lists 24 of them.
(The more “correct” symbol for the ‘y’ sound is actually /j/, and sometimes we use /ɹ/ for the English ‘r’ sound.)
---
1-16 are listen in voiceless/voiced pairs (odd numbers = voiceless, even numbers = voiced)
17-19 are nasal sounds (the sound comes through the nose)
20-23 are liquid sounds or semivowels
24 (h) is the only sound in English that is always voiceless