All Questions
Tagged with vowels orthography
30 questions
2
votes
1
answer
277
views
When is the "Short A" sound actually spelled with an AE?
I was reading a book on English spelling (Dictionary of the British English Spelling System, by Greg Brooks) and it mentioned that the Short A sound (æ) can be spelled using the following graphemes:
...
- 292
0
votes
0
answers
85
views
What’s going on with "hot -> heat”? [duplicate]
I am looking for a particular linguistic term for this process of turning words like hot into words like heat.
English has a bunch of pairs like these:
Hot -> heat
Whole -> heal
(Folk)lore ->...
- 43
2
votes
3
answers
652
views
Reduction of diphthongs to short vowels (/waɪz/ -> /'wɪz.əd/)
I've noticed this phenomenon / process in many words where a diphthong (or a long vowel as well?) reduces to a short vowel when it's inflected.
Consider the following examples:
Pronounce /...
- 16.7k
2
votes
2
answers
9k
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Are there words other than "friend" where "ie" is pronounced as /ɛ/ ("short e")?
Are there any words in English other than friend where the spelling "ie" corresponds to the "short e" sound /ɛ/?
- 1,442
2
votes
1
answer
1k
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Why is the spelling of "company" different from the pronunciation?
My students regularly pronounce the word "company" with [o] in the first syllable.
Why do we pronounce [ʌ] in this syllable? but write "o"?
Thank you.
user292343
5
votes
2
answers
119k
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Why is the plural form of piano "pianos" and not "pianoes"?
The rule says that if a singular noun ends in consonant + "o" then the plural form will be consonant + "oes".
e.g. tomato => tomatoes.
Then, why this rule does not apply to piano?
- 169
2
votes
1
answer
5k
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Rule for the pronunciation of the letter O as /ʌ/ vs. /ɒ/
If the letter o in a word is pronounced as a monophthong, it will fall
into two types:
pronounced as /ʌ/ as in color ("/kʌlə/")
pronounced as /ɒ/ as in lock ("/lɒk/")
What I would like to ask is ...
- 273
4
votes
1
answer
1k
views
Name for letter U in words like 'suede' and 'penguin'
What is the letter U called when it says the /w/ sound in words like suede and penguin? I've read that y and w are semivowels but the U in suede and penguin doesn't really conform to the definition of ...
- 47
8
votes
1
answer
20k
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Why is "Yosemite" spelled that way?
I'm not a native English speaker, but sometimes I get the feeling that the pronunciation of English words is random.
Why is "Yosemite" is pronounced as "Yoh-Sem-Ee-Tee" and written as "Yosemite" and ...
- 89
11
votes
2
answers
8k
views
Is there any rule for pronouncing words beginning with “re-”?
It’s hard for me to guess how to pronounce words beginning with re- correctly.
Sometimes it is /rɛ/ as in reference, but sometimes it is /ri/ as in report.
Is there any rule about this?
- 213
8
votes
2
answers
17k
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Participle of "center/centre" in UK English — "centring"? Seriously? [closed]
As an American, I was never shocked to see the word "center" spelled as "centre." It didn't bother me at all. Honestly.
But then I saw the participle of it spelled as "centring" as opposed to "...
- 395
1
vote
1
answer
895
views
Pronunciation of "great" vs. "treat" [closed]
Why is great pronounced /greit/ while in other words the ea is pronounced differently? Take treat, for example: /tri:t/. Why are two words with the same number of vowels and consonants and the same ...
- 7,119
0
votes
1
answer
700
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"Boneular" vs. "bonular" [closed]
My knowledge in morphology and orthography is lacking. I would like to know how to spell the neologism boneular, from bone (or Backbone, a programming library used for creating Web applications) and ...
- 111
2
votes
1
answer
19k
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“Bazaar” vs. “bazar”
Which of bazaar or bazar is better to use for the domain name of specialised marketplace?
Both are available according to the dictionaries.
Any advice which of these two is better to use in the URL?
- 1,030
0
votes
3
answers
916
views
Coining new words from existing ones: Duplicate last letter?
I am trying to invent a word by taking an existing word and turning it into a noun a person can be called who is interacting with an object.
The trouble I ran into was the initial word's ending.
...
- 119
2
votes
5
answers
2k
views
Can we call something a "word" if it doesn't have a vowel? [closed]
It seems self-evident to me, but in the heat of a Scrabble game (no surprise), my opponent claimed that "sh" was a word. I think it's a diphthong, but the printed dictionary definition of "word" didn'...
- 1,445
5
votes
0
answers
209
views
Why do you write "receive" with "ei" but "retrieve" with "ie"? [duplicate]
Possible Duplicate:
Why is it true that “I before E, except after C”?
Both words are similar in pronunciation but different in spelling. Why is it that receive is written with ei but retrieve has ...
- 151
0
votes
1
answer
6k
views
/u/ and /uː/ in pronunciation
What is the regularity of appearance of /uː/ and /u/ (or /ʊ/ in RP)? How can I be most sure deducing from spelling alone, that, say, "ooze" is pronounced /uːz/ and "wool" as /wul/? I know that English ...
5
votes
1
answer
18k
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What do the letters ï and ô mean? [duplicate]
Possible Duplicate:
What is the distinction between “role” and “rôle” [with a circumflex]?
What is the significance of the “ô” character in “rôle” in this work?
What is the standard rule ...
10
votes
3
answers
73k
views
Is it "flotation" or "floatation"?
Is the difference between flotation and floatation a US/UK difference or something else?
I think I did see floatation in some physics book.
- 288
7
votes
4
answers
127k
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How do we differentiate long vowels from short vowels in English
I was finding a school for my toddler. I saw this new theory called long vowels and short vowels
The teacher talk about apple, which she read something like "eiple" and the hat, which she claims use ...
- 2,085
2
votes
2
answers
8k
views
Why does a silent "-e" at the end of a word lengthen vowels?
There's a common pattern in English spelling where "short" vowels are pronounced as "long" vowels with the addition of a silent "e" at the end of the word.
E.g.
bit → bite
mat → mate
pet → pete
Is ...
- 147
14
votes
2
answers
65k
views
Is "imbedded" a valid spelling of the word "embedded"?
I have seen this used on our marketing materials:
The technology imbedded in this solution will help improve productivity.
I was going to flag it as a spelling error, however Googling provided ...
- 331
8
votes
2
answers
12k
views
Why is it 'speaking'/'speech' instead of 'speeking'/'speech' or 'speaking'/'speach'?
Why is it speaking/speech instead of speeking/speech or speaking/speach?
- 856
13
votes
4
answers
74k
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Why doesn't "ninth" have an "e", like "ninety"?
Is it just because "ninth" has only one syllable? That wouldn't make sense, though, because saying "NINE-ith" wouldn't be worse than saying "NINE-e-tee". If we were used to "nineth", we would have ...
- 57.8k
3
votes
3
answers
4k
views
Why do "able" and "haste" have long a's?
(There are others, such as table, paste, and baste.) The rule I've heard is that a vowel is made long when succeeded by a consonant and then another vowel. Some words treat double consonants as a ...
- 57.8k
3
votes
2
answers
57k
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Are W and Y vowels? [duplicate]
Possible Duplicates:
When is “Y” a vowel?
Is the 'w' in 'cow' a vowel or a consonant?
Are W and Y vowels? I learned it depends on the conditions. But I don't know ...
- 291
15
votes
2
answers
10k
views
Why did 'y' disappear as an internal vowel in English spelling?
Why did the character 'y' disappear in favor of 'i' in English spelling? I've often noticed this replacement when merchants try to sell or advertise something as archaic or old-timey, writing wife as ...
- 22k
11
votes
3
answers
12k
views
Are there any other English syllables without vowels, besides "thm"?
As far as I knew*, all English syllables have a vowel sound and all of them are spelled accordingly, except for "thm" as in rhythm and algorithm. Are there any others? And are there any etymological ...
- 3,344
172
votes
4
answers
232k
views
What is the plural form of "zero"?
I tried looking on Google, but there are some fairly contradictory results.
I thought I'd ask you guys so we could get an authoritative answer on the subject!
- 1,841