ENGLISH SOUND SYSTEM

Prepared by: Aimi, Eqa, Arifah

Pronunciation• Pronunciation refers to the way a word or a language is

spoken, or the manner in which someone utters a word. If someone is said to have "correct pronunciation," then it refers to both within a particular dialect.

• A word can be spoken in different ways by various individuals or groups, depending on many factors, such as: – the area in which they grew up, – the area in which they now live,– if they have a speech or voice disorder their ethnic group,– their social class, or– their education.

Examples:• accept (not except) • Arctic (not Artic)• ect cetera (not eck cetera)• escape (not exscape) • especially (not expecially) • espresso (not expresso) • February (not Febuary)

Enunciation• In phonetics, enunciation is the act of speaking.

Good enunciation is the act of speaking clearly and concisely.

• One type of enunciation error stems from dropping off the ends of words, especially "ing," "ed," "d," "p," or "t."

• For example : "Stopped" becomes "stop“.• Other times, we might muddle the middle of

words by replacing sharper sounds (like "t'") with softer sounds (like "d") because the softer sounds require less muscle energy.

• For example : "Butter" might become "budder."

Stress• In linguistics, stress is the relative emphasis that may be

given to certain syllables in a word• Stress is most dramatically realized on focussed or

accented words. For instance, consider the dialogue

"Is it brunch tomorrow?" "No, it's dinner tomorrow."

• In it, the stress-related acoustic differences between the syllables of "tomorrow" would be small compared to the differences between the syllables of "dinner", the emphasized word. In these emphasized words, stressed syllables such as "din" in "dinner" are louder and longer.

Intonation

• Intonation is the "music" of a language, and is perhaps the most important element of a good accent.

Consonant SoundsWhat are consonant sounds?• There are 44 sounds (19 + 25) that make up the sounds of

our English language. • 19 of the sounds we refer to as vowel sounds (because they

use the vowels a, e, i, o, u or make the sounds of our vowels)

• 25 of the sounds we refer to as consonant sounds• Each individual sound is sometimes referred to as a

grapheme or phoneme. • We use the letters of the alphabet to write sounds down. • There are over 70 ways to spell these sounds, which we

refer to as phonograms.

/b/ as in bib /d/ as in pond /f/ as in laugh /g/ as in pig

/h/ as in hop /j/ as in jam /k/ as in king /l/ as in hall

/m/ as in thumb /n/ as in pen /p/ as in pop /r/ as in car

/s/ as in sent /t/ as in tent /v/ as in hive /w/ as in window

/y/ as in yell /z/ as in zip /ch/ as in chip /sh/ as in sheep

/zh/ as in Asia /th/ as in the /th/ as in thing /hw/ wheat

/ng/ as in ring 25 CONSONANT SOUNDS

Vowel Sounds

Dipthongs• A Diphthong is the union of two vowels in one

sound. When both vowels are sounded, the diphthong is called PROPER, because then it is really a DIPHTHONG, or double sound; that is, the sounds of the vowels unite; as, oi in oil; ou in sound.

• When only one of the vowels is sounded, the diphthong is called IMPROPER, because then, as one of the vowels is silent, it is not properly a DIPHTHONG, though it takes that name; as, oa in boat, ui in suit, where a and i are silent.

Dipthong Approximate Eng. Sound

ai/ay like I in time

au like ow in now

ei/ey like a in date

eu like eh + oo

oi/oy like oy in toy

ia like ya in yacht

ie like ye in yet

io like yo in yoga

ua like wa in watt

ue like wa in wait

ui like wee in week

uo like uo in quota

Triphtong

• A Triphthong is the union of three vowels in one syllable; as, eau in beau, iew in view. The triphthong is properly a union of letters, not sounds.

Triphtong Approximate Eng. Sound

iai like yi in yipe

iei like English word yea

uai (uay) like wi in wine

uei (vey) like wa in wade

Thank You