Klryz
Pronunciation guide: IPA symbols, stress and word endings

Vowels

iːseeɪsite / ɛbedæcat
ɑːfatherɒhot (UK)ɔːlawʊput
uːtooʌcupɜːbirdəabout
eɪdayaɪmyɔɪboyaʊnow
əʊ / oʊgo (UK / US)ɪəneareəhairʊətour

Consonants that look unusual

θthinðthisʃsheʒmeasure
tʃchurchdʒjudgeŋsingjyes

p b t d k g f v s z h m n l r w sound as in ordinary English spelling.

Marks

  • ˈ main stress, before the stressed syllable: /ˈwɔːtə/ water · ˌ lighter (secondary) stress: /ˌʌndəˈstænd/ understand
  • ː a long vowel · (r) an r said only in accents that pronounce it (most American, Scottish, Irish)

Common word endings

  • -s / -es (plurals; he/she form of verbs): /s/ after voiceless sounds (cats), /z/ after voiced (dogs), /ɪz/ after s, z, sh, ch, j sounds (buses, watches). Spelling: -es after s, x, z, ch, sh; consonant + y → -ies (city → cities).
  • -ed (past): /t/ after voiceless sounds (walked), /d/ after voiced (played), /ɪd/ after t or d (wanted). Spelling: love → loved, stop → stopped, carry → carried.
  • -ing: make → making, run → running, see → seeing.
  • Irregular: go, went, gone · be, was, been · see, saw, seen · man → men · child → children · mouse → mice.
  • Older (King James) forms: -eth = -s (he loveth = he loves) · -est with “thou” (thou lovest) · spake = spoke.

English Dictionary · 107,383 entries · Sources & licences

confab

UK /ˈkɒnfæb/ · US /kənˈfæb/ noun, verb

Forms confabs confabbing confabbed

  1. noun (informal) Clipping of confabulation (“a casual chat or talk”).
  2. verb (intransitive, informal) Clipping of confabulate (“to speak casually with somebody; to chat”).

Synonyms

chat chinwag conflab schmooze confable discourse parley common confabulate conversate converse convo jaw treat word confabulation schmoose chew the fat shoot the breeze chitchat chit-chat chatter chaffer natter gossip claver visit confer consult

Etymology

Clipping of confabulation, from Middle English confabulacion (“conversation”), from Latin confābulātiōnem, from cōnfābulārī + -tiōnem (suffix forming nouns relating to actions or their results); see further at etymology 2.

Clipping of confabulate, from Latin cōnfābulārī + English -ate (suffix forming verbs with the sense of acting in the specified manner). Cōnfābulārī is the present active infinitive of cōnfābulor (“to converse; to discuss”), from con- (prefix indicating a bringing together) + fābulor (“to chat, converse, talk; to make up a story”) (from fābula (“discourse, narrative; fable, story”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *bʰeh₂- (“to say, speak”)) + for (“to say, speak, talk”)).

Webster’s 1913

  1. noun Familiar talk or conversation. [Colloq.]

Etymology [Contr. from confabulation.]

Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “confab”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details