Pronunciation guide: IPA symbols, stress and word endings

θ	thin	ð	this	ʃ	she	ʒ	measure
tʃ	church	dʒ	judge	ŋ	sing	j	yes

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

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)

-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.

cut back

verb

Forms cuts back cutting back

verb (transitive and intransitive with on) To reduce the amount of (something). “The foliage is out of control and needs to be cut back.”
verb (intransitive with on) To reduce spending. “We need to cut back heavily on office supplies. Is there another vendor we can use?”
verb (intransitive often with on) To reduce consumption. “He needs to cut back on doughnuts. He weighs 289 pounds!”
verb (intransitive, surfing) To perform the cutback maneuver.
verb (intransitive often with to) To use a short cut; to move to a location to block someone; to cut someone off “He almost scored but the defender cut back to him.”

Synonyms

Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 — from the Wiktionary entry “cut back”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details