PRONUNCIATION: Pronouncing /ʌ/
Ana Losada e José Luis Murado. CC BY-SA
Look at the words below. How are they pronounced?
| sun - some - much - money - up - month |
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All are pronounced with /ʌ/
Listen to their pronunciation and repeat.
Ana Losada e José Luis Murado. CC BY-SA
is a a half-open, central vowel pronounced with neutral lip position. Watch this video to see how /ʌ/ is pronounced.
This sound presents many problems for Spanish and Galician speakers who often confuse it with /a/. It occurs most commonly in ˂u˃ as in much, up, cup and ˂o˃ as in money, month and son.
Other spellings for /ʌ/ are:
- ˂ou˃: young, country, enough
- ˂oo˃: flood, blood
- ˂oe˃: does, doesn't
Listen to the recording below to hear the pronunciation of the words above.
Ana Losada e José Luis Murado. CC BY-SA
Exercise 1
Below you have 5 series of words. Listen to the words in each series and find the odd man out, that is to say, the word in which the letter(s) in bold type sound(s) differently.
Ana Losada e José Luis Murado. CC BY-SA
- mother, son, come, box
- up, student, much, run
- young, cousin, our, touch
- flood, does, bull, funny
- put, public, culture, just
Exercise 2
Read these sentences aloud. Then listen to the recording and repeat.
Ana Losada e José Luis Murado. CC BY-SA
- My mum loves the sun
- My cousin doesn't study much
- The young couple is coming on Sunday
- My brother loves honey
- Her husband is not much fun
- My son doesn't understand Russian