THE VOWELS IN ENGLISH

This lesson deals with the vowels: A, E, I, O, U (always said in that order).

I show you the vowels separately because they are so important. Mistakes and wrong sounds will be more obvious in English vowels than in other letters.

Also, of course, you can’t wait until near the end of the alphabet to learn the sounds of the letter ‘u’ in English.

The sounds of vowels will vary according to people’s accents in different countries and regions.

The student needs to produce a sound that is as accurate as possible but there is an acceptable range and it is sufficient to be within that range.

The sounds suggested here are indications of standard English as heard by a speaker of British English. I mention differences in North American English at each sound when they are relevant (and when I know about them).

Phonetics:

Since we are concerned with sounds, I give you an example of each sound. You may wish to use the phonetics shown in a dictionary but I don’t use the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA), so I can’t help you there.

Digital dictionaries which ‘speak’ the words to you are excellent if you have the money to buy one.

But for my students I just want to pass on an example of a sound, and for this I use well-known place names. If you follow sports you can hear the sounds of these places on your radio or television during reports of football or baseball matches.

The sounds of two vowels together are dealt with in the paper,

Sounds of Two Vowels.

The little box after each letter [    ] shows phonetically (where possible) how we pronounce the letter itself in the English alphabet.

Aa [a of USA] – has four sounds

1.  The most common sound of ‘a’ is of Manchester or Arsenal –

have, axe, father, parish, bad, hat, fast, map, sad, last, after, dance.

2.  We also have ‘a’ pronounced ei as in USA–

apron, April, table, crazy, favorite, stranger, arrange, danger, fate, late, taper, tale, sale (this change to the vowel sound is often produced by the ‘e’ following a single consonant – please see The Letter E.

3.  The third sound is very important and it’s difficult because you get no warning of when it arises. This is when ‘a’ is pronounced as ‘O’ of Tottenham or Jordan.

In North American English this sound is not so full and is more like a mixture ‘a’ of Arsenal and ‘e’ of Everton.

small, all, tall, what, was, warm, call, want, fall, mall, always, almost.

Once you have correctly identified the sound as ‘o’ you must not try to retain or reproduce any of the ‘a’ sound.

4.  The fourth sound is ‘e’ of Everton or Yemen -

many, any, including all words using ‘any’. For example, anyone, anything, anywhere, anyhow, anyway, anybody.

Ee [of Leeds or Sri Lanka]

The most - used letter of all. There are two basic sounds

1.  as in Everton or Yemen

letter, bed, send, bend, lend, tell, next, cellar, let, bet, debt, velvet,

2.   ‘ee’ as in English (Leeds) or ‘i’ as in Sri Lanka or Sierra Leone frequent, serious, period, serial, cereal, helium, query, tedious.

NOTE: it is extremely important to know that, in English, the letter ‘e’ at the end of a word is SILENT in virtually all cases. See The Letter E

Ii [of Mumbai] has three sounds.

The basic sound of ’i’ is especially important. It is the common sound of this vowel in ordinary words in English.

The tendency of some speakers of Romance languages (mainly the languages of Europe like French, Spanish or Italian) is to pronounce it ‘i’ (ee), as in their language.

This is wrong and you must abandon the idea that ‘i’ in English sounds like that. The correct sound is very short, very abrupt. It is best to show this sound by examples –

1. Liverpool, Ipswich, India, is, hill, grin, kill, still, him, gives, until, hill, his, this, timid

2.   This sound is the name of the letter – ‘ai’ as in Mumbai or Shanghai.

It appears in many words without any indication that it is not in category 1. above.

For example -

mind, kind, find, remind, final, tidal, blind,

Phonetically these are:

maind, kaind, faind, remaind, fainal, taidal, blaind.

You will notice that the ‘i’ sound in this category is not created or affected by a letter ‘e’ following close behind a consonant (see letter Ee above).

But in many cases this same change of sound is caused by the letter ‘e’ following, for example -

fine, time, slice, twice, kite, nice, vice, line, pine, mite.

In all these cases the sound is also ‘ai’.

3.    i as in Leeds or Rio de Janeiro. This category is very small:

police, machine, magazine, expertise, caprice, reprise.

Oo [of Ohio or Tokyo] has four sounds

1. as in Tottenham or Jordan

not, object, offense, observe, of, odd, off, top, stop,

2. as in Ohio or Tokyo

no, odour, occasion, open, glory, force, story

3. changes to A of Manchester or Arsenal

other, mother, ton, brother, Monday, cover, money, month, come, London.

You must think about this sound and practice it – the sound of ‘o’ as in Tottenham or Jordan is just wrong in these words (and many others of this group)..

4. as in Liverpool or Turin

to, two, do, who, whom, whose.

One point to note is that when the letter ‘e’ is nearby, the ‘o’ might act strangely. The most important example is in the word ‘one’. Whatever it might look like, this is pronounced UAN in all its uses. Examples –

one (the first number), someone, no one, one-sided, one-way, one-off, one-time.

COMBINATION:

OW – as in Saudi Arabia

how, now, cow, to bow, to plow

OW can also be ‘o’ as in Ohio or Tokyo –

slow, tow, snow, low, bow (and arrow),

OU – Please see Sounds of two Vowels.

Uu [of Liverpool or Turin] has four sounds

1.  ‘a’ as in Manchester or Arsenal (for most accents). This is the basic sound of ‘u’ in English

but, fun, butter, ‘bust’, bun, dust, cup, tunnel, under, upset, curse

2. U as in Liverpool or Turin

pull, full, bull, rule, pulpit, lube, butcher,

3. iu as in Yukon, United or universal.

This type is easy to remember if you take the English word ‘usual’ or ‘usually’ as the main example -

usual, usually : yusiual, yusiualé. Other examples –

use, useful, useless, utility, unique, universe, utensil etc.

In American English this rule is not closely followed and the pronunciation may be more like #2. above.

Note: Consistently with this ‘y’ sound, the indefinite article preceding this vowel at # 3 is ‘a’ and not ‘an’. For example, ‘a unique opportunity’, ‘a utensil’, ‘a universal problem’.

4. The sound of ‘u’ in ‘busy’ or ‘business’ is the short English ‘i’ as in ‘this’ or ‘hit’. We pronounce these words ‘bizi’ and ‘bizniz’.

There are very few examples of this sound –

busy, business, bury, figure, minute.

The related words also have the same sound:

busier, the busiest; businessman, business suit; figurative.

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