^ /ɛ/ in syllable-final positions may be respelled eh instead of e when otherwise it may be misinterpreted as another sound such as /i(ː)/ or /eɪ/.
Similarly, when a vowel is followed by /s/, one or more consonants, and a stressed vowel, the syllabification must be retained, as in fruh- STRAY-shən, because frus- TRAY-shən may result in a different pronunciation than intended. However, when the following consonant is a voiceless plosive ( /p, t, k/) pronounced with aspiration (a slight delay in the following vowel), it must be attributed to the same syllable as the following vowel, as in ta- TOO, because tat- OO may result in a different pronunciation than intended (compare "whatever" whot- EV-ər, whut-, wherein /t/ is not aspirated and may be glottalized or flapped). When a checked vowel is followed by a consonant and a stressed vowel, which is rare nonetheless, it is acceptable in some cases to attribute the following consonant to the same syllable as the checked vowel, as in bal- AY, even though in IPA it is customary to attribute it to the following syllable, as in / b æ ˈ l eɪ/. ^ a b c d e f /æ, ɛ, ɪ, ɒ, ʌ, ʊ/ ( a, e(h), i(h), o, u(h), uu) are checked vowels, meaning never occurring at the end of a word or before a vowel.Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Pronunciation.See documentation for : the template and instructions for adding pronunciation respelling It should not be used for representing non-English words or an approximation thereof. So, while the IPA is the required form of representing pronunciation, respelling remains optional. On the other hand, the IPA (being designed to represent sounds from any language in the world) is not as intuitive for those chiefly familiar with English orthography, for whom this respelling system is likely to be easier for English words and names. The IPA has significant advantages over this respelling system, as it can be used to accurately represent pronunciations from any language in the world, and (being an international standard) is often more familiar to European/Commonwealth and non-native speakers of English. In words where primary stress precedes secondary stress, however, the secondary stress should not be differentiated from unstressed syllables for example, "motorcycle" ( / ˈ m oʊ t ər ˌ s aɪ k əl/) should be respelled as MOH-tər-sy-kəl because MOH-tər- SY-kəl would incorrectly suggest the pronunciation / ˌ m oʊ t ər ˈ s aɪ k əl/.Īs designated in Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Pronunciation, the standard set of symbols used to show the pronunciation of English words on Wikipedia is the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA).
In this example, the primary and secondary stress are not distinguished because the difference is automatic. For example, the word "pronunciation" ( / p r ə ˌ n ʌ n s i ˈ eɪ ʃ ən/) is respelled prə- NUN-see- AY-shən. The stress on a syllable is indicated by capital letters. Syllables are separated by a hyphen ("-"). This does not mean these differences are, or must be, always distinguished if you speak a dialect that does not distinguish "father" and "farther", for example, simply ignore the difference between FAH-dhər and FAR-dhər.įor a more thorough discussion of the sounds and dialectal variation, see Help:IPA/English. That is, we record differences found in some varieties but not in others, such as those between "father" and "farther", "wine" and "whine", and "cot" and "caught". Both the IPA and respelling for English on Wikipedia are designed to record all distinctive sounds found in major varieties of English.