The Sounds of English

There are more than 40 sounds in Standard English: 26 consonants; 20 vowels.

Consonants

Consonants are made by using different parts of the mouth (e.g. lips, teeth, tongue). For example, the word 'bilabial' means using both lips. 'Labiodental' means using the lip and teeth. Different parts of the tongue can touch different parts of the roof of the mouth, or 'palate'. For example, the 'tip' of the tongue can touch the 'alveolar ridge' (see diagram). This is an 'alveolar' sound.

Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Tract.svg

You can learn more about how to make consonants by watching a BBC video about the sound. Click on a symbol to link to a youtube video.

	bilabial		labio- dental		dental		alveolar		post- alveolar		velar		glottal
stops	p	b					t	d			k	g
affricates							ʧ	ʤ
nasals		m						n				ŋ
fricatives			f	v	θ	ð	s	z	ʃ	ʒ			h
approximants								ɹ		j
lateral approximant								l
labio-velar approximant		w

Note: The international phonetic symbol for the English 'r' is /ɹ/ but many textbooks and dictionaries use the symbol /r/.

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