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Pronunciation respelling for English

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For the pronunciation respelling system used in Wikipedia, see Help:Pronunciation respelling key.

This article contains phonetic transcriptions in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA. For the distinction between [ ], / / and ⟨ ⟩, see IPA § Brackets and transcription delimiters.

A pronunciation respelling for English is a notation used to convey the pronunciation of words in the English language, which do not have a phonemic orthography (i.e. the spelling does not reliably indicate pronunciation).

There are two basic types of pronunciation respelling:

  • "Phonemic" systems, as commonly found in American dictionaries, consistently use one symbol per English phoneme. These systems are conceptually equivalent to the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) commonly used in bilingual dictionaries and scholarly writings but tend to use symbols based on English rather than Romance-language spelling conventions (e.g. ē for IPA /i/) and avoid non-alphabetic symbols (e.g. sh for IPA /ʃ/).
  • On the other hand, "non-phonemic"[1] or "newspaper"[2] systems, commonly used in newspapers and other non-technical writings, avoid diacritics and literally "respell" words making use of well-known English words and spelling conventions, even though the resulting system may not have a one-to-one mapping between symbols and sounds.

As an example, one pronunciation of Arkansas, transcribed /ˈɑːrkənsɔː/ in the IPA, could be respelled är′kən-sô′[3] or AR-kən-saw in a phonemic system, and arken-saw in a non-phonemic system.

Development and use

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Pronunciation respelling systems for English have been developed primarily for use in dictionaries. They are used there because it is not possible to predict with certainty the sound of a written English word from its spelling or the spelling of a spoken English word from its sound. So readers looking up an unfamiliar word in a dictionary may find, on seeing the pronunciation respelling, that the word is in fact already known to them orally. By the same token, those who hear an unfamiliar spoken word may see several possible matches in a dictionary and must rely on the pronunciation respellings to find the correct match.[4]

Traditional respelling systems for English use only the 26 ordinary letters of the Latin alphabet with diacritics, and are meant to be easy for native readers to understand. English dictionaries have used various such respelling systems to convey phonemic representations of the spoken word since Samuel Johnson published his Dictionary of the English Language in 1755, the earliest being devised by James Buchanan us be featured in his 1757 dictionary Linguæ Britannicæ Vera Pronunciatio,[5] although most words therein were not respelled but given diacritics;[6] since the language described by Buchanan was that of Scotland, William Kenrick responded in 1773 with A New Dictionary of the English Language, wherein the pronunciation of Southern England was covered and numbers rather than diacritics used to represent vowel sounds;[7] Thomas Sheridan devised a simpler scheme, which he employed in his successful 1780 General Dictionary of the English Language, a much larger work consisting of two volumes;[8][9] in 1791 John Walker produced A Critical Pronouncing Dictionary, which achieved a great reputation and ran into some forty editions.[10][11] Today, such systems remain in use in American dictionaries for native English speakers,[12] but they have been replaced by the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) in linguistics references and many bilingual dictionaries published outside the United States.[13]

The pronunciation which dictionaries refer to is some chosen "normal" one, thereby excluding other regional accents or dialect pronunciation. In England this standard is normally the Received Pronunciation, based upon the educated speech of southern England. The standard for American English is known as General American (GA).

Sophisticated phonetic systems have been developed, such as James Murray's scheme for the original Oxford English Dictionary, and the IPA, which replaced it in later editions and has been adopted by many British and international dictionaries. The IPA system is not a respelling system, because it uses symbols not in the English alphabet, such as ð and θ. Most current British dictionaries[14] use IPA for this purpose.

Traditional respelling systems

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The following chart matches the IPA symbols used to represent the sounds of the English language with the phonetic symbols used in several dictionaries, a majority of which transcribe American English.

These works adhere (for the most part) to the one-symbol-per-sound principle. Other works not included here, such as Webster's New Twentieth Century Dictionary of the English Language (unabridged, 2nd ed.), do not adhere and thus have several different symbols for the same sound (partly to allow for different phonemic mergers and splits).

The full titles of abbreviated column headings in the following table are viewable in interactive media (as opposed to hard copy), using the pointer. To see the full titles, hover over the abbreviations. On touchscreens, a long press and cancel may show them.

Consonants
IPA K&K APA NOAD AHD RHD WBO MECD DPL DPN TBD NBC MWCD OED COD[a] POD Cham CPD SD BLD AB Dictcom BBC Google Mac Wikipedia Examples
tʃ tʃ č ᴄʜ ch c͜h ch ch c̷h ch ch ch ch ch, tch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch ch, tch ch ch ch, tch church
ɡ[b] g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g, gh game
h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h h hh h h h h h hat
hw[c] hw hw (h)w hw hw hw hw hw hw hw   hw (h)w w hw hw wh which
dʒ dʒ ǯ j j j j j j j j j j j j j j j j j jh j j j j j judge
k k k k k k k k k k k k k k, ck k k k k k k k k k k k k kick
x x x ᴋʜ ᴋʜ ᴋ͜ʜ kh ʜ ḵ kh (χ) k͟h hh xh ᴋʜ kh kh loch (Scottish and Irish)
Buch (German)
ŋ ŋ ŋ ɴɢ ng n͡g ng ng ŋ ng ng ng ŋ ng ng ng ng ng ng ng ng ng ng
(ng-g, nk)		 ng ng ng thing
s s s s s s s s s s s s s s, ss s s s s s s s s s s s s, ss sauce
ʃ ʃ š ꜱʜ sh s͜h sh sh s̷h sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh ship
θ θ θ ᴛʜ th t͜h th th t̷h th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th thin
ð ð ð ᴛ͟ʜ 𝑡ℎ ᵺ th t͟h 𝑡̷h ᵺ T̶H th꞉ t͟h dh dh t͟h dh dh TH t͟h dh 𝑡ℎ dh dh dh this
j j y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y yes
ʒ ʒ ž ᴢʜ zh z͜h zh z͟h z̷h zh zh zh zh zh zh z͟h zh zh zh zh zh zh zh zh zh zh vision
The following letters have the same values in all systems listed: b, d, f, l, m, n, p, r[d], t, v, w, z.
Vowels
IPA K&K APA NOAD AHD RHD WBO MECD DPL DPN TBD NBC MWCD OED COD[a] POD Cham CPD SD BLD AB Dictcom BBC Google
AmE, BrE 		Mac Wikipedia Examples
æ æ æ a ă a a a a a a a a a ă a a a a a ae a a (arr) a a a (arr) cat
eɪ e e(y) ā ā ā ay ay ā ay ā ay ā ay ā ay ā eh ay, a_e ay ey ey ay ei ay ay day
ɛər ɛr εr e(ə)r âr âr air air – – âr air er air ār air ār, er[e] air air air eh r air air ehr, euh air air hair
ɑː ɑ a ä ä ä ah aa ä aw, o ä ah ä, ȧ ah ah aa ä ah ah ah aa ah aa aa ah ah father
ɑːr ɑr ar är är är ahr aar är – är ahr är ar a͡r aar är ar ahr aa r ahr ar aar, aa ar arm
ɛ ɛ ε e ĕ e eh e e ɛ e e e e ě e e e e e eh e e (err) e/eh e e (err) let
iː i i(y) ē ē ē ee ee ē ē ē ee ē ee ē ee ē ee ee ee iy ee ee ee ee ee see
ɪər ɪr ιr i(ə)r îr ēr ihr eer ir ier ir eer ēr eer ēr ihr eer iy r eer eer eer, eeuh ear eer here
ɪ ɪ ɪ i ĭ i ih i i i i i i i ǐ i i i i i ih i i (irr) i i i (irr) pit
aɪ aɪ ay ī ī ī y ī ī y ī igh ī igh ī ī ī ai eye, i_e, ye ɪ ay ahy igh, y ai uy y, eye[f] by
ɒ ɑ a ä ŏ o o o ä o o ah ä o ǒ o o o o o aa o o (orr) aa, o o o (orr) pot
oʊ o o(w) ō ō ō oh ō ō ō ō oh ō oh ō ō ō oh oh, o_e oh ow oh oh ow oh oh no
ɔː ɔ ɔ ô ô ô aw aw ô aw, o ô aw ȯ aw aw aw ö aw aw aw ao aw aw aa, aw aw aw caught
ɔːr ɔr ɔr ôr ôr ôr awr ȯr or ör or or ao r awr or or, aw or north
or o(w)r ōr, ör[g] awr, ohr force
ɔɪ ɔɪ ɔy oi oi oi oy oy oi oy oi oi ȯi oy oi oy oi oy oi oy oy oi oy oy oy oy noise
ʊ ᴜ ᴜ o͝o o͝o o͝o u o͝o oo u u̇ oo u̇ uu o͝o o͝o ŭ[h] uu u uu uh 𝑜𝑜 uu u oo uu took
ʊər ᴜr ᴜr o͝or o͝or o͝or ur oor u̇r oor u̇r oor oor oor oor oor uh r 𝑜𝑜r oor oor, uor oouh oor tour
uː u u(w) o͞o o͞o o͞o oo oo o͞o ū ü oo꞉ ü oo o͞o o͞o oo[h] oo oo oo uw oo oo oo ooh oo soon
aʊ aᴜ aw ou ou ou ow ow ou ow ou ow au̇ ow ow ow ow ow ou ow aw ou ow aw ow ow out
ʌ ʌ ʌ ə ŭ u uh u u ꭒ u uh ə u ǔ u u u uh ə ah uh u uh u u cut
ɜːr ɜr ər ər ûr ûr ur ur ʉr er ėr er ər ur e͡r ər ûr ur ur ər er ur ur ur, uh er ur word
ə ə ə ə ə ə uh ə ə e ə uh ə uh 𝑎, 𝑒, 𝑖, 𝑜, 𝑢 ə ə uh uh ə ah 𝑢ℎ uh uh uh ə about
ər ɚ ər ər ər ər uhr ər ər er ər er ər ur er ər ər ur ər er er uhr r, uh ər butter
juː ju yu yo͞o yo͞o yo͞o yoo yoo yo͞o yū yü yoo꞉ yü yoo ū yo͞o ū yoo yoo y uw yoo yoo yoo yooh ew view
Stress
IPA K&K APA NOAD AHD RHD WBO MECD DPL DPN TBD NBC MWCD[i] OED COD[a] POD Cham CPD SD BLD AB Dictcom BBC Google Mac Wikipedia Examples
ˈa ˈa á ˈa a′ a′ á a′ a′ a′ A ˈa A a· á a' a a a 1 a A a (')a A primary stress
ˌa ˌa à ˌa a′ a′ a′ a a′
 a ˌa a (a·) a a a 2 a a a .a secondary stress
a a a a a a a 0 a[j] a a tertiary stress

Title abbreviations

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Notes

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  1. ^ a b c Older editions of the Concise Oxford Dictionary used a mix of two systems: the "phonetic scheme" shown in the table above and a system "without respelling". The latter added diacritics to conventional spellings.
  2. ^ In IPA, an "opentail G" (ɡ / ) was historically preferred to a "looptail G" (g / ), although now either variant is acceptable.
  3. ^ May be analysed differently, see voiceless labial–velar fricative
  4. ^ The more precise IPA symbol ⟨ɹ⟩ is sometimes used for English /r/.
  5. ^ "er" is pronounced /ɛə(r)/ before consonants but /ɛr/ before vowels
  6. ^ Spelled eye as a syllable of its own; with a consonant, it is spelled y: iodine EYE-ə-dyne; item EYE-təm; pipe PYPE.
  7. ^ A pronunciation with the north vowel (ör) is always listed for words belonging to the force lexical set, but the distinct force vowel (ōr) is not always given as an alternative for words traditionally included in this group. For example, "ore", "worn", "ford", and "story" can be pronounced either way, but "hoar", "borne", "afford", and "glory" are sounded only with the north vowel; "born" and "borne" are thus invariably homophonous, unlike "or" and "ore", between which a distinction may be drawn. However, in older editions of the dictionary, the presence of the force vowel largely coincided with Wells's corresponding lexical set.[15]
  8. ^ a b Older editions of The Chambers Dictionary used o͝o for ŭ and o͞o for oo.
  9. ^ Older editions of the MWCD and other Webster's dictionaries used the system later followed by the American Heritage Dictionary, with primary stress indicated by a′ and secondary by a′ (sometimes rendered as a" and a').[16][17]
  10. ^ For tertiary stress, not only are the letters italicized, but they are in a different font, also. Secondary/tertiary stress is only marked when judged to be unpredictable, but is not distinguished from primary stress when it is marked.

Pronunciation without respelling

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Some dictionaries indicate hyphenation and syllabic stress in the headword. A few have even used diacritics to show pronunciation "without respelling" in the headwords.

The Concise Oxford Dictionary, 1st through 4th edition, used a mix of two systems.[18] Some editions of Webster's Unabridged Dictionary have offered a method for teachers to indicate pronunciation without respelling as a supplement to the respelling scheme used in the dictionary. Pronunciation without respelling is also sometimes used in texts with many unusual words, such as Bibles,[19][20][21] when it is desirable to show the received pronunciation. These will often be more exhaustive than dictionary respelling keys because all possible digraphs or readings need to have a unique spelling.

Concise Oxford Dictionary's system without respelling
COD variant IPA
ph /f/
kn (initial) /n/
wr (initial) /r/
g, dg /dʒ/ (before e, i, y)
/ɡ/ otherwise
(hard and soft g)
c /s/ (before e, i, y)
/k/ otherwise
(hard and soft c)
ai, ay /eɪ/
air /ɛər/
ae, ea, ee, ie /iː/
ė, ie (final), ey /ɪ/
ear, eer, ier /ɪər/
aw /ɔː/
oy /ɔɪ/
ou /aʊ/
i͡r, u͡r /ɜr/
eu, ew /juː/
Henry Adeney Redpath's table of signs in the King James Bible[20][21][22]
Symbol Original gloss Approximate IPA equivalent*
- syllable boundary (always added;
original hyphens become –)		 /./
-́ syllable boundary after stress* /ˈ/ or /ˌ/ before syll.
ä ah, arm, father /ɑː/
ă abet, hat, dilemma /æ, ə‡/
ā tame /eɪ/
â fare /ɛə†/
ạ call /ɔː/
ĕ met, her, second /ɛ, ɜ†, ə‡/
ē mete /iː/
ë a in tame /eɪ/
ī fine /aɪ/
ĭ him, fir, plentiful /ɪ, ɜ†, i‡, ə‡/
î machine /iː/
ị peculiar /j/
ō alone /oʊ/
ŏ on, protect /ɒ, ə‡/
ô nor /ɔː/
o̱ son /ʌ, ə‡/
ū tune /juː/
û rude /uː/
ŭ us /ʌ, ə‡/
u̇ turner /ɜ†/
ȳ lyre /aɪ/
y̆ typical, fully /ɪ, i‡/
a͞a a of am /æ/
a͡a a of fare /ɛə/
ǣ, a͞e mediæval /iː/
a͡i aisle /aɪ/
a͟i hail /eɪ/
a͞o o of alone /oʊ/
a͡u maul /ɔː/
e͡e heed /iː/
e͡i i of fine /aɪ/
e͡u neuter /juː/
e͡w lewd /juː/
o͡i oil /ɔɪ/
c̣ celestial /s/
c͟h character /k/
c͞i delicious /ʃ/
ġ giant /dʒ/
ṡ his /z/
s͞i adhesion /ʒ/
T͞h Thomas /t/
t͞i attraction /ʃ/

* IPA symbols interpreted by Wikipedia.
† This reading or symbol is only obtained or used before "r".
‡ This reading is only obtained in unstressed syllables.

International Phonetic Alphabet

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The International Phonetic Alphabet is a standardized method of phonetic transcription developed by a group of English and French language teachers in 1888. In the beginning, only specialized pronunciation dictionaries for linguists used it, for example, the English Pronouncing Dictionary edited by Daniel Jones (EPD, 1917). The IPA, used by English teachers as well, started to appear in popular dictionaries for learners of English as a foreign language such as the Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary (1948) and Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English (1978).

IPA is very flexible and allows for a wide variety of transcriptions between broad phonemic transcriptions which describe the significant units of meaning in language and phonetic transcriptions which may indicate every nuance of sound in detail.

The IPA transcription conventions used in the first twelve editions of the EPD was relatively simple, using a quantitative system indicating vowel length using a colon, and requiring the reader to infer other vowel qualities. Many phoneticians preferred a qualitative system, which used different symbols to indicate vowel timbre and colour. A. C. Gimson introduced a quantitative-qualitative IPA notation system when he took over editorship of the EPD (13th edition, 1967); and by the 1990s, the Gimson system had become the de facto standard for phonetic notation of British Received Pronunciation (RP).

Short and long vowels in various IPA schemes for RP
word quant. qual. Gimson
rid rid rɪd rɪd
reed riːd rid riːd
cod kɔd kɒd kɒd
cord kɔːd kɔd kɔːd

The first native (not learner's) English dictionary using IPA may have been the Collins English Dictionary (1979), and others followed suit. The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd edition (OED2, 1989) used IPA, transcribed letter-for-letter from entries in the first edition, which had been noted in a scheme by the original editor, James Murray.

While IPA has not been adopted by popular dictionaries in the United States,[citation needed] there is a demand for learner's dictionaries which provide both British and American English pronunciation. Some dictionaries, such as the Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary and the Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English provide a separate transcription for each.

British and American English dialects have a similar set of phonemes, but some are pronounced differently; in technical parlance, they consist of different phones. Although developed for RP, the Gimson system being phonemic, it is not far from much of General American pronunciation as well. A number of recent dictionaries, such as the Collins COBUILD Advanced Learner's English Dictionary, add a few non-phonemic symbols /ʳ i u ᵊl ᵊn/ to represent both RP and General American pronunciation in a single IPA transcription.

Adaptations of the Gimson system for American English
/ɒ/ Pronounced [ɑː] in General American.
/e/ In American English falls between [e] and [æ] (sometimes transcribed /ɛ/)
/əu/ This traditional transcription is probably more accurately replaced by /ou/ in American English.
/r/ Regular r is always pronounced
/ʳ/ Superscript r is only pronounced in rhotic dialects, such as General American, or when followed by a vowel (for example adding a suffix to change dear into dearest)
/i/ Medium i can be pronounced [ɪ] or [iː], depending on the dialect
/ɔː/ Many Americans pronounce /ɔː/ the same as /ɒ/ ([ɑː])
/ᵊl/ Syllabic l, sometimes transcribed /l/ or /əl/
/ᵊn/ Syllabic n, sometimes transcribed /n/ or /ən/

Clive Upton updated the Gimson scheme, changing the symbols used for five vowels. He served as pronunciation consultant for the influential Concise Oxford English Dictionary, which adopted this scheme in its ninth edition (1995). Upton's reform is controversial: it reflects changing pronunciation, but critics say it represents a narrower regional accent, and abandons parallelism with American and Australian English. In addition, the phonetician John C. Wells said that he could not understand why Upton had altered the presentation of price to prʌɪs.[23]

Upton outlined his reasons for the transcription in a chapter of A Handbook of Varieties of English. He said that the PRICE-vowel represented how the starting point could be anything from centralised front to centralised back.[24] The change in the NURSE vowel was intended as a simplification as well as a reflection that nɜːs was not the only possible realisation in RP.[25] The other alterations were intended to reflect changes that have occurred over time.

Upton's reform
word Gimson Upton
bet bet bɛt
bat bæt bat
nurse nɜːs nəːs
square skweə skwɛː
price praɪs prʌɪs

The in-progress 3rd edition of the Oxford English Dictionary uses Upton's scheme for representing British pronunciations. For American pronunciations it uses an IPA-based scheme devised by William Kretzschmar of the University of Georgia.

Comparison

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Comparison of the IPA variants for English
Lexical sets RP GA
Jones
(1909, 1917)[26][27] 		Gimson
(1962, 1967)[28][29] 		Upton
(1995)[30] 		Kenyon&Knott
(1944)[31] 		Roach et al.
(1997)[32]
FLEECE iː iː iː i iː
KIT i ɪ ɪ ɪ ɪ
DRESS e e ɛ ɛ e
TRAP æ æ a æ æ
START ɑː ɑː ɑː ɑr~ɑː[i] ɑːr
PALM ɑː ɑː ɑː ɑ ɑː
LOT ɔ ɒ ɒ ɑ~ɒ[i] ɑː
THOUGHT ɔː ɔː ɔː ɔ ɔː
NORTH ɔː ɔː ɔː ɔr~ɔə[i] ɔːr
FOOT u ʊ ʊ ᴜ ʊ
GOOSE uː uː uː u uː
STRUT ʌ ʌ ʌ ʌ ʌ
NURSE əː ɜː əː ɝ~ɜ[i] ɝː
LETTER ə ə ə ɚ~ə[i] ɚ
COMMA ə ə ə ə ə
FACE ei eɪ eɪ e eɪ
GOAT ou əʊ əʊ o oʊ
PRICE ai aɪ ʌɪ aɪ aɪ
MOUTH au~ɑu[ii] aʊ aʊ aᴜ aʊ
CHOICE ɔi ɔɪ ɔɪ ɔɪ ɔɪ
NEAR iə ɪə ɪə ɪr~ɪə[i] ɪr
SQUARE ɛə eə ɛː ɛr~ɛə[i] er
CURE uə ʊə ʊə ᴜr~ᴜə[i] ʊr
Notes
  1. ^ a b c d e f g h Kenyon & Knott provided alternative variants for Eastern and Southern pronunciation: /ɑː ɒ ɔə ɜ ə ɪə ɛə ᴜə/ for general /ɑr ɑ ɔr ɝ ɚ ɪr ɛr ᴜr/, respectively.[31]
  2. ^ In his earlier works, Jones used /ɑu/ for this diphthong.[26]

Dictionaries for English-language learners

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For many English language learners, particularly learners without easy Internet access, dictionary pronunciation respelling are the only source of pronunciation information for most new words. Which respelling systems are best for such learners has been a matter of debate.

In countries where the local languages are written in non-Latin, phonemic orthographies, various other respelling systems have been used. In India, for example, many English bilingual dictionaries provide pronunciation respellings in the local orthography. This is the case for several Indian languages, including Hindi, Urdu, Malayalam, and Tamil. To reduce the potential distortions of bilingual phonemic transcription, some dictionaries add English letters to the local-script respellings to represent sounds not specified in the local script. For example, in English-Tamil dictionaries, the sounds /b/ and /z/ need to be specified, as in this respelling of busy: "bபிzஸி".[33]

Because these respellings primarily use symbols already known to anyone with minimal literacy in the local language, they are more practical to use in such contexts than the IPA or the Latin respelling systems with diacritics. Another advantage of local-script respellings for English learners is that they retain the "flavour" of local English speech, allowing learners to make connections between their spoken and written English experiences. However, these systems also have limitations. One limitation is that they do not illuminate the English writing system. Like the IPA, they represent phonemes differently from the ways in which the phonemes are normally spelled. So these notations do not guide readers to infer the regularities of English spelling. Also, the practicality of these systems for learning English locally may be offset by difficulties in communication with people used to different norms such as General American or Received Pronunciation.

Children's dictionaries

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Most beginner dictionaries are picture dictionaries, or word books. For preliterate native speakers of a language, the pictures in these dictionaries both define the entry words and are the "keys" to their pronunciation. Respellings for English begin to appear in dictionaries for novice readers. Generally, US-based dictionaries contain pronunciation information for all headwords, while UK-based dictionaries provide pronunciation information only for unusual (e.g., ache) or ambiguously spelled (e.g., bow) words.[34][clarification needed]

As the normal age of literacy acquisition varies among languages, so do the age-range designations of children's books. Generally, age ranges for young children's books in English lag behind those of languages with phonemic orthographies by about a year. This corresponds to the slow pace of literacy acquisition among English speakers as compared to speakers of languages with phonemic orthographies, such as Italian.[35] Italian children are expected to learn to read within the first year of elementary school, whereas English-speaking children are expected to read by the end of third grade. Pronunciation respellings begin to appear in dictionaries for children in third grade and up.

There seems to be very little research on which respelling systems are most useful for children, apart from two small studies done in the 1980s and 1990s. Both studies were limited to traditional respelling systems without diacritics (setting aside both the IPA and the Webster-based systems used in American dictionaries). Both studies found that in such systems, word respellings may be cumbersome and ambiguous, as in this respelling of psychology: "suy-kol-uh-jee".

The authors of the two studies proposed alternative systems, though there were no follow-up studies. Yule's "cut system" leaves out extra letters, adds specific spellings for sounds with variable spellings, and adds accents to show long vowels, as in this respelling of occasion: o-cà-zhon.[36] Fraser advocated a "non-phonemic" approach using a small set of common spelling patterns in which words would be respelled chunk by chunk, rather than phoneme by phoneme, as in this respelling of persiflage (IPA: /ˈpərsɪˌflɑʒ/): per-sif-large.[37] According to both authors, the reduced vowel (schwa) does not need to be shown in a respelling so long as syllabification and syllable stress are shown.

The following overlapping issues concerning pronunciation respelling in children's dictionaries were directly raised by Yule and Fraser: the level of difficulty, the type of notation, the degree of divergence from regular spelling, and pronunciation norms. Yule also raised the question of the types of impact respelling systems could have on children's literacy acquisition. These issues could be usefully addressed in studies that include American respelling systems as well as the IPA.

An issue that has arisen since the Yule and Fraser studies concerns the utility of pronunciation respellings given the availability of audio pronunciations in online dictionaries. Currently, the advantage of written respellings is that they may be read phoneme by phoneme, in parallel to the way novice readers are taught to "stretch out" words to hear all the sounds they contain, while the audio pronunciations are given only as whole words spoken in real time. When audio pronunciations are made flexible, it will become possible to study and compare the utility of different combinations of pronunciation features in the online children's dictionaries.

Other uses

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Anglophone press agencies, such as the Voice of America, periodically release lists of respelled given names of internationally relevant people, in order to help news TV and radio announcers and spokespersons to pronounce them as closely as possible to their original languages.

See also

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References

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  1. ^ Fraser 1997, p. 182
  2. ^ Landau 2001, p. 121
  3. ^ "Arkansas". The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (5th ed.). HarperCollins.
  4. ^ Merriam-Webster Online n.d.
  5. ^ "dictionary | Definition, History, Types, & Facts | Britannica". www.britannica.com. Retrieved 2021-12-31.
  6. ^ Buchanan, James (1757). Linguæ Britannicæ Vera Pronunciatio : Or, a New English Dictionary. Containing I. An Explanation of All English Words Used by the Best Writers;...II. The Language from which Each Word is Derived. III. The Part of Speech to which it Belongs. IV. A Supplement of Upwards of 4000 Proper Names.In which Every Words Has Not Only the Common Accent to Denote the Emphasis of the Voice, But, ... by James Buchanan. A. Millar.
  7. ^ KENRICK (LL.D.), William (1773). A new Dictionary of the English Language. ... To which is prefixed a Rhetorical Grammar.
  8. ^ Sheridan, Thomas (1780). A general dictionary of the English language. : One main object of which, is, to establish a plain and permanent standard pronunciation. : To which is prefixed a rhetorical grammar. University of California Libraries. London : Printed for J. Dodsley ... C. Dilly ... and J. Wilkie ...
  9. ^ Sheridan, Thomas (1789). A complete dictionary of the English language, : both with regard to sound and meaning. One main object of which is, to establish a plain and permanent standard of pronunciation. To which is prefixed a prosodial grammar. National Library of Scotland. London: : Printed for Charles Dilly, in the Poultry.
  10. ^ Walker, John (1791). A critical pronouncing dictionary and expositor of the English language ... To which are prefixed, principles of English pronunciation ... Likewise rules to be observed by the natives of Scotland, Ireland, and London, for avoiding their respective peculiarities; and directions to foreigners for acquiring a knowledge of the use of this dictionary. The whole interspersed with observations, philological, critical, and grammatical. New York Public Library. London, G.G.J. and J. Robinson.
  11. ^ Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Walker, John" . Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 28 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 272.
  12. ^ Landau 2001, p. 118
  13. ^ Landau 2001, pp. 119–21
  14. ^ Such as The Oxford BBC Guide to Pronunciation Mind your language Archived 2008-07-09 at the Wayback Machine, by Dot Wordsworth, in The Spectator, November 7, 2007.
  15. ^ MacDonald, A. M. (1960). Chambers Twentieth Century Dictionary. Allied Publishers Private, Calcutta.
  16. ^ Webster, Noah (1898). Webster's Collegiate Dictionary: A Dictionary of the English Language : Giving the Derivations, Pronunciations, Definitions and Synonyms of a Large Vocabulary of the Words Occurring in Literature, Art, Science, and the Common Speech. G. & C. Merriam.
  17. ^ Porter, Noah (1913). Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary. C. & G. Merriam Co.
  18. ^ Fowler, H. W.; Fowler, F. G., eds. (1911). The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Current English (1st ed.). Oxford: Clarendon Press.
  19. ^ The self-pronouncing New Testament of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Philadelphia: A. J. Holman & Co. 1895.
  20. ^ a b The Oxford self-pronouncing Bible; the Holy Bible containing the Old and New Testaments. New York & London: Oxford University Press. 1897.
  21. ^ a b The Oxford self-pronouncing Testament; the New Testament... New York & London: Oxford University Press. 1900.
  22. ^ The Holy Bible: Authorized King James Version. Collins' Clear-Type Press. 1959.
  23. ^ "IPA transcription systems for English".
  24. ^ Upton 2004, p. 225
  25. ^ Upton 2004, p. 224
  26. ^ a b Jones, Daniel (1909). The Pronunciation of English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. p. XIV-XV.
  27. ^ Jones, Daniel (1917). An English Pronouncing Dictionary. J. M. Dent & Sons Ltd. p. XXV. ISBN 9780415233392.
  28. ^ Gimson, A. C. (1962). An introduction to the pronunciation of English (1 ed.).
  29. ^ Crystal, David (1995). The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English language. Cambridge University Press. p. 237. ISBN 9780521401791.
  30. ^ Concise Oxford English Dictionary (10 ed.). Oxford University Press. 1995. ISBN 9780199601110.
  31. ^ a b Kenyon, John S.; Knott, Thomas A. (1944). A Pronouncing Dictionary of American English. Springfield, MA: G.& C. Merriam Co.
  32. ^ Jones, Daniel (1997). Roach, Peter; Hartman, James; Setter, Jane (eds.). English Pronouncing Dictionary. Cambridge University press.
  33. ^ Students' Deluxe Dictionary n.d.
  34. ^ Oxford Junior Illustrated Dictionary
  35. ^ Seymour 2003
  36. ^ Yule 1991
  37. ^ Fraser 1996

Sources

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