Turn on your speakers!

Do you ever feel like breaking down because of English spelling? Don't worry, English spelling and pronunciation system is very confusing and often puzzles even the native speaker. Dr. Edward Rondthaler the noted typographist, the chairman of the American Literary Council and master of the English language says that "nothing seems to be spelled, or said, quite the way you expect it to be!" In fact there are two English languages - the Written English and the Spoken or Phonetic English. But if you really want to communicate, which means speak, understand, read and write English, you have to deal with both of them.

There are 26 letters in the English alphabet but they stand for at least 44 sounds of real English. The table below contains phonetic symbols used in various English dictionaries and their audio pronunciation (MP3 format). However it doesn't list all possible sounds of American or British English considering that some researchers count up to 49 (or even more) distinct sounds in English language. The number of sounds and sounds themselves depend of course on dialect i.e. country, area and … evaluation procedure.

There are quite a few phonetic transcription systems in the world. In my opinion some of phonetic alphabets are too sophisticated to learn, the others are too simple to feature all sounds of English. The two most popular among them are the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) and the Merriam Webster system. IPA used mainly in European and British dictionaries while Merriam Webster - in American ones, including of course the Merriam Webster Dictionary itself. There are some similarities but also many differences between the two systems. The main table represents the IPA alphabet and at the bottom of the page you will find a link (printscreen of original page) to Merriam Webster Pronunciation guide. Compare and choose...

Phonetic transcription is usually written in [square brackets] or between two \backslash symbols\.
Stress: main stress is a short vertical or slant line placed at the top before the stressed syllable in the phonetic transcription of the word; secondary stress is a short vertical or slant line placed at the bottom before the stressed syllable. E.g.:


In order to insure correct character mapping for any possible platform I used images instead of phonetic font to represent the international phonetic symbols, so don't try to copy/paste them as text. And if you need to display phonetic alphabet I do recommend using images (you can copy them here). This may seem not too convenient but it is certainly more reliable and you may be sure that your visitor or reader will see correct symbols. Just try to search the Internet for phonetic transcription and you'll see on a good half of the pages unrecognizable characters or question marks instead of some phonetic symbols. So the images remain in power.And now all you have to do is read, listen and repeat as much as possible! 

English Phonetics - Reference Table

Vowels

IPA Phonetic Symbol	Example
	tree, sea, receive, women, believe, we, people
	bit, symbol, recall, business
	cat, apple, compact
	car, far, garage, heart
	sort, ball, ought, awful, board, floor, audacity, saw
	put, foot, could, butcher, woman
	fool, rule, shoes, true, crew, move, through
	up, other, but, couple, blood, love
	her, first, turn, search
	until, about, alias
	bed, effort, head, said, friend
	rock, impossible, body, cough, knowledge

Diphthongs

IPA Phonetic Symbol	Example
	tray, eight, make, sail, say, great, ace
	sky, I, bye, buy, by, guide, flight, rye, die, choir ['kwair]
	joy, coin, oyster
-r (amer.)	fear, beer, here
-r (amer.)	hair, care, there, hare
-r (amer.)	tour, poor
	trousers, cow, hour, our
	joke, coat, own, go, though, sew, toe

Consonants

IPA Phonetic Symbol	Example
	parking, gallop, open
	board, tab, abandon
	trunk, request, receipt
	add, ad, diligent
	kodak, cord, accomplish, school, ache, conqueror, exchange (x = k+s)
	grace, agree, auxiliary (x = g+z)
	chance, achieve, catch, mutual
	jungle, judge, logic, procedure
	fool, atmosphere, enough
	vocal, give
	thanks, ethic
	there, other
	sunday, citizen, east, scissors, psychology
	zebra, cosmonaut, scissors, resign, xenon
	shine, sure, action, special, issue, conscience, anxious (x = k +)
	visual, casual, usual, garage,
	head, uphill
	mother, lamb
	note, intrusion, knowledge, pneumatic
	sing, sink
	laughter, illegal
	random, orange; (amer.) order
	yet, yesterday, you, utility; (u = j + u)
	what, windows, quest