Understanding and Teaching the Pronunciation of English.pdf

The phonemic alphabet

A phonemic alphabet is a set of symbols that represent the
sounds of a language. One symbol represents exactly one
phoneme.

Why do we need a phonemic alphabet? It’s because
languages generally don’t have perfect spelling systems, with
exactly one symbol for each phoneme. Sometimes the same

symbol can stand for more than one sound. For example, in

English the letter “c” can represent at least three di"erent

phonemes:

• /k/ as in cat


• /s/ as in city


• /tʃ/ as in cello
  In other cases, the same sound can be represented by more
  than one spelling. For example, the sound /f/ in English can
  be spelled in these ways:


• “f” in fun


• “ph” in phone


• “gh” in cough

Because of this, it’s useful to have a special set of symbols

that can represent sounds more consistently. These phonemic

symbols can help both teachers and learners to record and

interpret the pronunciation of new words accurately.

Some of the symbols in the phonemic alphabet of English,

such as /ɡ/ and /ɑ/, look like letters used in ordinary

spelling. However, they don’t always represent the same

sounds that they do in normal spelling, and they can each

represent only one sound. For example, the phonemic symbol

/ɡ/ can represent only the !rst sound in good, not the !rst

sound in gentle; /ɑ/ can represent only the vowel sound in

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Phonemic Symbols and Phonetic Symbols

Symbols that represent the phonemes of a language are called

phonemic symbols. We write phonemic symbols with slash

marks around them: /s/. Phonemic symbols represent only the

basic phonemes of the language, not slight variations of them.

Symbols that represent the allophones of the phonemes of a

language are called phonetic symbols. We write phonetic

symbols with brackets around them: [s]. Phonetic symbols are

intended to represent smaller, more exact variations of sound

than phonemic symbols.

When we want symbols to represent actual letters of the

alphabet, we can put them in quotation marks: “s.”

When you write phonemic or phonetic symbols, be careful to

write them exactly as they are. You can’t change from a lower

case to an upper case letter or make other changes in form. For

example, /R/ is a totally different symbol than /r/. Different letter

shapes might also be different symbols; /e/ does not represent

the same sound as /ɛ/; /a/ is not the same as /ɑ/.