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A

PRONOUNCING

DICTIONARY

OF

AMERICAN ENGLISH

BY

JOHN SAMUEL KENYON, Ph.D.

Professor of the English Language in Hiram College;

Consulting Editor and Author of the Guide to Pronunciation,

Webster s New International Dictionary, Second Edition

AND

THOMAS ALBERT KNOTT, Ph.D.

Professor of English in the University of Michigan; Editor of the Middle English Dictionary ; General Editor, Webster's New International Dictionary, Second Edition

G. & C. MERRIAM COMPANY, PUBLISHERS

SPRINGFIELD, MASS., U.S.A.

W

Copyright, 1949

BY

G. & C. MERRIAM CO.

PREVIOUS EDITION COPYRIGHT, 1944 BY G. & C. MERRIAM CO.

COPYRIGHT UNDER INTERNATIONAL COPYRIGHT UNION

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED UNDER INTERNATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION (1910) BY

G. & C. MERRIAM CO.

A II rishls reserved

MADE IN THE U.S.A. GEORGE BANTA PUBLISHING COMPANY, ELECTROTYPERS, PRINTERS, AND BINDERS ®

THE COLLEGIATE PRESS, MENASHA, WIS., U.S.A.

To

Myra Pow Kenyon

AND

Myra Powers Knott

This publication was in large part made possible by funds granted by Carnegie Corporation of New York. That Corporation is not, however, the author, owner, publisher, or proprietor of this publication, and is not to be understood as approving by virtue of its grant any of the statements made or views expressed herein.

PREFACE

More than ten years ago several scholars especially interested in Ameri- can English suggested to one of the present editors the making of a phonetic pronouncing dictionary of the speech of the United States that might serve, both in the United States and elsewhere, the purposes served for Southern British English by Professor Daniel Jones's English Pronouncing Dictionary. About six years ago the editors became associated in this work.

Although as a pioneer in the field great credit must go to Professor Jones, who has placed all later lexicographers under inescapable obligation to him, our task is much different from his. He records the pronunciation of a limited and nearly homogeneous class of people in England in a type of speech identical with that of the editor himself. Our problem has been to record without prejudice or preference several different types of speech used by large bodies of educated and cultivated Americans in widely separated areas and with markedly different backgrounds of tradition and culture. Here let it be emphasized once for all that we have no prejudice whatever either for or against any of these varieties of American speech.

As the book is completed, we are keenly aware that only a beginning has been made, subject to later supplementation by other students of the field. On the whole, Southern speech has in the past received least attention. If we have failed to do it the full justice that was our intention, our failure must be laid in part to conflicting testimony, but mainly to the fact that this field has still largely to be investigated.

It was originally intended to include Canadian speech as one of the main regional divisions. A number of questionnaires were sent to Canada, and some correspondents took pains to send us excellent material (see acknowl- edgments below). The material was not, however, extensive enough to warrant full record of Canadian pronunciation, so that we have had to content ourselves with occasional references thereto. See mention of some Canadian variants (§118).

The scope of this work is limited. It is not'intended as a source book for the study of American dialects. That work is being done by the Linguistic Atlas of the United States and Canada. ItJsjmr-ainxio^record cmljr what is rather_va^fily: called slandard speech (see further. Introduction, §§1-2, 57-58, 76, 90). It is not our purpose even to try to exhaust that field. Almost certainly we have omitted many "good" pronunciations. Many of these are provided for in the Introduction by the lists of variants not fully re- corded in the vocabulary (§§90 ff.). Recent studies and records of American speech have made it clear that there exists far greater variety than was formerly supposed in the speech of Americans of unquestioned cultivation

(v) .

vi Preface

and importance. Considering the actual facts of contemporary American pronunciation, the editors feel that on the whole they have been conserva- tive in the variety recorded.

The vocabulary is intended to include the great body of common words in use in America. Besides, it includes a great many somewhat unusual words, inserted for a variety of reasons. Especial attention has been given to American proper names, though an exhaustive treatment of these is far \ beyond the scope of this work. The editors have had in mind the needs of college and university students, and have therefore included many names of history and literature likely to be encountered by them, as well as a large number of notes on various aspects of the English language. While foreign names are, strictly, outside the scope of a dictionary of American English, it is impossible to avoid including many often heard and used by Americans. The field of British place and personal names, tempting to one interested in pronunciation, has been little entered. A few of general in- terest must be included, and a considerable number of names of places in England whose pronunciation was verified locally by one of the editors have been inserted. Many of these names are of historical and traditional interest to Americans, and a great number have been transferred to Amer- ica.

_Ag in_all trustworthy djctioaagiesj the -editors have-endeavored to base the pronunciatiQrLS--an-a€-tual G^iltivated usage. No other standard has, in point of fact, ever finally settled pronunciation. This book can be taken as a safe guide to pronunciation only insofar as we have succeeded in doing this. According to this standard, no words are, as often said, "almost universally mispronounced," for that is self-contradictory. For an editor the temptation is often strong to prefer what he thinks "ought to be" the right pronunciation; but it has to be resisted. For example, on etymological grounds the word dahlia "ought to be" 'dalja; by traditional Anglicizing habits of English it should be Melja (as it is in England and often in Canada) ; as a fact, in America it is prevailingly ^daelja. In this case the variants are current enough to allow free choice; but in many cases the theoretically "right" pronunciation of a word is not even current.

In a work of this sort it is unavoidable to adopt certain devices to save space. These are explained in the Introduction (§§59 ff.). If the reader is now and then annoyed by these, he is asked to reflect that this makes possi- ble the inclusion of far more material than would otherwise be possible, and on the whole makes this material easier for the reader to find.

A question naturally arises as to the relation of this work to the other dictionaries published by G. & C. Merriam Company. This book is pub- lished on a different basis from their other publications. For this book they act only as publishers and distributors, without editorial supervision. The Merriam Company is in no way responsible for any statements made in this book. That responsibility rests solely on the two authors.

\

\

Preface vii

The purpose of this dictionary is quite new in America. First, it deals ^ solely with pronunciation; Even the entries are determined to a consider- able extent by that purpose; for example, certain proper names of persons or places are selected, not for their intrinsic importance, but for some in- terest or problem in their pronunciation.

But the chief difference between this and the other Merriam dictionaries is that this is a dictiomiyLJiLcoliQquiaLEnglish, of the evejyday uncon- scious speechjoiLoiltivaied^xeople — of those in every community who carry onTthe affairs and set the social and educational standards of those com- munities. Webster's New International Dictionary, Second Edition (In- troduction, p. xii) thus defines its purpose in regard to pronunciation:

"In this edition, the style adopted for representation is that of formal platform speech— and this must be clearly remembered by consultants of the pronunciations here given. The omission of less precise pronuncia- tions of familiar words does not, of course, indicate either that those pro- nunciations do not exist or that the editors of the dictionary refuse to recognize them. They do exist, and very naturally so when the occasion suits. . . . The recording of all such colloquial pronunciations of every separate word is not, however, possible m such a Dictionary as the New International. . . .^ TlTPj^roniinriaiixmA-cxmiainpH in thigJjjrtjrvnaTy are not theoretical. They,repr£sent_a£tual_spe££h — the speech of cultivated users of English, speaking formally with a view to being completely understood by their hearers."

On the other hand, the pronunciation which the present editors intend \., to represent in this book is what has been called "easy English," "the \ speech of well-bred ease" — not slovenly or careless speech, nor, on the other hand, formal platform speech. Of course the great majority of English words are pronounced alike in colloquial and in formal speech, and much the largest part of the vocabulary will be found to have the same pro- nunciations in both books, and a large part of the differences will be the differences between colloquial and formal pronunciation. (For fuller dis- cussion of the term colloquial, see Introduction, §§1-2.)

The New International does not attempt to represent the pronunciation of words as they occur in connected speech. The editors state, "It would be '\ impossible, even were it desirable, to attempt to record the pronunciation of 'running speech,' that is, of words as elements in connected spoken dis- course. ..." The present book does not attempt to do this completely, could not, in fact, but in many instances does show modified pronuncia- tions brought about by the phonetic effect of words on one another. Still more often the pronunciation of words as here indicated has been influ- enced, not so much by preceding or following sounds, as by rhythm, tempo, intonation, sense stress, etc. This will account for a goodly number of dif- ferences between the two books.

Another difference of aim lies in the scope of the two works. The New

viii ■ Preface

International avowedly includes the pronunciation "of all parts of the English-speaking world" (p. xii), and puts little emphasis on regional differ- ences within America. This book only occasionally and incidentally repre- sents British or other non-American pronunciation of English, and repre- sents as fully_as_piacticable the_main regional_differences in America .

In some cases there are differences of accentuation that do not represent real inconsistencies. In the Guide to Pronunciation in the New International (p. xxxvi, col. 1) it is pointed out that a great many English words have no fixed accentuation, and that the accent shown in the vocabulary is merely one possible accentuation among others that may be equally cor- rect. In this book, in some instances, the accentuation may depend on the colloquial character of the pronunciation. In some cases, too, differences of accentuation are due merely to a difference of practical policy. For in- stance, the New International, like many dictionaries, usually places no accent mark on a final third syllable though it may have secondary stress; thus the word calabash has only the first syllable marked, whereas in this book the mark of secondary accent is regularly placed on such words ('kielajbaej). This represents no difference of accentuation in the two books. ^ but merely a difference of practice, both methods being quite defensible. N? The editors_believe that jtMs. book is-a nafiira] rnmplprpfTit fp Wpf)<:fpr\

New International Dictionary, Second Edition. The New International fully recogriizes the validity and importance of colloquial English speech. In its Guide to Pronunciation, §8, it states: "The most important of these dif- ferent styles [of spoken English] is what may be called the cultivated col- loquial, which has aptly been termed the style of well-bred ease. This is the most used of the standard styles, it is acceptable to every class of society, whether used by them or not. ..." The New International provides for colloquial pronunciation by means of certain flexible symbols. Thus the Webster symbol a ('italic short a') "is used to suggest a variable sound. . . tending. . ., especially in familiar speech, to the neutral vowel [9]" (Guide, §91). The symbol e ('italic short e') serves a similar purpose: "In the great majority of everyday words, unaccented e before n or /, and in many words in other unaccented position, as in quiet, propriety, is obscured to the neutral vowel [a] in colloquial speech" (Guide, §127). Thus our book gives chief emphasis to colloquial speech, while the New International, though fully recognizing it, treats it only as one among many features of the English language.

The New International has also given a table of the International Pho- netic Alphabet for English with full illustration of its use: see especially Guide, pp. xxii-xxv, and thereafter throughout the Guide. The G. & C. Merriam Co. would therefore seem to be in a logical position to publish a dictionary of colloquial American speech in the symbols of the Inter- national Phonetic Alphabet. In the upshot, we believe that the actual dif-

Preface ix

ferences in pronunciation between the Merriam-Webster dictionaries and this one are comparatively few.

The eager and extensive co-operation which the editors have received in the prosecution of this work has gone far beyond our expectation, and has placed us under great obligation to all who have shown interest and given help. J^irstof all we wish to express our thanks to the Carnegie Corporation for a grant-in-aid through the University of Wisconsin to one of the editors, and to that University for inviting him to spend the year 1940-41 in resi- dence to prosecute the work; to the Carnegie Corporation, on recommenda- tion of the American Council of Learned Societies, for extending the grant- in-aid to supply this editor with an instructor at Hiram College in 1941-42 to enable him to give more time to the dictionary; to Dr. Margaret Water- man for competently fulfilling this appointment; and to Hiram College for granting him leave of absence in 1940-41.

We are under very particular obligations to Professor Miles L. Hanley, of the University of Wisconsin, for his hearty encouragement of the dic- tionary from its beginning, for placing at our disposal his great collection of rimes and spellings at the University of Wisconsin, and for many valuable suggestions; and to Mrs. Louise Hanley for much help in the utilization of the above-mentioned collections, and for many items of expert editorial advice.

We have profited greatly from the material thus far published by the Linguistic Atlas of the United States and Canada, and in addition we wish to thank the Directors for placing at our disposal a considerable amount of unpublished material from the collections covering parts of the Central West and of the South.

We thankfully acknowledge our great indebtedness, in common with all students of the English language, to the great Oxford English Dictionary.

Intimately associated as the editors have been with Webster's New International Dictionary, Second Edition, it is inevitable that we should be influenced by its standards and indebted to its materials in many ways. We gladly acknowledge the deepest obligations to it.

We are indebted to many individuals who have supplied us with details of information in their respective fields; am.ong them. Professors Myles Dillon (Celtic), William Ellery Leonard (English), J. Homer Herriott (Spanish), Joseph L. Russo (Italian), Alexander A. Vasiliev (Russian), R-M. S. Heffner (German and Phonetics), Einar Haugen (Scandinavian), Casimir Zdanowicz (French), Dr. Karl G. Bottke (French and Italian), Mr. Charles E. Condray (Southern speech), — all at the University of Wisconsin; to Mr. Edward Artin, G. & C. Merriam Co., Springfield, Mass. (Eastern speech). Professor J. D. M. Ford, Harvard University (Italian), Professor Bernard Bloch, Brown University (Eastern speech), Dr. George L. Trager, Yale University (Linguistics), Dr. Ruth E. Mulhauser, Hiram

X Preface

College (Romance Languages), Professor R. H. Stetson, Oberlin College (Syllables).

To scholars and other competent observers in various parts of the United States and Canada we are under special obligation for material which they have collected on the speech of their regions, with valuable comment and in many instances with phonograph records: to Professors Katherine Wheat- ley, University of Texas; William A. Read, Louisiana State University; George P. Wilson, Woman's College, University of North Carolina; C. K. Thomas, Cornell University; C. M. Wise, Louisiana State University; Lee S. Hultzen, University of California at Los Angeles; W. Norwood Brigance, Wabash College; Mr. John Kepke, New York City; Mr. L. Sprague de Camp, New York City; Dr. Raven I. McDavid, Jr., South Carolina; Dr. Martin Joos, University of Toronto, Can.

We also wish to thank a number of scholars and teachers who responded to our request for advice on the editing (published in American Speech, xi, Oct. 1936, pp. 227-31), replying either in the columns of that journal or by private correspondence. Their suggestions were all carefully considered, and many of them were adopted.

To Mr. Donald A. Bird, Mr. Philip M. Davies, and Mrs. Wayne Caygill of the University of Wisconsin we are indebted for valuable assistance in preparing the manuscript.

In addition to those mentioned above, the editors also have to express lasting obligations to many more scholars, teachers, and others, who made transcriptions of their own and others' speech, and often supplied supplementary notes; in several instances also they sent phonograph records. To those whose names follow and a few that we had no means of identifying we extend our sincere thanks. Titles are omitted; and since it could not be significant without detailed explanation, address and locality are omitted. Suffice it to say that the informants were well distributed over the United States. Those from Canada are so marked.

Virgil A. Anderson, Phyllis B. Arlt, A. M. Barnes, L. L. Barrett, A. C. Baugh, J. F. Bender, C. L. Bennet (Can.), E. B. Birney (Can.), Morton W. Bloomtield (Can.), Hilda Brannon, Alexander Brede, Jr., Christine Broome, William F. Bryan, Donald C. Bryant, C. H. Carruthers (Can.), Philip H. Churchman, Roy B. Clark, T. F. Cummings, Edwin B. Davis, J. de Angulo, L. R. Dingus, Sarah Dodson, Julia Duncan, Norman E. Eliason, Bert Emsley, E. E. Ericson, Paul H. Flint, Frances A. Foster, Elizabeth F. Gardner, James Geddes, Jr., Erma M. Gill, W. Cabell Greet, Louis A. Guerriero, Harold F. Harding, Harry W. Hastings, Grace E. Ingledue, Annie S. Irvine, Cary F. Jacob, Joseph Jones, W. Powell Jones, Claude E. Kantner, Clifford Anne King, C. A. Knudson, C. A. Lloyd, C. M. Lot- speich, William F. Luebke, Klonda Lynn, T. O. Mabbott, John C. Mc- Closkey, Cassa L. McDonald, James B. McMillan, Kemp Malone, Ed- ward W. Mammen, Albert H. Marckwardt, E. K. Maxfield, R. J. Menner,

Preface xi

Alice W. Mills, George Neely, T. Earl Pardoe, Gordon E. Peterson, Holland Peterson (Can.), Louise Pound, E. G. Proudman, Robert L. Ramsay, W. Charles Redding, Loren D. Reid, Stuart Robertson, J. C. Ruppenthal, I. Willis Russell, C. Richard Sanders, Edwin F. Shewmake, Loretta Skelly, Gordon W. Smith, Paul L. Stayner, J. M. Steadman, Jr., W. J. Stevens (Can.), Everett F. Strong, Morris Swadesh, C. H. Thomas, Argus Tresid- der, E. H. Tuttle, W. Freeman Twaddell, Charles H. Voelker, Chad Walsh, Lois P. Ware, Raymond Weeks, Walter H. Wilke, Rudolph Willard, A. M. Withers, Robert Withington.

The typesetting and electrotyping of this book were done by the George Banta Publishing Company, of Menasha, Wisconsin. To all members of its staff who were concerned in any way with its making, the editors express their grateful appreciation.

The editors feel that the making of the dictionary has been a co-operative enterprise, and if it has value, this is in large measure due to expert help from many voluntary contributors; for its defects the editors hold them- selves solely responsible.

Vachel Lindsay Room, Hiram College John S. Kenyon

September, 1943 Thomas A, Knott

CONVENTIONALIZED DIAGRAM OF THE SPEECH ORGANS (Reprinted by permission from Kenyon's American Pronunciation, 8th ed.)

LL=Lips. Pt = Tongue Point. Bl = Tongue Blade. Tr = Teethridge. HP = Hard Palate. V = Velum (soft palate): black: lowered, or open; dotted: raised, or closed. U = Uvula. Ph = Pharynx. VC = Vocal Cords.

(xU)

L'

Lbr

CHART OF THE TONGUE POSITIONS OF THE VOWELS

(Reproduced, with slight changes, from Kenyon's American Pronunciation, 8th edition, by permission.)

Hf = High-front L'hf = Lower high-front H''mf= Higher mid-front L^'mf = Lower mid -front Lf = Low-front

The left of the figure represents the front of the mouth He = High-central

Mc = Mid-central

Lea = Low-central advanced

Hbr = High-back round L''hbr= Lower high-back round Mbr = Mid-back round H''lbr = Higher low-back round Lbr = Low-back round Lb = Low-back

(xiii)

INTRODUCTION

THE STYLE OF SPEECH REPRESENTED

§1. It is the purpose of this dictionary to show the pronunciation of cultivated colloquial English in the United States. The meaning of the word colloquial is sometimes misunderstood. A common misunderstanding is that in dictionaries the label Colloq. attached to a word or pronunciation brands it as inferior, and therefore to be avoided.

Webster^s New International Dictionary, Second Edition, thus defines colloquial: "Pertaining to, or used in, conversation, esp. common and familiar conversation; conversational; hence, unstudied; informal; as, colloquial phrases or pronunciations; specif., of a word or a sense or use of a word or expression, acceptable and appropriate in ordinary conversational context, as in intimate speech among cultivated people, in familiar letters, in informal speeches or writings, but not in formal written discourse {flabbergast; go slow; harum-scarum). Colloquial speech may be as correct as formal speech. 'Every educated person speaks his mother tongue in at least two ways, and the difference between the dignified and the colloquial style is considerable.' — G. L. Kittredge." It should be noted that the illustrative words do not refer to pronuncia- tion but to diction, though the definition includes pronunciation.

The definition in the Oxford Dictionary is concise and also adequate. Though it does not mention pronunciation, "etc." may safel}^ be taken to include it: "Of words, phrases, etc.: Belonging to common speech; characteristic of or proper to ordinary conversation, as dis- tinguished from formal or elevated language. (The usual sense.)"

Definitions of colloquial that only concern choice of words and give as examples only oaths or slang are perhaps in part responsible for some of the popular misunderstanding of the term.

A less frequent, but still not uncommon error is the confusion of colloquial with local, the assumption that a colloquialism is a localism, and so to be avoided.

Another not uncommon confusion is to regard colloquial English as the opposite of standard English {standard being confused with formal or literary). There is standard colloquial English and standard formal or Hterary English, as there is nonstandard colloquial and nonstandard formal English. As regards pronunciation, one kind of nonstandard formal Enghsh is the arti- ficial type in which vowels that are normally unaccented are pronounced with their accented sounds, in which articles {a, an, tlie), prepositions {to, from, of), and other normally unstressed particles are pronounced with their emphatic forms instead, in which the tempo and intonation are not those of traditional living speech, in which abnormal accentuation and loudness are practiced, together with similar distortions that detract from unostentatious sincerity.

The accepted meaning of colloquial is to be found in the work of such linguistic scholars as Professor Henry Cecil Wyld, of Oxford, whose History of Modern Colloquial English deals with the unstudied speech and familiar correspondence of the cultivated classes, and reminds us of the importance both to literature and to general culture of this central core of the EngHsh language. Says Professor Wyld, "This style of Uterary prose is aUve and expressive chiefly insofar as it is rooted in that of colloquial utterance. . . . The style of Literature is rooted in the life and conversation of the age."^ Similarly, the American scholar and poet William Ellery

1 History oj Modern Colloquial English, London 1925, pp. 157, 188.

fxv)

xvi The Phonetic Alphabet

Leonard: "In general every good colloquialism is possible in good prose (or verse), for quite rightly good prose (or verse) is becoming more and more a skillful adaptation of the vigorous, _i;pmpact, racy idiom of the best spoken speech."^ ' ^y / §2. Colloquial pronunciation is here treated as the conversational and familiar utterance \ foi cultivated speakers when speaking in the normal contacts of life and concerned with what 1 Vthey are saying, not how they are saying it. There are, of course, different styles of colloquial, / fl-om that of the everyday contacts of family life to the somewhat less familiar contacts of \ social and business or professional life. The variant pronunciations of the same word fre- quently shown will often reflect the different styles of the colloquial. In all cases of words that are not formal per se, unstudied everyday speech is the basis. It is of course true that the majority of words in general use are the same for colloquial as for formal language, and are pronounced alike in both styles.

The editors are aware that the attempt to represent in fairly accurate symbols the every- day speech of the cultivated is likely now and then to cause surprise and to tempt criticism. The average observer has not been trained to observe speech on the wing, ana is too apt to be influenced by unconscious habitual association with spelling forms. No experience is com- moner with trained observers than to hear certain pronunciations in the very statements in which the critic is denying them.

It must also be remembered that not all words are of a colloquial nature. Words not in colloquial use have, properly speaking, no colloquial pronunciation. Thus the word exorcise does not often occur in conversation. Its pronunciation is therefore what it would be in formal context, with the -or- fully sounded. If it should become a popular word, it would sound just like exercise. So the word adhibit, not being colloquial, receives the full sound of the first vowel as in add, while in the more popular word advise the first vowel is normally obscured.

THE PHONETIC ALPHABET

§3. Pronunciation in this dictionary is indicated by the alphabet of the International Phonetic Association (IPA). These symbols and the pronunciations represented by them in- variably appear in boldface type. More than half of these are the ordinary letters of the English alphabet or familiar variations of them. v

Each symbol stands for or ly one speech sound, and each speech sound has only one symbol to represent it. In accord with the practice of many British and American users of this alphabet the accented sounds a, 3, s' are considered to be separate speech sounds from the unaccented sounds a and ^. Diphthongs are regarded as single sounds and their symbols (ai, au, oi, etc.) as single symbols. The same is true of tj, d3.

In using the phonetic alphabet the reader must be careful to give only the one designated sound to those letters which in ordinary spelling represent more than one sound. Thus the symbol g has only the sound in get get, never that in gem dsem; s has only tlie sound in gas gaes, never that in iiise waiz or that in vision Visan. The dotted i has only the sound in machine malfin, never that in shin fin; ordinary e always has the sound in gate get, never that in tnet met. Below is the list of symbols with key words. The notes after the table give fuller informa- tion and additional symbols. The accent mark (') always precedes the syllable accented.

' American Speech, viii, 3, Oct. 1933, p. 57.

The Phonetic Alphabet

xvii

VOWELS

Sym-

Sym-

bol

Spelling

Spoken Form

bol

SpeUing

Spoken Form

i

bee

bl

u

full

ful

I

pity

'piti

u

tooth

tue

e

rate

ret

3-

further

'fySa^ accented syllable

e

yet

j£t

only, r'5 sounded

9

sang

S£eg

3

further

'faSa accented syllable

a

bath

baO as heard in the East,

only, r'^ silent

between

ae (sang)

a^

further

'fytSa' unaccented syllable

and a (ah)

only, r's sounded

a

ah far

a far

3

further

'fsSa unaccented syllable only, t's silent

D

watch

WDtJ between o

3 (jaw)

1 (ah) and

custom above

'kAstam unaccented syl- a'bAv table

3

jaw

d33

gorge

gards

A

custom

'kAstam accented sylla-

o

go

go

above

a'bAv ble

DIPHTHONGS

ai

while

hwail

ju

using

'juzig

au

how

hau

fuse

fjuz

31

toy

t3I

lU

fuse

fiuz

CONSONANTS

Sym-

S3rm-

bol

Spelling

Spoken Form

bol

Spelling

Spoken Form

P

pity

'piti

d3

jaw

d33

b

bee

bi

edge

Eds

t

tooth

tue

m

custom

%ASt3in

d

dish

di/

in

keep 'em

'kipm

k

custom

'kAstsm

n

y. vision

Vi33n

g

go

go

9

Eden

'id^i

f

fuU

ful

0

sang

saeg

V

vision

'visan

angry

'aeg-gri

e

tooth

tue

1

full

ful

3

further

'fytia'

}

cradle

'kredj

s

sang

saeg

w

watch

wotj

z

using

'juzig

hw

while

hwail

;

dish

di/

3

yet

jet

5

vision

Vi33ii

I

rate

ret

h

how

hau

very

Veri

tS

watch

WDtJ

far

far

chest

(Jest

gorge

gsrds

xviii The Phonetic Alphabet

ACCENT MARKS

§4. The mark ' above the line and before a syllable indicates that that syllable has the principal accent, as in action 'aek/an. The corresponding mark ^ below the line and before a syllable indicates that that syllable has an accentuation somewhat weaker than the main one, as in acrobat 'aekrajbaet, Aberdeeti jaeba^'din, shoemaker '/u/meka'. For discussion of accent, see §§48-54.

LENGTH MARK

§5. The colon (:) after a vowel or a consonant symbol indicates that its sound is prolonged. Thus the form sae:nd beside saet means that the ss sound in sand is longer than in sat; and the form d33is : means that in one pronunciation of the plural joists (with omitted t) the s is longer than it is in rejoice ri'dsois. In the vocabulary the length sign is used only occasionally or in certain classes of words. See fuller discussion of length at §55.

NOTES ON THE SYMBOLS

§6. I. The symbol i is used for accented or unaccented syllables. Though the accented and unaccented vowels in pity 'piti, sitting 'sitig, visit Vizit, etc., are sometimes different in quality, the differences are here ignored, since they vary with different speakers and with the different sounds that precede or follow. This accords with common practice in transcription.

When final, the unaccented vowel in pity 'piti and similar words varies with different speak- ers in .I'Vmerica from a sound like the i in bit bit, or like the first i in 'piti, to a sound that ap- proaches the i in bee bi. See the ending -y in the vocabulary.

§7. e. The vowel in rate ret and other words with "long a" is very often (but by no means always) a diphthong (gliding from one vowel to another in the same syllable) ei, ei, ee, or the like. On linguistic principles the one sj'mbol e properly stands for all varieties of the sound (whether diphthong or not). The variants never distinguish words otherwise alike.

§8. E. The symbol e is used not only for words like yet J£t, send send, but also for one type of pronunciation of the vowel sound in there 'Ser, swear swtr, air er, as pronounced by Taa.ny. When thus followed by r, the e sound is usually a little more like the ae in sang saeg than is the E in yet J£t, send send. Many speakers pronounce ae in such words in both America and England. Both pronunciations are given in the vocabulary {there tier, tiaer).

§9. ae. This ligature is a unit symbol (not two letters) standing for a single simple vowel sound. It was the letter used in Anglo-Saxon times for the same sound in Old English as in present English sat (OE sast). Originally combined from the Latin letters a and e (since its sound la}^ between the two Latin sounds), its present value in the IP A alphabet is the same as in its oldest use in Enghsh.

§10. a. This vowel sound, not in general use in America as a whole, is about midway be- tween the vowel of sang saeg and the vowel of ah a, father 'fatfa^. It is often heard in New England and New York City in such words as ask ask, chaff tjaf, bath ba6 (which are also there pronounced aesk, tj'aef, baeO or ask, tJaf, baO). It commonly begins the diphtliongs in while and how. The vowel a is an important sound in French, Spanish, and other foreign languages, and is common in cultivated Northern British, Scottish, Anglo-Irish, and Canadian. The symbol a must always be carefully distinguished from a. For the use of a in Eastern American, see §§102 f.

The Phonetic Alphabet xix

§11. a. This is the "broad a" sound in ah a, far lax, father 'fatJaf in most of America. It is also used by the majority. of Americans in "short o" words such as top tap, got gat, fodder 'fada^. in which some speakers pronounce d.

§12. D. The symbol d represents a vowel not in universal American use. It is the historical "short o" now generally used in England in words like top top, got got, fodder 'foda, by many Easterners and Southerners, and in certain kinds of words by many speakers in all parts of the country. It is a sound about midway between a in ah and 3 in wall. It may be approximated by trying to sound a in ah while (without moving the tongue) rounding the lips for o in wall. As with a, so with o, there is no key word that will convey to all Americans its exact sound. The key word watch, here used, frequently is spoken with d in all parts of America, but it is also often pronounced wat/, with a as in ah, and wat/, with a as in wall.

§13. o. Like e, the symbol o represents either a simple vowel or a diphthong (ou, ou, ov, etc.). For the same reason stated at e (§7 above) the symbol o is used for both the simple vowel and the diphthong. For b see -ow in the vocabulary.

§14. u, u. The small capital u {full ful) and the Io^^"er-case u (tooth tu9) are to be carefullj- distinguished from each other.

§15. y. The symbol y represents the accented form of the so-called "r-colored" vowel used in the first syllable oi further 'fytia' by those who do not "drop their r's." In current spelling it is spelt with a vowel letter followed by the letter r {word, fur, term, firm, earn). But in sound this vowel y is not followed by r; it is a vowel made wliile the tongue is at the same time holding the position for r. Such vowels are common in many types of English. The con- sonantal r sound that formerly followed the vowel (hence the present spelling) long ago merged with the preceding vowel and disappeared as a separate sound, though its effect is still heard in the r-coloring of the vowel. The simple proof of the nature of the present sound is that the vowel cannot be pronounced separately from the r without producing a quite different sound, whereas this can easily be done with, say, the a and r of /arm.

§16. 3. The symbol 3 represents the corresponding vowel in the word furtJwr of those who "drop their r's," the tongue for this vowel 3 being in the same general central position in the mouth as for 3^, but without the simultaneous adjustment of the tongue for the r-coloring (usually the elevation of the tip). For those accustomed to pronounce y a fairly good 3 can be made by trying to pronounce 3^ in bird with the point of the tongue placed against the backs of the lower teeth, and with the jaw a trifle more closed than for the vowel a in sun. This 3 is often followed by r, as in furry 'fs-ri, from fur is. While the majority of Ameri- cans pronounce fur fy, and furry 'fs^i, most British and many eastern and southern Americans pronounce fur is, and ftirry 'f3'ri. But in words Uke hurry, which is not derived from a simple form hur z.?, furry is ixovafur, three American pronunciations are common, — 'hy -i, 'hs-ri, 'hA-ri, the last being least frequent and tending to become 'hs-ri or 'hy-n.

§17. a'. The symbol 9- is the unaccented r-colored vowel, like 3" inseparable from its r quality, as pronounced by those who do not "drop their r's." The two symbols y and a' are formed from the IP A symbols 3 and a (as used, e.g., in the word Herbert 'hsbat in Ida C. Ward's Phonetics of English, Cambridge, Engd. 1939, p. 108), by attaching the hook of retro- flexion (r-coloring) used by the IPA on the consonants s, z, t, d, etc. {Le Maitre Fhonetique, Jan.-Mar. 1942, inside front cover). This makes easy the comparison of such words as Herbert

XX The Phonetic Alphabet

as pronounced by those who "drop their r's" ('hsbat) and by those who sound them ('hs^ba^t), showing at a glance the phonetic relation between such words in the two types of speech {further 'fsSa — 'fa^Sa*, perverse paVss — pa'Vss, bird bad — byd, over 'ova — 'ova^), all four sounds 3, y, a, » being vowels, none of them here followed by r.

§18. a. The s3Tnbol a represents the "neutral vowel," or "schwa" Jwa, heard in the im- accented syllable of custom 'kAStam, or, as just shown above, in that oi further from those who "drop their r's" ('f sSa) . With many such speakers the a of 'f atSa is not exactly like the a of 'kAS- tam, but is commonly regarded as the same speech sound.

§19. A. This represents the accented vowel of custom 'kAstam, above a'bAv, undone An'dAn. In An'dAnthe first syllable is not quite without accent, but has sufficient accent (though not marked) to make it audibly more prominent than the un- of unless (spoken colloquially) an'ks. Compare unlace Angles with unless an'ks, or undone An'dAn with and done in the phrase over and done with 'ova' an'dAn witJ, or untilled with until in This land was untitled until now An'tild an 'til nau. The prefix un- is commonly pronounced An- with more or less subordinate accent. See un- in the vocabulary.

§20. ai, au. For regional varieties of these diphthongs see Variants §§105-108.

§21. ju. This is a rising diphthong — the Jast part being stressed more than the first. It begins with the glide consonant j (as in yet J£t) and ends with the vowel u (as in tooth tu9). ju would not be separately Usted as a vowel symbol, being a consonant plus vowel, except for comparison with the diphthong lu (see below), with which it often alternates, for ju is of the same nature as other combinations of consonantal j plus a vowel (as in ye ji, yea je, yaw ja, yet jet, etc.) or of consonantal w plus a vowel {we wi, way we, woe wo, etc.).

§22. lu. This is either a falling diphthong (first element stressed, as in the diphthongs ai, au, 3i), or a level-stress diphthong, both elements being about equall}' prominent. If the last element becomes more prominent, then lu becomes ju, as it did historically in such words as use juz. The form lu is heard from many speakers in such words as fuse fiuz, where others pronounce ju (fjuz). For the occurrence of lu in America, see Variants §109.

lu is a modified form of lu, occurring chiefly as an alternative to u or ju that has been re- duced from u or ju by lack of stress {superb su'pyb, siu'pyb, sju'pyb) or before r {curious 'kjurias, 'kiurias). The phonetic surroundings lead without effort to the modified lu and ju.

§23. g. It should be noted that this sound is a simple, single sound, which cannot be di- vided. It is made by contact of the tongue back with the velum, as the simple sound n is made by contact of the tongue point with the upper teethridge. The usual spelhng with two letters {ng) has sometimes led to an impression that o is a combination sound. It is also spelt with n only {angry 'aeg-gri, ink igk). When speakers "drop their g's" (as in runnin' for running), they drop no sound, but they replace the tongue-back nasal g ('rAmg) with the tongue-point nasal n ('rAnin).

§24. m, n, 1. These are called syllabic consonants because they form syllables without any vowel whatever, either alone {stop 'em 'stap-m, button 'bAt-n, saddle 'saed-l) or with other con- sonants {opened 'op-md, buttoned 'bAt-nd, saddled 'saed-ld). These and such forms as keep 'em 'kipm, Eden 'idit^, cradle 'kredl have no vowel in the unaccented syllable because, for ip, the lips continue closed throughout pip, and, for ip and |, the tongue point remains in contact with the teethridge throughout t^ and dj. Between some other consonants, as sip {lessen

The Phonetic Alphabet xxi

'ksn), zn {reason 'rizn), pi {apple 'aepl) the transition to the second consonant is so quick, or the opening of the speech organs is so slight, that no vowel intervenes.

All of the foregoing forms can also be uttered with the schwa vowel a plus a nonsyllabic consonant ('kipara, 'idan, 'bAtan, 'kredal, ^ksan, 'rizan, 'aepal), but in some of these and many others the pronunciation with a is either not accepted in good use, or is a mark of formal, noncolloquial pronunciation. On this point see