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

nerd

UK /nɜːd/ · US /nɝd/ noun

Forms nerds knurd nurd

  1. noun (slang, sometimes derogatory) A person who is intellectual but generally introverted. “The bullies used to call him a nerd at school.”
  2. noun (informal, sometimes derogatory) One who has an intense, obsessive interest in something. “a computer nerd”
  3. noun (informal, sometimes derogatory) A member of a subculture revolving around intellectualism, technology, video games, fantasy and science fiction, comic books and assorted media. [from 1980s]
  4. noun (informal, sometimes derogatory, dated) One who is stupid and socially inept or unattractive; a social outcast. [from 1970s until early 1990s]

Synonyms

geek dag propeller head swot grind wonk dweeb

Etymology

Unknown. Attested since 1951 as US student slang.
* Perhaps an alteration of nerts (“nuts", "crazy”); see references below.
* The word, capitalized, appeared in 1950 in Dr. Seuss’s If I Ran the Zoo as the name of an imaginary animal:
*: And then, just to show them, I’ll sail to Katroo / And bring back an It-Kutch, a Preep and a Proo, / A Nerkle, a Nerd and a Seersucker too!
* Possibly a rebracketing of inert as a nert, as in he's inert = he's a nerd, in reference to one's lack of competence or athletic ability.
* Various unlikely folk etymologies and less likely backronymic speculations also exist.

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