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

flinch

/ˈflɪnt͡ʃ/ noun, verb

Also a form of flense

Forms flinches flinching flinched

  1. noun A reflexive jerking away. “My eye doctor hates the flinch I have every time he tries to get near my eyes.”
  2. noun (croquet) The slipping of the foot from a ball, when attempting to give a tight croquet.
  3. verb (intransitive) To make a sudden, involuntary movement in response to a (usually negative) stimulus; to cringe; to blench.
  4. verb To dodge (a question), to avoid an unpleasant task or duty
  5. verb (croquet) To let the foot slip from a ball, when attempting to give a tight croquet.

Synonyms

cower recoil wince squinch funk cringe shrink quail

Etymology

From Middle French flenchir (“to bend”), from Old French flenchir, flanchir, from Frankish *hlankijan, from Proto-Germanic *hlankijaną (“to bend, twist, flex”), from Proto-Indo-European *kleng- (“to bend, turn, wind”). Cognate with Old High German hlenken, whence Middle High German lenken (“to bend”), Modern German lenken (“to cause to veer or turn aside, steer”). Attested in English since the 16th century.

Webster’s 1913

  1. verb To withdraw from any suffering or undertaking, from pain or danger; to fail in doing or perserving; to show signs of yielding or of suffering; to shrink; to wince; as, one of the parties flinched from the combat.
  2. verb To let the foot slip from a ball, when attempting to give a tight croquet.
  3. noun The act of flinching.

Etymology [Prob. fr. OE. flecchen to waver, give way, F. fléchir, fr. L. flectere to bend; but prob. influenced by E. blench. Cf. Flex.]

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