Category Archives: Pronunciation

In my last post I talked about the magic E (the E at the end of a word that magically transforms the previous vowel sound) and gave some examples of words with magic Es as well as some words that look like they have a magic E but don’t. However, all the words I gave you (with or without a magic E) had one thing in common: the E was silent.

In other words, when you see a word like opposite or machine or advice or palace, you never actually say the E at the end. Well, that’s true over 99% of the time, but English being English, there are exceptions. Occasionally we do pronounce the final E.

Probably the most common exception is recipe, pronounced with three syllables:
/ˈresɪpi/

A recipe is the set of instructions that you follow when you want to cook something. Sometimes we use recipe to talk about a method for reaching a certain outcome, good or bad, as in “a recipe for success” or “a recipe for disaster”. Note that we don’t use recipe to mean the piece of paper the doctor gives you that allows you to get medicine; we call that a prescription.

Here are some more exceptions. The first two are brand names:

Nike
/ˈnaɪki/
I always want to say this to rhyme with like and bike but that’s not how you say it. The sportswear company took its name from Nike, the Greek goddess of victory.

Adobe
/əˈdəʊbi/
This is the name of a software company. The word adobe, which we borrowed from Spanish but has Arabic origins, also means a kind of sun-dried brick used as a building material.

anemone
/əˈneməni/
A lot of native speakers have difficulty saying this word! It’s a type of plant with small, pretty flowers. If you’re lucky enough to live by the sea, you might also see a sea anemone. This word has Greek origins.

epitome
/ɪˈpɪtəmi/
This isn’t an especially common word, but you’ll hear it from time to time. It’s yet another word that we borrowed from Greek, and it means the perfect example of something. I could say that my apartment is the epitome of luxury, though of course I’d be lying.

hyperbole
/haɪˈpɜːbəli/
This is another Greek-derived word, and it means an exaggeration. If I said “I’ve seen this film thousands of times”, that would be an example of hyperbole.

coyote
/kaɪˈəʊti/
I’ve never seen one of these, except in cartoons, so this isn’t a word I often need to use. Coyotes are common in America and are a bit like dogs.

antipodes
/ænˈtɪpədiːz/
People from the UK sometimes use Antipodes to talk about Australia and New Zealand, but the word really refers to opposite points on the earth’s surface.

Hades
/ˈheɪdiːz/
Hades is the Greek god of the underworld.

There are also words we’ve borrowed from French where the final E is pronounced, such as café (/ˈkæfeɪ/), cliché (/ˈkliːʃeɪ/) and résumé (/ˈrezuːmeɪ/). All these words should really be spelt with acute accents (é) but some people are lazy and leave them off. A résumé (with the accents) means a summary. When applying for a job in America, you’ll usually have to include a résumé; in Britain we call this a CV, which stands for “curriculum vitae”. Note that resume (without the accents) is a completely different word; it’s a verb, meaning to continue after an interruption. Resume is pronounced /rɪˈzjuːm/, with a magic E!

Update (3rd April 2018):
One of my students recently suggested I add karate to this list, so here goes:

karate
/kəˈrɑːti/

It’s E of course! E is everywhere. It’s the most common letter in the English language. However, not all Es are created equal. Some are special and are known as magic Es. The magic E is usually found at the end of a word. It makes no sound, but it changes the previous vowel sound from a short one to a long one, just like magic! Here are a few short words that are magically transformed by the letter E:

mat -> mate
/mæt/ -> /meɪt/

pet -> Pete
/pet/ -> /piːt/

pip -> pipe
/pɪp/ -> /paɪp/

cod -> code
/kɒd/ -> /kəʊd/

cub -> cube
/kʌb/ -> /kjuːb/

Note that a C or G changes from a hard sound to a soft sound when we add a magic E:

Mac -> mace
/mæk/ -> /meɪs/

rag -> rage
/ræg/ -> /reɪdʒ/

Some longer words also have a magic E at the end:

decorate
/ˈdekəreɪt/

compete
/kəmˈpiːt/

decline
/dɪˈklaɪn/

episode
/ˈepɪsəʊd/

absolute
/æbsəˈluːt/

So far, so good. By now you might be wondering why I’ve put all those funny symbols underneath each word. They’re IPA symbols. IPA stands for International Phonetic Alphabet, where each symbol represents a single sound. Because English spelling is weird – we don’t always write what we say or say what we write – knowing the IPA is extremely useful. I will talk about the IPA more in a later post.

There’s nothing particularly complicated about the magic E, but sometimes the magic just doesn’t work! In some words the E changes the vowel sound into something different to what you’d expect, and other times the E does nothing at all. Now you can hear me say twenty of the many longer words where the final E loses its magic touch:

determine
/dɪˈtɜːmɪn/

examine
/ɪgˈzæmɪn/

machine
/məˈʃiːn/

magazine
/mægəˈziːn/

purchase
/ˈpɜːtʃəs/

purpose
/ˈpɜːpəs/

promise
/ˈprɒmɪs/

opposite
/ˈɒpəzɪt/

ultimate
/ˈʌltɪmət/

delicate
/ˈdelɪkət/

effective
/ɪˈfektɪv/

negative
/ˈnegətɪv/

Except in very rare cases, words ending in V are not allowed in English. They’re prohibited, forbidden, banned. To avoid a final V, we stick an E on the end. That’s why there are lots of words ending in -ve (especially -ive) where the E isn’t magic.

service
/ˈsɜːvɪs/

police
/pəˈliːs/

lettuce
/ˈletɪs/

palace
/ˈpælɪs/

The word surface is similar (/ˈsɜːfɪs/). Don’t say face!

sausage
/ˈsɒsɪdʒ/

shortage
/ˈʃɔːtɪdʒ/

Lots of other words ending in -age also have the /-ɪdʒ/ pronunciation.

college
/ˈkɒlɪdʒ/

minute (time)
/ˈmɪnɪt/

Note that minute has two definitions. As well as “60 seconds”, minute can describe something very small:
“He lives in a minute apartment in the middle of Paris.”

When we use minute to mean “very small”, it has a very different pronunciation, with a magic E:

minute (tiny)
/maɪˈnjuːt/

Unfortunately English pronunciation is irregular and there are no easy rules; you just have to practise. The more you speak and listen to English, the faster your pronunciation will improve!

Oh, and one final one that just crossed my mind:

Europe
/ˈjʊərəp/

Back in April I wrote a post on how to say days of the month, such as 20th and 30th. In today’s short post I’ll talk about the days of the week.

I’m sure you know the words for days of the week in English, but I’ll write them down here just in case:

Monday
Tuesday
Wednesday
Thursday
Friday
Saturday
Sunday

And this is me saying them:

Simple, right? Well sort of. A lot of English learners confuse Tuesday and Thursday, both in writing and in speaking. I even saw a sign on a shop that said it was closed early on Thuesday. I wish I’d taken a photo. Perhaps they meant both Tuesday and Thursday! As well as having different spellings, Tuesday and Thursday are pronounced quite differently. In British English (which I speak), the sound at the beginning of Tuesday is similar to the ch in chop or change; Americans say Tuesday with a simple t sound at the beginning. Thursday, however, starts with that difficult th sound, as in the words thick and thin. The vowel sounds in the two words are also different: Tues is like blues; Thurs is like hers.

Here I say just Tuesday and Thursday. It’s important that you make the difference:

Wednesday can also be a difficult day. The spelling is a little crazy. Most English speakers don’t pronounce the first d at all; we say the word as if it was written Wensday:

Finally, Monday, the day that we all hate. Don’t be fooled by the o. The first vowel sound in Monday is exactly the same as in the one in Sunday: the two words rhyme (cue a slightly cheesy hit from the eighties). Here I say Sunday and Monday:

Enjoy your day, whatever day it is!

Just a few doors down from me is a shop that sells kids’ stuff, toys mostly. It used to sell food. One day I saw these strange SAIL signs in the window. SAIL? This is Timișoara. We’re a ten-hour drive from the sea here. Nobody is going anywhere in a sailing boat.

Then the next day I walked past again, and SAIL had magically become SALE. Somebody had probably told them to change the signs. No, it wasn’t me.

SAIL and SALE are what are known as homophones, two words that are spelt differently but sound exactly the same. There are loads of homophones in English. Another pair of homophones are HEAR and HERE. Sometimes you’ll even get three words that sound the same, like THEIR, THERE and THEY’RE, which even native speakers mix up from time to time.

Here are a few sentences where I’ve used the wrong homophones. All the words in bold should be a different word that is pronounced the same. See if you can correct these sentences:

1. Are wee going the write weigh on this rode?
2. Learning to reed English is a reel waist of thyme.
3. The home teem one by too goals to won.
4. It reigned all threw the knight.
5. My sun kneads to cell his base guitar.
6. I maid it to London in fore ours.
7. The Prince of whales is the air to the thrown.

Good luck!