Pronunciation

Pronunciation can give new learners headaches. English has sounds not present in other languages and to add to the difficulty, there are differences in dialects even within the same country. To get an idea of how different it can be, visit the Speech Accent Archive and IDEA (International Dialects of English Archive). Both have a large sample of English speaker's accents from around the world. The former includes both native and non-native English speakers and the latter includes native speakers only.

The following tabbed list contains summaries and/or definitions of pronunciation terms. For those interested in more in-depth information on the subject, see the provided links.

  • The first three contain charts for English pronunciations (based on dialect).

  • The next two are articles on how a person's native language influences learning and pronouncing English.

  • The next four define the standard dialects/pronunciations of English with pointers to complete articles.

  • The last one contains pointers to other articles on English dialect that might be of interest.

International Phonetic Alphabet for English
IPA chart for English
SAMPA chart for English
Anglophone pronunciation of foreign languages
Non-Native pronunciation of English
American English
Australian English
Received Pronunciation
General American
Other

The International Phonetic Alphabet for English shows how the IPA symbols are used for English. Because regional accents of English are more distinguished in vowel sounds than consonants, this article divides discussion of the vowels into Received Pronunciation, General American and General Australian (see definitions of these below).
























The IPA chart for English shows the most common way the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is applied to represent the English language.





























SAMPA stands for Speech Assessment Methods Phonetic Alphabet and is a computer-readable phonetic script using 7-bit printable ASCII characters, based on the IPA. The SAMPA chart for English is a version of SAMPA for English sounds.


























Anglophone pronunciation of foreign languages summarizes the difficulties encountered due to transfer of phonological rules and differences in grammar and syntax for speakers whose native languages are:

If you have a student whose native language is one of the above, it is highly recommended that you read through that section.

















Non-native pronunciation of English is a reverse version of anglophone pronunciation. Here, non-native pronunciations result from users carrying the intonation, phonological processes and pronunciation rules from their native language to English. Creative pronunciations for English sounds not found in the native language may also be used. Again, the Wikipedia has a wonderful article going through the non-native accents by region:

  • Afrikaans
  • Arabic
  • Bosnian, Croatian and Serbian
  • Bulgarian
  • Cantonese (Chinese)
  • Czech
  • Dutch
  • Finnish
  • French
  • German
  • Greek
  • Hebrew
  • Hungarian
  • The Indian Subcontinent
  • Icelandic
  • Italian
  • Japanese
  • Korean
  • Latvian
  • Malay and Indonesian
  • Mandarin (Chinese)
  • Maori
  • Mozambique
  • Nigeria
  • Persian
  • Polish
  • Portuguese
  • Romanian
  • Russian
  • Spanish
  • Swahili
  • Swedish
  • Swiss German
  • Tagalog/Filipino
  • Thai
  • Turkish
  • Ukrainian
  • Vietnamese

American English (AmE) is the dialect of the English language used mostly in the USA. American English does not include Canadian English.





























Australian English (AuE) is the form of the English language used in Australia.






























Received Pronunciation (RP) is a form of English English, generally defined as the "educated spoken English of southeastern England." It is the English taught by British instructors to non-native speakers and the pronunciation represented in most British dictionaries.


























General American is a national accent of American English based on speech common in the Midwestern part of the USA and used by many American network television broadcasters. It is sometimes called Standard Midwestern or American broadcast English.