Pronunciation Vocabulary

TYPES OF SOUNDS

Consonant – a sound made by partially or completely blocking air in the mouth with the teeth, tongue, or lips
Vowel – a sound made with an open mouth, with no air blocked by the teeth, tongue, or lips

Back – made with your tongue pulled towards the back of your mouth
Central – made with your tongue in the center of your mouth, not pulled forward or backward
Diphthong – made by combining two vowels into one syllable
Front – made with your tongue pulled towards the front of your mouth and with your lips spread out
High – made with your tongue raised near the roof of your mouth
Lax – made with a relaxed tongue
Low – made with your tongue lowered in your mouth and with your jaw lowered
Mid – made with your tongue in the middle of your mouth, neither raised nor lowered
Reduced – changed to become an unstressed vowel, often Schwa (/ə/)
Round – made with the lips forming a circle
Stressed – longer, louder, and higher-pitched than other vowels in a word
Tense – made with a tightened tongue
Unstressed – shorter, quieter, and lower-pitched than the stressed vowel

Affricate – made by combining a stop consonant with a fricative consonant in the same part of the mouth
Alveolar – made with the tip of your tongue touching your alveolar ridge (the hard part of the roof of your mouth behind your teeth)
Bilabial – made using both lips
Fricative – made by partially stopping the flow of air in your mouth but allowing some air to escape
Glide – pronounced like a vowel sound, but occurs at a syllable boundary next to a vowel
Glottal – made by blocking air in the vocal tract
Labiodental – made with your upper front teeth touching your lower lip
Liquid – made with your tongue near a specific place in the mouth, changing but not blocking the flow of air
Nasal – made with air flowing out through your nose, but not through your mouth
Palatal – made with the middle of your tongue touching your hard palate (the hard, bony place in the middle of the roof of your mouth)
Stop – made by completely stopping the flow of air in your mouth, then suddenly releasing the air
Velar – made with the back of your tongue touching your velum (the soft part of the back of the roof of your mouth)
Voiced – made by vibrating the vocal cords
Voiceless – made without vibrating the vocal cords

Consonant cluster – two or more consonants pronounced together in a syllable, without being separated by a vowel
Enunciate – pronounce clearly and distinctly
Syllable – a unit of sound that has one vowel, with or without consonants
Prefix – a unit of sound added to the beginning of a word, which changes the meaning of the word
Suffix – a unit of sound added to the end of a word, which changes the meaning of the word