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CAMBRIDGEEnglish

PronouncingDictionary

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First published by J. M. Dent & Sons Ltd 1917First published by Cambridge University Press 1991This edition published 2006

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Cambridge English pronouncing dictionary. – 17th ed. / [edited by Peter Roach, JamesHartman, Jane Setter].

p. cm.Cover title: English pronouncing dictionaryRev. ed. of: English pronouncing dictionary. 16th ed. 2003Includes bibliographical references and index.ISBN-13: 978-0-521-86230-1ISBN-10: 0-521-86230-2ISBN-13: 978-0-521-68086-8 (pbk.)ISBN-10: 0-521-68086-7 (pbk.)[etc.]I. Roach, Peter (Peter John) II. Hartman, James, 1939– III. Setter, Jane. IV. Jones, Daniel,1881–1967. English pronouncing dictionary. V. English pronouncing dictionary. VI. Title:English pronouncing dictionary.

PE1137.J55 2006421 .52–dc222006011963

ISBN-13 978-0-521-86230-1 hardbackISBN-10 0-521-86230-2 hardback

ISBN-13 978-0-521-68086-8 paperbackISBN-10 0-521-68086-7 paperback

ISBN-13 978-0-521-68087-5 paperback + cd-romISBN-10 0-521-68087-5 paperback + cd-rom






iii

ContentsEditors’ preface to the 17th edition iv

Introduction v

Part 1: Introduction to the English Pronouncing Dictionary v

1.1 What is the English Pronouncing Dictionary? v

1.2 Whose pronunciation is represented? v

1.3 How are the pronunciations chosen? vi

1.4 Regional accents vi

1.5 Pronunciation of foreign words vi

1.6 Usage notes vii

1.7 Syllable divisions vii

Part 2: Principles of transcription viii

2.1 The phoneme principle viii

2.2 Vowels and diphthongs viii

2.3 Consonants x

2.4 Non-English sounds xi

2.5 Stress xii

2.6 Syllable divisions xiii

2.7 Assimilation xiii

2.8 Treatment of /r/ xiv

2.9 Use of /i/ and /u/ xiv

2.10 Syllabic consonants xiv

2.11 Optional sounds xv

2.12 Elision xv

Part 3: Explanatory notes xvi

References in introduction xviii

List of recommended reading xviii

The International Phonetic Alphabet xx

Index of Information Panels xxi

The dictionary 1

Study Section 573






iv

Introduction

Editors’ preface to the17th Edition

The English Pronouncing Dictionary was firstpublished in 1917, perhaps the greatest work ofthe greatest of British phoneticians, Daniel Jones(born in 1881). Jones was Professor of Phoneticsat University College London from 1921 until hisretirement in 1949. He was still an occasional vis-itor to the department in 1967 when Peter Roachwas there as a postgraduate student of phonetics,though he died in December of that year. The lastedition of the English Pronouncing Dictionary inwhich Jones was directly involved was the 12th,and the 13th was substantially revised by A. C.Gimson, his successor as Professor of Phonetics atUniversity College. From the 13th edition, Gimsonwas assisted by Dr. Susan Ramsaran, and in herpreface to the 14th edition she notes that they hadbeen making plans for a 15th edition at the time ofGimson’s death. After this, the publishing rightswere acquired from the original publishers, J.M.Dent & Sons, by Cambridge University Press.

With the publication of the 15th edition in 1997,the English Pronouncing Dictionary entered thecomputer age. All the entries were converted intoa computer database, and transferred electronical-ly between phonetics experts in Reading, Leeds,Kansas, Hong Kong, then back to Cambridge.The process of updating and adding to previouseditions has therefore become much more effi-cient. Versions of this database are available elec-tronically and are currently being used by lan-guage researchers in both academic and commer-cial institutions. For details of licensing the data-base, see the Cambridge Dictionaries website:www.dictionary.cambridge.org

The other major development for the EnglishPronouncing Dictionary is the creation of a CD-ROM version. This 17th edition now has bothBritish and American spoken pronunciations forevery word in the dictionary. For linguists andlearners of English, there is also the ability tosearch on both alphabetic and phonetic characters,and to record the user’s own voice and compare itwith the spoken pronunciation on the CD-ROM.

The English Pronouncing Dictionary has been inuse for almost 90 years, and during that time it hasbecome established as a classic work of reference,both for native speakers of English wanting an

authoritative guide to pronunciation, and for usersof English as a foreign or second language all overthe world.

Above all, the aim of the dictionary is to includeinformation which is relevant to the needs of con-temporary users and which is presented in theclearest possible way. This aim has informed boththe choice of vocabulary covered and the range ofpronunciations shown. The 15th edition saw amassive injection of 18,000 new words. Largenumbers of terms connected with science andtechnology were added, as well as hundreds ofpeople and places which had acquired fame ornotoriety in recent years. Personal names, bothfirst names and family names, were based on cen-sus reports and statistical analysis, and many sub-ject areas such as literature and law were revisedand updated. For the first time, US spellings andvocabulary items were included.

This process of updating continues with each newedition, and we are fortunate to have the use of theCambridge International Corpus, a collection ofaround 800 million words of written and tran-scribed spoken texts from a variety of genres. Thiscorpus informs all Cambridge dictionaries, andgives us clear, empirical evidence for new words(general and proper nouns) which have come toprominence since the previous edition. The 16th

edition added information panels explaining pho-netics terminology and discussing the relationshipbetween spelling and pronunciation, and this 17th

edition also has a study section introducing sever-al fascinating pronunciation topics such as differ-ences between British and American pronuncia-tion, Weak forms, and Intonation.

In the Preface to the 15th edition we thanked themany people who had contributed to our work,and our debt to them remains, as it did for the 16th

Edition. Above all, we are very grateful to LizWalter, our Commissioning Editor at CambridgeUniversity Press, who has overseen the productionof the 15th and 16th Editions and continued to worktirelessly to advise and encourage us on the 17th.

We would also like to thank Diane Cranz andDominic Glennon, who have grappled heroicallywith the challenges of producing the CD-ROM, aswell as Catherine Sangster and her colleagues inthe BBC Pronunciation Unit for their generousadvice.

PETER ROACHJAMES HARTMANJANE SETTER






Introduction

It is strongly recommended that users of thisdictionary read the introduction, since a fullunderstanding of the information in it will ensurethe most effective use of the dictionary.

(PART 1) ‘What is the English PronouncingDictionary?’: The intended use of the dictionary,the principles of its design and the accents ofEnglish represented in it.

(PART 2) ‘Principles of Transcription’: The maincharacteristics of the British and American accents.

(PART 3) ‘Explanatory Notes’: How to interpretthe information provided with the individual wordsin the dictionary.

Part 1: Introduction to the EnglishPronouncing Dictionary

1.1 What is the English PronouncingDictionary?This dictionary is designed to provide informationon the current pronunciation of approximately80,000 English words and phrases. For each entry,a British and an American pronunciation is shown(see Section 1.2 below). The pronunciation is givenin modified phonemic transcription, and you needto understand the principles of phonemictranscription in order to be able to make proper useof this information (see Section 2.1 below).

The Pronouncing Dictionary provides muchessential information that is not available in ageneral dictionary, such as the pronunciation ofproper names, the pronunciation of all inflectedforms of each word, and a larger amount of detailabout variant pronunciations than is usual in ageneral dictionary.

1.2 Whose pronunciation is represented?A pronouncing dictionary must base itsrecommendations on one or more models. Apronunciation model is a carefully chosen anddefined accent of a language. In the first edition ofthis dictionary (1917), Daniel Jones described thetype of pronunciation recorded as “that mostusually heard in everyday speech in the families ofSouthern English persons whose menfolk havebeen educated at the great public boarding-

schools”. Accordingly, he felt able to refer to hismodel as “Public School Pronunciation” (PSP). Inlater editions, e.g. that of 1937, he added the remarkthat boys in boarding-schools tend to lose theirmarkedly local peculiarities, whereas this is not thecase for those in day-schools. He had by 1926,however, abandoned the term PSP in favour of“Received Pronunciation” (RP). The type of speechhe had in mind had for centuries been regarded as akind of standard, having its base in the educatedpronunciation of London and the Home Counties(the counties surrounding London). Its use was notrestricted to this region, however, beingcharacteristic by the nineteenth century of upper-class speech throughout the country. The Editor ofthe 14th Edition of this dictionary, A. C. Gimson,commented in 1977 “Such a definition of RP ishardly tenable today”, and went on “If I haveretained the traditional, though imprecise, term‘received pronunciation’, it is because the label hassuch wide currency in books on present-dayEnglish and because it is a convenient name for anaccent which remains generally acceptable andintelligible within Britain”.

For this edition a more broadly-based andaccessible model accent for British English isrepresented, and pronunciations for one broadly-conceived accent of American English have beenadded. The time has come to abandon the archaicname Received Pronunciation. The model used forBritish English is what is referred to as BBCEnglish; this is the pronunciation of professionalspeakers employed by the BBC as newsreaders andannouncers on BBC1 and BBC2 television, theWorld Service and BBC Radio 3 and 4, as well asmany commercial broadcasting organisations suchas ITN. Of course, one finds differences betweensuch speakers – individual broadcasters all havetheir own personal characteristics, and an increasingnumber of broadcasters with Scottish, Welsh andIrish accents are employed. However, the accentdescribed here is typical of broadcasters with anEnglish accent, and there is a useful degree ofconsistency in the broadcast speech of thesespeakers. Their speech does not carry for mostpeople the connotations of high social class andprivilege that PSP and RP have had in the past. Anadditional advantage in concentrating on the accentof broadcasters is that it is easy to gain access toexamples, and the sound quality is usually of a veryhigh standard.

For American English, the selection also followswhat is frequently heard from professional voices

v

Introduction






on national network news and informationprogrammes. It is similar to what has been termed“General American”, which refers to ageographically (largely non-coastal) and sociallybased set of pronunciation features. It is importantto note that no single dialect – regional or social –has been singled out as an American standard. Evennational media (radio, television, movies, CD-ROM, etc.), with professionally trained voices havespeakers with regionally mixed features. However,“Network English”, in its most colourless form, canbe described as a relatively homogeneous dialectthat reflects the ongoing development ofprogressive American dialects (Canadian Englishhas several notable differences). This “dialect”itself contains some variant forms. The variantsincluded within this targeted accent involve vowelsbefore /r/, possible differences in words like ‘cot’and ‘caught’ and some vowels before /l/. It is fullyrhotic. These differences largely pass unnoticed bythe audiences for Network English, and are alsoreflective of age differences. What are thought to bethe more progressive (used by educated, sociallymobile, and younger speakers) variants are listedfirst in each entry. The intent is to list the variety ofpronunciations with the least amount of regional orsocial marking, while still being sensitive to thetraits of the individual word.

1.3 How are the pronunciations chosen?It is important to remember that the pronunciationof English words is not governed by a strict set ofrules; most words have more than onepronunciation, and the speaker’s choice of which touse depends on a wide range of factors. Theseinclude the degree of formality, the amount ofbackground noise, the speed of utterance, thespeaker’s perception of the listener and thefrequency with which the speaker uses the word.For example, the two words ‘virtuous’ and‘virtuoso’ are closely similar in spelling and share acommon origin. However, the former is morecommon than the latter, and for British English/�v��.tʃu.əs/ is given as the first pronunciation ofthe former but /�v��.tju.əυ.səυ/ for the latter(which in general is typical of more carefulspeech). If such variation did not exist, most of thework of compiling a pronouncing dictionary couldbe done easily by means of one of the availablecomputer programs that convert English spellinginto a phonemic transcription. Ultimately, however,the decisions about which pronunciation torecommend, which pronunciations have droppedout of use, and so on, have been based on theeditors’ intuitions as professional phoneticians and

observers of the pronunciation of English(particularly broadcast English) over many years.The opinion of many colleagues and acquaintanceshas also been a valuable source of advice.

In general, a pronunciation typical of a morecasual, informal style of speaking is given forcommon words, and a more careful pronunciationfor uncommon words. In real life, speakers tend toarticulate most carefully when listeners are likely tohave difficulty in recognising the words they hear.When more than one pronunciation of a word isgiven, the order of the alternatives is important.The first pronunciation given is believed to be themost usual one although the distance between thealternatives may vary, with some alternant formsrivalling the first-given in perceived frequencywhile others may be a more distant second.

1.4 Regional AccentsA pronouncing dictionary that systematicallypresented the pronunciations of a range of regionalaccents would be very valuable, but it would bevery much bigger than the present volume and thejob of ensuring an adequate coverage which treatedall accents as equally important would have takenmany years. In the case of some place-names,information about local pronunciations has beenretained or added as well as “official” broadcastingones, but the other words are given only in thestandard accents chosen for British and AmericanEnglish.

1.5 Pronunciation of foreign wordsMany of the words in an English dictionary are offoreign origin, and in previous editions of thisdictionary many such words have been given bothin an Anglicised pronunciation used by mostEnglish speakers, and in a broad phonetictranscription of the “authentic” pronunciation in theoriginal language. This edition does not givedetailed phonetic transcriptions of foreign words;the primary aim of this dictionary is to listpronunciations likely to be used by educatedspeakers of English, and an authentic pronunciationwould in some circumstances be quite inappropriate(pronouncing ‘Paris’ as /p�r�i�/, for example). Insome cases the information is unnecessary (veryfew English speakers would attempt, or evenrecognise, an authentic pronunciation of a wordfrom a non-European language), while in othercases it is difficult to establish the authentic original(many African place-names, for example, havereached us after being adapted by British, French orPortuguese colonists; place-names in Spain may be

vi

Introduction






vii

Introduction

pronounced in different ways according to theirregional affiliation, so that the name of Barcelonamight be given a Catalan or a Castilian Spanishpronunciation, while other Spanish names aredifferent according to whether they originate inSpain or South America). Words and names offoreign origin are therefore given in what is felt tobe the pronunciation likely to be used amongeducated speakers of English.

In some cases it is possible to identify an alternativepronunciation which represents an attempt topronounce in a manner closer to the supposedoriginal. This is marked by first indicating thelanguage which the speaker would be aiming at,then giving the pronunciation, using wherenecessary additional phonetic symbols not requiredfor the phonemic transcription of English. Forexample, the word ‘bolognese’ is widely used torefer to a sauce served with pasta. This is given as/�bɒl.ə�neiz/ for British English and as/�boυ.lə�ni�z/ for American; for speakers of bothgroups, a pronunciation aimed at being nearer tothe Italian original would be /�bɒl.ə�njei.zei/(though this would still be different from thepronunciation that would be produced by an Italianspeaker). To indicate that this last pronunciation isaimed at sounding Italian, it is marked in the entry

as: as if Italian: �bɒl.ə�njei.zei. In a few cases ithas been necessary to mark separate British andAmerican pronunciations within this field, as thedegree of Anglicisation of any given word mayvary between British and American English.

1.6 Usage notesUsage notes are included with some words. Insome cases these are needed so that users of thedictionary can understand how alternativepronunciations are to be used. In some cases therules needed for correct pronunciation are quitecomplex, most noticeably in the case of the so-called “weak-form words” such as ‘there’, ‘her’.Explanations with examples are given in such cases.

1.7 Syllable divisionsEarlier editions of this dictionary regularly markedthe division between syllables. This practice waslargely abandoned in the 14th Edition, but thepresent edition gives syllable divisions in all cases, since it is felt that foreign learners will find the information useful. Syllable division ismarked with the symbol . recommended by theInternational Phonetic Association. The decisionon where to place a syllable division is not alwayseasy, and the rules used in this work are explainedlater in this Introduction (Section 2.6).






viii

Introduction

Part 2: Principles of transcription

2.1 The phoneme principleThe basic principle of the transcription used is, asin all previous editions, phonemic. This means thata small set of symbols is used to represent thesounds that can be shown to be distinctive inEnglish, so that replacing one phoneme by anothercan change the identity of a word. We do notusually add phonetic detail such as the presence ofglottal stops, aspiration or vowel devoicing. It isusual to put slant brackets before and after symbolsrepresenting phonemes (e.g. the word ‘cat’ wouldbe represented phonemically as /k�t/). When non-phonemic symbols are used, the convention is touse square brackets (e.g. the glottal stop will berepresented as [ʔ]). In entries in the dictionaryitself, however, we do not use these brackets, inorder to keep the information simple; only inexplanatory notes do we use slant or squarebrackets. For an explanation of the principle of thephoneme and some of the problems associated withit, see Roach (2000), Chapters 5 and 13. The use ofphonemic transcription in works on pronunciation(including this one) has remained in the “realist”tradition established by Jones, while approaches tothe phoneme by theoretical phonologists havechanged radically during recent decades andbecome much more abstract. There are a fewexceptions to our general use of the phonemeprinciple that should be mentioned here, however.One is the use, in American pronunciations, of the [�] diacritic to indicate the voicing and “flapping”of /t/ in words such as ‘getting’ /� et�.iŋ/, and‘better’ /�bet�.�/. This is an important feature ofAmerican pronunciation, but speakers of BritishEnglish find it difficult to apply the rule whichdetermines when /t/ is voiced and/or flapped.Another is the use of the symbols [i] and [u] , theuse of which is explained below (Section 2.9).Finally, it is necessary to use a number of specialsymbols which are not normally used for Englishphonemes. This set includes some nasalised vowelsused particularly in some words taken from French,the [x] sound found in Scottish words such as ‘loch’,and some non-linguistic sounds used in certainexclamations and interjections (see Section 2.4).

2.2 Vowels and diphthongsIt is standard practice in phonetics to represent thequality of vowels and diphthongs by placing themon a four-sided figure usually known as theCardinal Vowel quadrilateral (see Roach (2000),pp. 13–14). This device is used in the voweldescriptions in the following section.

(a) British English British English (BBC accent) is generallydescribed as having short vowels, long vowels anddiphthongs. There are said to be seven shortvowels, five long ones and eight diphthongs. At theend of this section some attention is also given totriphthongs.

• Short vowels:pit pet pat putt pot put anotheri e � � ɒ υ ə ə

• Long vowels:bean barn born booon burn

i� ɑ� ɔ� u� ��

• Diphthongs:bay buy boy no now peer pair poorei ai ɔi əυ aυ iə eə υə

These vowels and diphthongs may be placed on theCardinal Vowel quadrilateral as shown in Figs. 1 -3. It should be noted that though each vowel (ordiphthong starting-point) is marked with a point(•), it is misleading to think of this as a precisetarget; the point represents the centre of an areawithin which the typical vowel pronunciation falls.

Fig. 1 BBC English pure vowels

Fig. 2 BBC English closing diphthongs

i� u�

υi

ə, ��

ɔ�

ɒ

�

ɑ��

e

əυ ɔi

ai

ei

aυ






Fig. 3 BBC English centring diphthongs

A few comments on individual vowels and vowelsymbols are needed. The pronunciation of anylanguage is constantly changing, and a dictionarysuch as this one should reflect such changes.However, there is a general reluctance among usersof phonemic transcription to change the symbolsused too frequently, as this causes existing teachingmaterials and textbooks to become out of date. The following remarks apply chiefly to BBCpronunciation.

(a) The length of long vowels and diphthongs isvery much reduced when they occur in syllablesclosed by the voiceless or fortis consonants / p, t,k, tʃ, f, θ, s, ʃ /. Thus /i�/ in ‘beat’ has only abouthalf the length of /i�/ in ‘bead’ or ‘bee’; similarly/ei/ in ‘place’ is much reduced in length comparedwith /ei/ in ‘plays’ or ‘play’.

(b) The vowel /�/, classified as a short vowel, isnevertheless comparatively long before /b, d, ,d�, m, n/. The quality of this vowel is more openthan it used to be, and the symbol /a/ might one daybe considered preferable. We have retained the /�/symbol partly because it is phonetically appropriatefor the corresponding American vowel.

(c) The vowel /�/ used to be a back vowel, and thesymbol was chosen for this reason. This is nolonger a back vowel, but a central one. Alternativesymbols could be considered in the future.

(d) Among younger speakers, the /u�/ vowel hasmoved to a more front quality, with less lip-rounding, particularly when preceded by /j/ as in‘use’.

(e) Among the diphthongs, there seems to be aprogressive decline in the use of /υə/, with /ɔ�/taking its place (e.g. the pronunciation of the word‘poor’ as /pɔ�/ is increasingly common).

(f) Triphthongs create some problems. These three-vowel sequences are generally held to be composedof one of the diphthongs /ei, ai, ɔi, əυ, aυ/ plus aschwa (e.g. ‘layer’ /leiər/; ‘fire’ /faiər/). In BritishEnglish many of these triphthongs are pronouncedwith such slight movement in vowel quality that itis difficult for foreign learners to recognise them;for example, the name ‘Ireland’, which is generallytranscribed /�aiə.lənd/, frequently has an initialsyllable which sounds virtually indistinguishablefrom /ɑ�/. It seems reasonable in this case to treatthese sounds as being monosyllabic (e.g. the word‘fire’ is a single syllable), but in other words andnames transcribed with the same symbols it seemsnecessary to insert a syllable division. This isusually done (i) when there is a morphemeboundary (e.g. ‘buyer’ /bai.ər/) and (ii) when theword is felt to be foreign (this includes manyBiblical names originating from Hebrew, e.g.‘Messiah’).

Another problem with triphthongs is that before an/r/ consonant at the beginning of a followingsyllable, the distinction between /aiə/ and /ai/seems to be neutralised – it seems to make nodifference whether one represents ‘Irish’, ‘irate’ as/�aiə.riʃ/, /aiə�reit/ or as /�ai.riʃ/ , /ai�reit/, sincethere is no regular distinction made inpronunciation. In general, the practice of thisedition is to transcribe such cases as /aiə- /.

(b) American EnglishAmerican English is commonly described ashaving lax vowels, tense vowels, and widediphthongs. Generally speaking, lax vowels arelower and made with less oral tension; they do notusually end syllables. Vowel length in AmericanEnglish is generally considered to be conditionedby phonological environment, so the long/shortdistinction described for BBC English is notusually present, though we have retained the lengthmark on the tense vowels /i�, ɑ�, ɔ�, ��, u�/ in orderto mark their relationship to the English long vowels.Since the diphthongal movement in /ei/ and /oυ/ issmall in American pronunciation, these are treatedas tense vowels. Vowels preceding /r/ are notablyinfluenced by rhotic colouring. Word spellings suchas ‘bird’, ‘word’, ‘curd’, ‘earth’, ‘jerk’, which nowrhyme with /�/ in American English, at one time inhistory had differing vowels. The retroflexedvowels /�/ and /�/, stressed and unstressed, areamong those features that noticeably distinguishAmerican English from BBC English. All vowelsoccurring before /r/ within a syllable are likely tobecome “r-coloured” to some extent.

ix

Introduction

υə

iə

eə






x

Introduction

• lax vowels: i e � � υ ə• tense vowels: i� ɑ� ɔ� �� u� ei oυ• wide diphthongs: aυ ai ɔi• retroflexed vowels (“r-coloured”) � �

There is an issue in the symbolization of thediphthong in the word “home”. This has for manyyears been represented as /əυ/, but in earliereditions of this and others of Jones’ works thesymbolization /ou/ indicated a rounded initialvowel. This is still the preferred transcription forthe American English diphthong. In order topreserve compatibility with other works, we havechosen to use /əυ/ for BBC English and /oυ/ forAmerican.

The American /�/ vowel is somewhat closer thanBBC /�/, and seems to be evolving into an evencloser vowel in many speakers. It is used in thesame words as BBC /�/ and also in most of thewords which in BBC have /ɑ�/ when there is noletter r in the spelling and a fricative consonant atthe end of the syllable, (e.g. ‘pass’, ‘ask’). Thequality of American /ɑ�/ is similar to the BBC /ɑ�/vowel; it is used in some of the words which have/ɑ�/ in BBC when there is no letter r in the spelling(e.g. ‘father’, ‘calm’). It also replaces the BBCshort /ɒ/ vowel in many words (e.g. ‘hot’, ‘top’,‘bother’): ‘bother’ rhymes with ‘father’. American/ɔ�/ is more open in quality than BBC /ɔ�/. It is usedwhere BBC has /ɔ�/ (e.g. ‘cause’, ‘walk’), and alsoreplaces BBC short /ɒ/ in many words, e.g. ‘long’,‘dog’. American /u�/ is similar to BBC /u�/, but isalso used where BBC has /ju�/ after alveolarconsonants (e.g. ‘new’, ‘duty’).

2.3 Consonants(a) British English (BBC)

• Plosives: p b t d k pin bin tin din kin gum

• Affricates: tʃ d�chain Jane

• Fricatives: f v θ ð s zfine vine think this seal zeal

ʃ � hsheep measure how

• Nasals: m n ŋsum sun sung

• Approximants: l r w jlight right wet yet

These consonants can be arranged in table form asshown below. The layout of the symbols followsthe principle that, where there are two consonantswhich differ only in voicing, they are placed side byside with the voiceless one to the left.

(a) Certain types of consonant have a distinctionsuch as that between /t/ and /d/; this is commonlyclassed as a distinction between voiceless andvoiced consonants, but the distinction is in factmuch more complex. Consonants usually classedas voiceless are /p, t, k, f, θ, s, ʃ, h, tʃ/, withvoiced partners /b, d, , v, ð, z, �, d�/. Since thepresence or absence of voicing is often lessimportant than some other phonetic features, it hasbeen suggested that instead the terms fortis(equivalent to voiceless) and lenis (equivalent tovoiced) should be used. These terms imply that themain distinguishing factor is the amount of energyused in the articulation (fortis consonants beingmade with greater energy than lenis). These terms

Table of English Consonants

Bilabial Labio-dental Dental Alveolar Post-alveolar Palatal Velar Glottal

Plosive p b t d k Affricate tʃ d�Fricative f v θ ð s z ʃ � (x) hNasal m n ŋLateralapproximant lApproximant w r j






are not used in this dictionary, since the usefulnessof this terminology is uncertain. Some of thecharacteristics of the two types of consonant are setout below.

(b) /p,t,k/ are typically accompanied by aspiration(i.e. an interval of breath before the followingvowel onset), especially when initial in a stressedsyllable. Thus, ‘pin’ is distinguished from ‘bin’very largely by the aspiration accompanying /p/.However, in the syllable-initial sequences /sp-, st-, sk- /, /p, t, k/ lack such aspiration. When /l/,/j/, /w/ or /r/ immediately follow /p,t,k/, they aredevoiced and are pronounced as fricatives. Anothercharacteristic of /p,t,k/ that is not marked intranscriptions is glottalization; when one of theseconsonants is followed by another consonant it isnow usual to find that a glottal closure precedes the/p/, /t/ or /k/, particularly if the syllable in whichthey occur is stressed. Thus the pronunciation of ‘captain’, ‘rightful’, ‘Yorkshire’, which arephonemically /�k�p.tin/, /�rait.fəl/, /�jɔ�k.ʃər/,could be shown (using the symbol [ʔ] for glottalclosure) as [�k�ʔp.tin], [�raiʔt.fl�], [�jɔ�ʔk.ʃər].Similarly, in American English ‘mountain’ has onepronunciation that could be represented as[maυ̃.ʔn� ].

(c) Voiceless consonants have a shortening effecton sounds preceding them within a syllable. Thusin the words ‘right’ and ‘ride’ (/rait/ and /raid/) thediphthong is noticeably shorter in the first wordthan in the second; in the words ‘bent’ and ‘bend’(/bent/ and /bend/), both the vowel /e/ and thenasal consonant /n/ are shorter in the first word.This length difference is not always easy to observein connected speech.

(d) The consonant /l/ has two different allophonesin BBC English, the so-called “clear” and “dark”allophones. The “clear” one (which has an /i�/-likequality) occurs before vowels, the “dark” one(which has an /u�/-like quality) before consonantsor before a pause.

(e) The consonants /ʃ/, /�/, /tʃ/, d�/, /r/ are usuallyaccompanied by lip-rounding.

(b) American EnglishThe consonants of the American English model, atthe phonemic level, may be represented by thesame broad scheme used for British English above.Similarly, many of the distinguishing phonetictraits discussed for British English hold forAmerican English as well: initial /p,t,k/ are

normally aspirated except when immediatelypreceded by /s/. Glottalization preceding and, attimes, replacing the plosives occurs often in rapidspeech. There are, of course, numerous phoneticand phonological differences between British andAmerican English, as there are within regional andsocial varieties within the two political entities.Two differences receive sufficient attention andhave attained sufficient generality within the twovarieties that they are represented here. One isphonetic: the “flapped” medial /t/ (as in ‘butter’) istranscribed as /t�/ (see Section 2.1 above); the otheris phonological: the presence (in AmericanEnglish) of postvocalic /r/ (as in ‘farmer’/�fɑ�r.m�/). It should also be noted that thedifference between “clear” and “dark” /l/ is muchless marked in American than in the BBC accent,so that even prevocalic /l/ in Americanpronunciation sounds dark to English ears.

2.4 Non-English soundsIn addition to the phonemes of English describedabove, most English speakers are aware of, andoften attempt to pronounce, some sounds oflanguages other than English. The number of suchsounds is small, since most foreign words andnames are Anglicised so that they are pronouncedwith English phonemes. We find the voiceless velarfricative [x] in the Gaelic languages of Scotlandand Ireland in words such as ‘loch’ and names suchas ‘Strachan’. The same sound is often used byEnglish speakers for the German sound which iswritten ‘ch’ (e.g. ‘Bach’ [bɑ�x]) and the Spanishsound spelt ‘j’ (e.g. ‘Badajoz’ [�b�d.ə�xɒθ] ). Thevoiceless lateral fricative [�] is found (alwaysrepresented in spelling with ‘ll’) in Welsh wordsand names such as ‘Llanberis’; we give thepronunciation of this sound as h l to indicate that itmay be pronounced as a voiceless [�] (as manyBritish English speakers do), but alternatively as avoiced one: thus /h l�n�ber.is/. The dictionary listsa few names with more than one of these sounds(e.g. Llanelli). Most non-Welsh speakers areunlikely to pronounce more than one [�] sound in aword, so we give the pronunciation as /θl/ for ‘ll’sounds after the initial one.

The other case which needs special attention is thepronunciation of French nasalised vowels. ManyEnglish speakers attempt to produce somethingsimilar to the French vowels /ε̃/, /ɑ̃/, /ɔ̃/, /�̃/ inwords such as ‘vin’, ‘restaurant’, ‘bon’, ‘Verdun’.

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Although many speakers do not get close to theFrench vowels, the principle adopted here is to usesymbols for English vowels, with addednasalisation. The equivalents are:

French Englishε̃ �̃ɑ̃ ɑ̃�ɔ̃ ɔ̃��̃ �̃�

2.5 StressStress patterns present one of the most difficultproblems in a pronouncing dictionary. One reasonfor this is that many polysyllabic words have morethan one possible stress pattern, and one mustconsider carefully which should be recommended.Secondly, the stress of many words changes indifferent contexts, and it is necessary to indicatehow this happens. Thirdly, there is nostraightforward way to decide on how manydifferent levels of stress are recognisable.

(a) Where more than one stress pattern is possible,the preferred pronunciation is given first and thenalternatives are listed. Many dictionaries use theconvention of representing stress patterns usingdashes to represent syllables: thus the two possiblepatterns for ‘cigarette’ (�ciga�rette and �cigarette)can be shown as �--�- and �---. This convention,which is sometimes referred to (incorrectly) as“Morse Code”, is used in this work for short words,since it is economical on space. However, in longerwords users are likely to find it difficult to interpret.In the planning of this edition, an experiment wascarried out to test this, and it was found that readers(both native speakers and non-native speakers ofEnglish) do indeed take less time to read wordstress patterns when the whole word is given, ratherthan just a “dashes and dots” pattern (Strombergand Roach, 1993). Consequently, words of morethan three syllables are given in full whenalternative stress patterns are being given.

(b) The most common case of variable stressplacement caused by context is what is usuallynowadays known as “stress-shift”. As a generalrule, when a word of several syllables has a stressnear the end of the word, and is followed by anotherword with stress near its beginning, there is atendency for the stress in the first word to movenearer the beginning if it contains a syllable that iscapable of receiving stress. For example, the word‘academic’ in isolation usually has the stress on thepenultimate syllable /-dem-/. However, when the

word ‘year’ follows, the stress is often found tomove to the first syllable /�k-/. The whole phrase‘academic year’ will have its primary stress on theword ‘year’, so the resulting stress pattern will be�academic �year (where � represents secondarystress and � represents primary stress). To make thisprocess easier to understand, this dictionary nowgives specific examples in each case where stress-shift is possible except where certain prefixes suchas ‘un-’ produce hundreds of such cases. In general,this shift is not obligatory: it would not be amispronunciation to say aca�demic �year. However,it is undoubtedly widespread and in some cases isused almost without exception: for example,although the adjective ‘compact’ on its own ispronounced with the stress pattern -�- , in the phrase‘compact disc’ it is virtually always pronouncedwith stress on the first syllable.

(c) It is necessary to decide how many levels ofstress to mark. The minimum possible range is two:stressed and unstressed. This is inadequate forrepresenting English words in a pronouncingdictionary: a word such as ‘controversial’ clearlyhas stress(es) on the first and third syllables, andequally clearly has stronger stress on the thirdsyllable than on the first. It is therefore necessary torecognise an intermediate level of stress(“secondary”). The transcription of this word,therefore, is /�kɒn.trə�v��.ʃəl/. An argument canbe made for recognising yet another level (tertiarystress): in a word such as ‘indivisibility’, forexample, it can be claimed that the level of stress onthe third syllable /viz/ is weaker than that on thefirst syllable /in/, which has secondary stress(primary stress being placed on the penultimatesyllable /bil/). However, introducing this extralevel creates a degree of complexity that it is betterto avoid. In EPD14 some long polysyllabic wordswere transcribed with two primary stress marks(e.g. ‘cross-examination’ was given as/�krɒsi �z�mi�neiʃn/): for the present edition onlyone primary stress may occur in a word or compound.

(d) Secondary stresses have only limitedoccurrence after a primary stress: such a secondarystress is only marked in closed or hyphenatedcompound words where the second element ispolysyllabic (e.g. �fish�mon er).

(e) Stress assignment on prefixes:

(i) In words containing a prefix such as, forexample, con-, de-, im-, in-, secondarystress is not applied to the prefix where

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the following (i.e. second) syllable isstressed. Examples include ‘intoxicate’/in�tɒk.si.keitb -�tɑ�k-/.

(ii) Where the prefix is separable, however, asin impossible, a variant showing secondarystress on the prefix is listed, as follows:/im�pɒs.ə.bl� ,�im -/.

(iii) In all other cases, primary or secondarystress is applied to the prefix whereappropriate.

(f) In the case of words which do not have a prefixbut have a stressed second syllable preceded by asyllable with a full vowel (e.g. ‘shampoo’,‘Chinese’) the first syllable is usually treated asunstressed, though in some cases capable ofreceiving primary stress through stress-shift.

2.6 Syllable divisionsThe 14th Edition of EPD marked syllable division(using hyphens) only when it was important todistinguish between the affricate /tʃ/ and thephonemes /t/ and /ʃ/ at a syllable juncture (e.g.‘satchel’ /�s�tʃəl/ and ‘nutshell’ /�n�t-ʃel/).However, although native speakers may well findno difficulty in dividing words into syllables, itseems that learners of English have trouble in doingso, and the divisions are therefore marked.Descriptions of stress and rhythm are usuallyexpressed in terms of syllables, and so it is helpfulto have polysyllabic words clearly broken up intotheir constituent syllables. The syllabifiedtranscription of a polysyllabic word is easier to readand interpret than an undivided one. In addition, thedictionary is likely to be of interest to the field ofspeech and language technology, where syllabledivisions can be useful in developing automaticspeech and language analysis systems.

A dot . is used to divide syllables, in accordancewith the current recommendations of theInternational Phonetic Association. These may beread in the IPA Handbook (International PhoneticAssociation 1999). However, this is not used wherea stress mark � or � occurs, as these are effectivelyalso syllable division markers.

No completely satisfactory scheme of syllabledivision can be produced – all sets of rules will throwup some cases which cannot be dealt with properly.The principles used in this edition are set out below.This requires some discussion of phonotactics, thestudy of permissible phoneme sequences.

(a) As far as possible, syllables should not bedivided in a way that violates what is known ofEnglish syllable structure. The ‘Maximal OnsetsPrinciple’, which is widely recognised incontemporary phonology, is followed as far aspossible. This means that, where possible, syllablesshould be divided in such a way that as manyconsonants as possible are assigned to thebeginning of the syllable to the right (if one thinksin terms of how they are written in transcription),rather than to the end of the syllable to the left.However, when this would result in a syllableending with a stressed /i/, /e/, /�/, /�/, /ɒ/ or /υ/, it isconsidered that this would constitute a violation ofEnglish phonotactics, and the first (or only)intervocalic consonant is assigned to the precedingsyllable; thus the word ‘better’ is divided /�bet.ər/ ,whereas ‘beater’ is divided /�bi�.tər/. In the case ofunstressed short vowels, /e/, /�/, /�/ and /ɒ/ are alsoprevented from appearing in syllable-final position;however, unstressed /i/ and /υ/ are allowed thesame “privilege of occurrence” as /ə/ when aconsonant begins a following syllable, and maytherefore occur in final position in unstressedsyllables except pre-pausally. Thus in a word suchas ‘develop’, the syllable division is /di�vel.əp/.

(b) Notwithstanding the above, words incompounds should not be re-divided syllabically ina way that does not agree with perceived wordboundaries. For example, ‘hardware’ could intheory be divided /�hɑ�.dweər/, but most readerswould find this counter-intuitive and would prefer/�hɑ�d.weər/. This principle applies to open, closedand hyphenated compounds.

2.7 AssimilationAssimilation is a process found in all languageswhich causes speech sounds to be modified in a waywhich makes them more similar to their neighbours.A well-known example is that of English alveolarconsonants such as /t , d , n/, which, when they arefollowed by a consonant which does not havealveolar place of articulation, tend to adopt the placeof articulation of the following consonant. Thus the/t/ at the end of ‘foot’ /fυt/ changes to /p/ whenfollowed by /b/ in the word ‘football’, giving thepronunciation /�fυp.bɔ�l/. A similar case is theassimilation of /s/ to a following /ʃ/ or /j/, resultingin the pronunciation of ‘this ship’ as /ðiʃ�ʃip/ and‘this year’ as /ðiʃ�jiər/. This assimilation can beconsidered to be optional.

The assimilation of /n/ is a rather special case:many English words begin with the prefixes ‘in-’

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and ‘un-’, and in a number of cases the /n/ of theseprefixes is followed by a consonant which is notalveolar. In some cases it seems to be normal thatthe /n/ is regularly assimilated to the place ofarticulation of the following consonant (e.g.‘inquest’ /�iŋ.kwest/), while in others thisassimilation is optional (e.g. ‘incautious’ may be/in�kɔ�.ʃəs/ or /iŋ�kɔ�.ʃəs/). Where it is clear thatthe prefix is attached to a word that existsindependently, so that prefix and stem are easilyseparable, the assimilation is normally treated asoptional. When it seems more like an integral partof the word, the assimilation is shown asobligatory. The occurrence of assimilation inBritish and American English may differ.

2.8 Treatment of /r/The accent used for British English is classed asnon-rhotic – the phoneme /r/ is not usuallypronounced except when a vowel follows it. TheAmerican pronunciations, on the other hand, doshow a rhotic accent, and in general in the accentdescribed, /r/ is pronounced where the letter r isfound in the spelling.

It is necessary to show, in British English entries,cases of potential pronunciation of /r/, mainly inword-final position; in other words, it is necessary toindicate, in a word such as ‘car’, that though theword when said in isolation does not have /r/ in thepronunciation (/kɑ�/), there is a potential /r/ which isrealised if a vowel follows (e.g. in ‘car owner’). Thisis indicated by giving the transcription as /kɑ�r/,where the superscript /r/ indicates the potential forpronunciation. This is traditionally known as‘linking r’. A controversial question is that of so-called ‘intrusive r’, where the phoneme /r/ ispronounced when no ‘r’ is seen in the spelling. Forexample, the phrase ‘china and glass’ will often bepronounced with /r/ at the end of the word ‘china’;although this type of pronunciation is widespread inthe speech of native speakers of the accent described,it is still safer not to recommend it to foreignlearners, and it is therefore avoided in this dictionary.

2.9 Use of /i/ and /u/There are many places in present-day British andAmerican English where the distinction between /i/and /i�/ is neutralised. For example, the final vowelof ‘city’ and ‘seedy’ seems to belong neither to the/i/ phoneme nor to /i�/. The symbol /i/ is used in thiscase (though it is not, strictly speaking, a phonemesymbol; there is no obvious way to choose suitablebrackets for this symbol, but phoneme brackets //will be used for simplicity). A parallel argumentcan be made for the distinction between /υ/ and /u�/

(with a corresponding ‘neutralised’ symbol /u/),though this is needed much less frequently. Thisissue, and the issues which follow, are discussed indetail in Roach (2000), pp. 84–86.

(a) In word-final position, /i/ and /υ/ do not occur.Word-final, close vowels are transcribed with /i/ and/u/ if unstressed. Word-final /i�/ and /u�/ are possibleboth with stress (‘grandee’, ‘bamboo’) and without(‘Hindi’, ‘argue’), although in the unstressed case itis often not possible to draw a clear line between /i�/and /i/ , or between /u�/ and /u/.

(b) In compounds such as ‘busybody’ and namessuch as ‘Merryweather’, /i/ is permitted to occurword-medially, e.g. ‘busybody’ is transcribed/�biz.i�bɒd.i b �biz.i.bɑ�.di/) and ‘Merry-weather’ as /�mer.i�weð.ər b �mer.i� weð.�/ .In all other cases word-medially, /i/ is used whenthe vowel is unstressed, unless a vowel follows (seebelow).

(c) The vowel symbols /i/ and /υ/ only occur infront of another vowel symbol if they form part of acomposite (diphthong or triphthong) phonemesymbol (e.g. /iə, υə/). Otherwise /i/ or /u/ is used(e.g. ‘scurrying’ /�sk�r.i.iŋ/, ‘influenza’/�in.flu�en.zə/.

(d) A matter related to this decision concerns wordsending in ‘-ier’, ‘-eer’, ‘-ia’. The usual transcriptionin the 14th Edition of the EPD was /iə/. However,‘reindeer’ and ‘windier’ (comparative form of‘windy’) do not have identical pronunciations intheir final syllables in British English (BBC). In thisedition, the alternative /-jə/ previously given for thelatter type of word has been dropped; ‘reindeer’ istranscribed as /�rein.diər/ and ‘windier’ as/�win.di.ər/. The latter transcription, which indicatesa different (closer) vowel quality in the secondsyllable of ‘windier’, and implies a pronunciationwith three rather than two syllables, is felt to beaccurate in terms of contemporary pronunciation.

The long vowels /i�/ and /u�/ may also occur beforeother vowels, but only when in a stressed syllable(e.g. ‘skiing’ /�ski�.iŋ/, ‘canoeing’ /kə�nu�.iŋ/).

2.10 Syllabic consonantsSyllabic consonants are frequently found in Englishpronunciation: these are cases where instead of anexpected vowel-plus-consonant sequence, theconsonant alone (usually one of /m, n, ŋ, l, r/) ispronounced with the rhythmical value of a syllable.(See Roach, 2000, pp. 86–90.) In EPD14, syllabicconsonants were only marked where there is

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xv

Introduction

ambiguity in the pronunciation of a word; forexample, in a word such as ‘bottle’, the transcription/�bɒtl/ is said to imply unambiguously that the /l/ issyllabic, whereas in the derived form ‘bottling’there may be two pronunciations, one with and onewithout a syllabic /l/. In this instance the EPD14preferred pronunciation was /�bɒtl�iŋ/, with/�bɒtliŋ/ given as an alternative.

The main problem here is how to deal with optionaland obligatory syllabicity and the permissibility ofvowels. The most frequently found case is where anitem may have (i) a schwa vowel followed by a non-syllabic consonant, (ii) a syllabic consonant notpreceded by schwa or (iii) a non-syllabic consonantnot preceded by schwa. For example, ‘lightening’may be (i) /�lai.tə.niŋ/, (ii) /�lait.n� .iŋ/ or (iii)/�lait.niŋ/. Such items are transcribed as/�lai.tən.iŋ/ and /�lait.niŋ/, the first representingcases (i) and (ii), in which there are three syllables,and the second representing only the disyllabicpronunciation, (iii). The use of superscript schwa inwords such as /�lai.tən.iŋ/ should be interpreted asmeaning that the schwa may be pronounced, or maybe omitted while giving its syllabic character to thefollowing consonant.

Syllabic nasals are not usual where they wouldresult in a nasal-plosive-syllabic consonantsequence (e.g. ‘London’, ‘abandon’ must contain aschwa vowel in the final syllable).

2.11 Optional soundsThe convention used in EPD14 of printingphoneme symbols in italics to indicate that theymay be omitted is retained, though used moresparingly. It is not necessary to give alternativepronunciations that simply follow general rules ofsimplification that apply in rapid speech. Forexample, pointing out the possibility of omitting the[d] sound in ‘engine’ seems unnecessary, whereas itdoes seem worth recording the fact that somespeakers pronounce words such as ‘lunch’ and‘French’ with a final /ntʃ/ while others have final/nʃ/. There is a difference between the two cases:the former is a straightforward example of elision,and needs no special explanation that refers to aspecific word or class of word, while the latter is aparticular case of an insertion or deletion that isrestricted to a particular phonological environment;speakers are usually consistent in using one or otherof the alternative pronunciations in the latter case.

2.12 ElisionAs mentioned in the preceding section, there are

many cases where sounds which are produced inwords pronounced on their own, or in slow, carefulspeech, are not found in a different style of speech.This is known as elision, and this dictionarynormally does not show elisions in order to avoidadding a large number of additional pronunciationsthat are typical of casual speech. It is usual toexplain elision in terms of the Principle of LeastEffort – we try to avoid doing more work than isnecessary. We find elision most commonly in thesimplification of consonant clusters. A commonexample is the loss of /t/ and /d/ in combinationwith other consonants. Examples are:

‘act badly’ /��kt�b�d.li/ (careful speech) /��k�b�d.li/ (rapid speech)

‘strange person’ /�streind��p��.sən b-�p��.sən/ (careful speech) /�strein��p��.sənb -�p��.sən/ (rapid speech)

The fricative /θ/ is also frequently lost in clusters inrapid speech. Examples are:

‘sixth place’ /�siksθ�pleis/ (careful speech)/�siks�pleis/ (rapid speech)

Elision of vowels is also found, and again thisseems to be characteristic of rapid or casual speech.Examples are:

‘philosophy’ /fi�lɒs.ə.fi b -�lɑ�.sə-/ (carefulspeech) /fə�lɒs.fi b -�lɑ�s.fi/ (rapid speech)

‘persuade’ /pə�sweid b p��-/ (carefulspeech) /psweid/ (rapid speech)






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Introduction

Part 3: Explanatory notes

Variant pronunciations showthe parts that are differentfrom the first pronunciation.

Inflections and derived formsof words are shown after themain form.

British pronunciations.

American pronunciation.

For US pronunciations, onlythe part that is different fromthe British is shown.

affectation ��f.ek�tei.ʃən,-ik�- -s -z

adapt ə�d�pt -s -s -ing -iŋ -ed -id -ive -iv

Barnardo bə�nɑ�.dəυ, bɑ�-b bə��nɑ�r.doυ

deportee �di�.pɔ��ti� b -pɔ�r�- -s -z

actuar|y ��k.tʃu.ə.r�i, -tju.er�ib-tʃu- -ies -iz

The ‘cutback bar’ shows theplace at which a word isdivided so that alternativeendings can be shown withouthaving to print the entireword again. Inflected formsand derived forms are addedto this stem.

Pronunciations are shown inorder of frequency.

This sign shows that anAmerican pronunciationfollows. If this sign is notshown, the pronunciation isthe same for British andAmerican.






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Introduction

Stress patterns are shown forcommon compounds andidioms.

In some words, the stressmoves according to theposition of the word. This iscalled ‘stress shift’ and isindicated with an example.

Glosses indicate wherepronunciations differaccording to meaning.

Words which can be used withor without a capital letter areshown like this.

A semi-colon indicates thatthe alternatives that followcannot be added to thepronunciation given earlier.

apple ��p. əl -s -z �apple �blossom;�apple �butter; �apple �sauceb �apple �sauce; �apple �tree; the�apple of one’s �eye

Aden in the Yemen: �ei.dən b �ɑ�-, �ei-in Grampian region: ��d.ən

advent (A) ��d.vent, -vənt -s -s

Adriatic �ei.dri��t.ik b -��t� - stressshift: �Adriatic �Sea

Italic characters indicate thata sound is optional.

adenoidectom|y��d.ə.nɔi�dek.tə.m�i,-in.ɔi�-b -ən.ɔi�-; ��d.nɔi�- -ies -iz

Variant spelling of the word.

Acheulean, Acheulian ə�tʃu�.li.ən






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Introduction

References in introduction

Roach, P. (2000) English Phonetics andPhonology, (3rd Edition), CambridgeUniversity Press.

Stromberg, K. and Roach, P. (1993) ‘Therepresentation of stress-patterns inpronunciation dictionaries: ‘Morse-code’ vs.orthographic marking’, Journal of theInternational Phonetic Association, vol.23.3,pp. 55-58.

Michaelis, H. and Jones, D. (1913) A PhoneticDictionary of the English Language, CarlMeyer (Gustav Prior).

List of recommended reading

A. Works principally on British EnglishBrazil, D. (1994) Pronunciation for Advanced

Learners of English, Cambridge UniversityPress.This book examines the sound system ofEnglish in the context of connected speech anddescribes how intonation works in practice.

Cauldwell, R. (2002) Streaming speech: listeningand pronunciation for advanced learners ofEnglish, Speechinaction. CD-ROM.Material for practical study of contemporarypronunciation, available in British andAmerican versions.

Collins, B. and Mees, I. M. (2003) PracticalPhonetics and Phonology: a resource book forstudents, Routledge.An accessible and lively introduction with afocus on English, and an accompanying audioCD.

Foulkes, P. and Docherty, G. (1999) UrbanVoices: Accent Studies in the British Isles,Arnold.A collection of papers about different Britishaccents and the problems of describing them.

Giegerich, H. J. (1992) English Phonology,Cambridge University Press.A theoretical introduction to the phonology ofEnglish.

Gimson, A. C., revised by A. Cruttenden (2001)The Pronunciation of English (6th Edition),Arnold.The best contemporary description of thephonetics of English, written by the personresponsible for the 13th and 14th Editions ofthis dictionary.

Hancock, M. (2003) English Pronunciation inUse, Cambridge University Press.A recent addition to Cambridge’s ‘In Use’series for learners of English language, withdescriptive panels followed by practicalexercises. Recorded material is also available.






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Hewings, M. (2004) Pronunciation PracticeActivities, Cambridge University Press.A resource book for teachers of Englishlanguage, with a wide range of pronunciationclassroom activities for all levels of learners.Includes an audio CD.

International Phonetic Association (1999)Handbook of the International PhoneticAssociation, Cambridge University Press.A detailed presentation of the principles andpractices of the IPA.

Roach, P. (2000) English Phonetics andPhonology (3rd Edition), CambridgeUniversity Press.An introductory textbook with practicalexercises.

Shockey, L. (2003) Sound Patterns of SpokenEnglish, Blackwell.A clear exposition of the many ways in whichnatural connected English speech differs fromdescriptions of isolated words.

Wells, J.C. (1982) Accents of English, CambridgeUniversity Press (3 volumes).A very detailed and comprehensive account ofthe different accents of English throughout theworld.

B. American EnglishCassidy, F. G. and Hall, J. H. (eds). (1985 )

Dictionary of American Regional English,Belknap/Harvard Press.An ongoing publication, each entry listingpronunciations in designated regions.

Gilbert, J. B. (2005) Clear Speech: pronunciationand listening comprehension in NorthAmerican English. (3rd Edition), CambridgeUniversity Press.A lively and practical course on pronunciation.

Kenyon, J. S. and Knott, T. A. (1953) A Pronouncing Dictionary of AmericanEnglish (2nd Edition), G.& C. Merriam & Co.One of the earlier pronouncing dictionaries forAmerican English.

Kreidler, C. W. (2004) The Pronunciation ofEnglish: a coursebook. (2nd Edition),Blackwell.A textbook which also gives information aboutBritish English.

Lujan, B. (2004) The American Accent Guide,Lingual Arts.A complete course on American pronunciation,with CD’s.

Wolfram, W. and Johnson, R. (1996) PhonologicalAnalysis: Focus on American English, PrenticeHall.An introduction to the phonological structuresof American English.

Wolfram, W. and Schilling-Estes, N. (2006)“American English: Dialects and Variation,”Language In Society, vol 25, Blackwell.A comprehensive account of the developmentof American English regional and socialvarieties.

Van Riper, C. and Smith, D. (1992) Introduction toGeneral American Phonetics, Waveland Press.A practical workbook.

Yavas, M. (2006) Applied English Phonology,Blackwell.A detailed introduction to English phoneticsand phonology in applied contexts, withAmerican English focus.






This chart is reproduced by courtesy of the International Phonetic Association






Abbreviations 2Accent 4Acronyms 6Affricate 11Allophone 17Alveolar 19Approximant 29Articulation 33Aspiration 35Assimilation 36Bilabial 56Cardinal vowel 78Clear l 95Cluster 97Coalescence 98Coarticulation 98Coda 99Compounds 105Connected speech 109Consonant 110Dark l 129Dental 137Devoicing 141Diphthong 144Elision 165Flap 194Fortis 200French 202Fricative 203

Glottal Stop 216Glottalisation 216Homographs 242Intonation 269Labiodental 288Larynx 291Lateral 292Latin 292Lax 294Length 296Lenis 296Liaison 298Monophthong 331Names and places 339Nasal 341Nasalisation 341Neutral 344Neutralisation 345Onset 360Palatal 372Palato-alveolar 372Pharyngeal 385Phone 387Phoneme 387Phonetics 388Phonology 388Pitch 391Plosive 394Postalveolar 399

Prefix 402Retroflex 430Rhotic 432Rhyme/rime 432Rhythm 433Rounding 437Schwa 448Soft palate 468Spreading 474Stress 482Stress shift 482Suffix 486Syllabic consonant 492Syllable 493Tap 496Tense 500Tone 509Tone unit 510Trill 516Triphthong 517Uvular 539Velar 542Velarisation 542Vocal folds 547Voice onset time 547Voicing 547Vowel 548Vowel reduction 548Weak form 555

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Index of Information Panels






Documents

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