THE PRONUNCIATION
OF VOWEL LETTERS
CONTENT:



1. Letter-To-Sound Rules 1: Single Vowel
Letters ( vowel digraphs)
2. Letter-To-Sound Rules 2: Graphic
Position of Vowel-Letters
3. Laxing Rules
1. LETTER-TO-SOUND RULES:
SINGLE VOWEL LETTERS
Why do plain-tense vowels have broken-tense and plainlax vowels broad-lax counterparts?
What do we call these rules?
Pre-R Breaking:
Pre-R Broadening:
Plain-tense vowels may not
stand before r, and are
replaced
by
their broken
counterparts in this position
Plain-lax
vowels
are
replaced by their broad
counterparts before r
PRACTICE
Place the following words into the chart.
1. bacon
2. parent
3. cat
4. start
5. previous
6. hero
7. very
8. her
9. kind
10. pirate
11. mirror
12. affirm
13. post
14. glory
15. gone
16. nor
17. music
18. during
19. punish
20. surface
2. LETTER-TO-SOUND RULES:
GRAPHIC POSITION OF VOWELLETTERS
graphic position of a vowel-letter: the
letters that follow it in spelling
 two types: free and covered

What do <V>, <C>, <#> and <SLV> refer to?


Covered position rule: “If a stressed single
vowel-letter stands in covered graphic position, it
is pronounced lax” (Covered vowels are lax)
Free position basic rule: “If a stressed single
vowel-letter stands in free graphic position, it is
pronounced tense, unless some laxing rules apply
to it.” (Free vowels are tense unless laxed by rule)
PRACTICE
Decide if the stressed vowels in the following
words are in free or covered position.
1. spot
2. bank
3. going
4. radio
5. cyclist
6. revise
7. lion
3. LAXING RULES
a. Trisyllabic Laxing Rule: if the stressed vowel is in at least
the third-last syllable of the word, it must be lax
e.g. hesitate
b. Laxing by ending
e.g. metric
solid
c. Laxing by free <u>: if it is followed by a free vowel letter
<u> in the next syllable
e.g. gradual
d. CiV laxing: there is a stressed vowel letter <i> or <y> which
is followed by a consonant letter + another vowel letter <i> +
one more vowel letter
e.g. decision
PRACTICE
Graph.pos.
Rule
Tns/Lx
value
Pre-R
Break./Broad
Trnscr.sym
bol
SOURCES
1.Baloghné Bérces Katalin, Szentgyörgyi Szilárd.
Az angol nyelv kiejtése -The Pronunciation of
English.
http://mek.oszk.hu/04900/04910/04910.pdf
2. Nádasdy, Ádám. Practice Book in English
Phonetics and Phonology. Budapest: Nemzeti
Tankönyvkiadó, 2003.
THANK YOU FOR YOUR
ATTENTION!