Hello there, dear readers. Let us continue from the previous post about phonemic letters.
Last time, we learnt about vowels and diphthongs. In this post, we are going to learn about consonants. Phonemic consonants are a bit but not much different from the Roman consonants, with addition of a few letters that produce unique sounds such as the sounds produced by letter 'c' in the word 'chariot', the letters 'th' in 'this' and 'that', and also the letter 's' in 'pleasure'.
Phonemic consonants are divided into two types: voiced and voiceless consonants.
Voiced consonants
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Voiceless consonants
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/b/ pronounced as 'b' as in 'bird'
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/p/ pronounced as 'p' as in 'pear'
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/d/ pronounced as 'd' as in 'dog'
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/t/ pronounced as 't' as in 'table'
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/v/ pronounced as 'v' as in 'volcano'
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/f/ pronounced as 'f' as in 'fish'
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/ð/ pronounced as voiced 'th' as in 'mother'
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/θ/ pronounced as voiceless 'th' as in 'thirteen'
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/g/ pronounced as 'g' as in 'girl'
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/k/ pronounced as 'k' as in 'key'
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/z/ pronounced as 'z' as in 'zebra'
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/s/ pronounced as 's' as in 'sofa'
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/ʒ/ pronounced as 'zh' as in 'television'
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/ʃ/ pronounced as 'sh' as in 'sheep'
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/dʒ/ pronounced as 'j' as in 'jar'
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/tʃ/ pronounced as 'ch' as in 'chair'
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Also included in the voiced list are these consonants:
/w/ pronounced as 'w' as in 'web'
/j/ pronounced as 'y' as in 'yacht'
/r/ pronounced as 'r' as in 'rose'
/l/ pronounced as 'l' as in 'leaf'
/m/ pronounced as 'm' as in 'monkey'
/n/ pronounced as 'n' as in 'nine'
/ŋ/ pronounced as 'ng' as in 'ring'
The voiced and voiceless pairs (shown in the table) is pronounced at the same place in the mouth.
/w/ pronounced as 'w' as in 'web'
/j/ pronounced as 'y' as in 'yacht'
/r/ pronounced as 'r' as in 'rose'
/l/ pronounced as 'l' as in 'leaf'
/m/ pronounced as 'm' as in 'monkey'
/n/ pronounced as 'n' as in 'nine'
/ŋ/ pronounced as 'ng' as in 'ring'
The voiced and voiceless pairs (shown in the table) is pronounced at the same place in the mouth.
- /g/ and /k/ are pronounced with the tip of the tongue touching the back of our mouth
- /d/ and /t/ are pronounced with the tip of the tongue touching the back of our upper front teeth
- /p/ and /b/ are pronounced with our lips closed together
- /f/ and /v/ are pronounced with our bottom lips touching the upper front teeth
- /s/ and /z/ are pronounced by opening a small gap between our front teeth and releasing some air
- /θ/ and /ð/ are pronounced by slightly biting the tip of our tongue
To determine if a consonant is either voiced or voiceless, try pronouncing the sound of the letter by its own. If your mouth vibrates, the consonant is voiced. If your mouth does not vibrate, the consonant is voiceless.
Some consonants can be used to transcribe different Roman letters, such as:
- /k/ can be used to transcribe words that start with letters 'k' (kill) or 'c' (cake)
- /s/ can be used to transcribe words that start with/have letters 's' (sin) or 'c' (city)
- /z/ can be used to transcribe words that start with/have/ends with letters 'z' (zoo), 's' (easy) 'x' (example) or 'se' (wise)
- /f/ can be used to transcribe words that start with/have/ends with letters 'f' (flower), 'gh' (laugh) or 'ph' (phobia)
- /ʃ/ can be used to transcribe words that start with/have letters 'sh' (shampoo), 'ch' (champagne), 'c' (special), 'tio' (information) or 'cia' (commercial)
- /tʃ/ can be used to transcribe words that have letters 'ch' (church), 't' (furniture), or 'tio' (question)
- /ʒ/ can be used to transcribe words that start with 's' (pleasure) or 'g' (garage)
- /dʒ/ can be used to transcribe words that start with 'j' (jar), 'g' (general) or 'dge' (judge)
- /w/ can be used to transcribe words that start with 'w' (war) or 'wh' (white)
- /n/ can be used to transcribe words that start with 'n' (now) or 'kn' (knife)
- /ŋ/ can be used to transcribe words that have/ends with letters 'ng' (bring) or 'nk' (bank)
- /m/ can be used to transcribe words that ends with 'm' (calm), 'me' (come) or 'mb' (climb)
Students often get confused between the sound /j/ and the letter 'j'. /j/ produced the sound for letter 'y' not 'j'. The sound for letter 'j' is /dʒ/.
Students may also transcribe words like 'cute', 'mute', 'tune' and 'view' as /kɪʊt/, /mɪʊt/, /tɪʊn/ and /vɪʊ/. These are considered as wrong transcriptions, as there is no diphthong letter of /ɪʊ/.
The right way to transcribe those words are by using the combination of /j/ and /u:/ sounds (/ju:/). Therefore, the right transcriptions are /kju:t/, /mju:t/, /tju:n/ and /vju:/.
By now, you have already learnt all the parts of the International Phonetic Alphabet. Here is the complete table of all the alphabets.
/ʊ/
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/u:/
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/b/
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/p/
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/ɒ/
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/ɔ:/
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/d/
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/t/
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/ɪ/
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/i:/
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/v/
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/f/
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/ə/
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/ɜ:/
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/ð/
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/θ/
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/ʌ/
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/a:/
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/g/
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/k/
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/e/
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/æ/
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/z/
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/s/
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/ʒ/
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/ʃ/
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/ɪe/
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/eɪ/
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/dʒ/
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/tʃ/
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/aɪ/
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/ɔɪ/
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/m/
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/n/
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/ʊə/
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/əʊ/
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/w/
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/j/
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/aʊ/
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/ŋ/
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/r/
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/l/
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*Blue columns: short vowels
*Red column: long vowels
*Orange columns: diphthongs
*Green columns: consonants
*Light green: voiced consonants
*Dark green: voiceless consonants
Now, you are ready to do your own transcription, which we will discuss in the next post, coming soon! Until then. :)
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