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

bureaucracy

UK /bjʊəˈɹɒk.ɹə.si/ · US /bjʊˈɹɑ.kɹə.si/ noun

Forms bureaucracies bureau-ocracy bureaucratie

  1. noun Government by bureaus or their administrators or officers.
  2. noun (business, organizational theory) A system of administration based upon organisation into bureaus, division of labour, a hierarchy of authority, etc., designed to dispose of a large body of work in a routine manner. “At that time the administration replaced the system of patronage in the civil service with a bureaucracy.”
  3. noun The body of officers and administrators, especially of a government. “The bureaucracy is expanding to meet the needs of the expanding bureaucracy. (apocryphal quip)”
  4. noun (chiefly derogatory) Excessive red tape and routine in any administration, body or behaviour. “The head of the civil service promised to clamp down on bureaucracy.”

Synonyms

papyrocracy bureaucratism

Etymology

From bureau + -cracy, from French bureaucratie, coined by Jean Claude Marie Vincent de Gournay from bureau (“office”) + -cratie (“rule of”).

Webster’s 1913

  1. noun A system of carrying on the business of government by means of departments or bureaus, each under the control of a chief, in contradiction to a system in which the officers of government have an associated authority and responsibility; also, government conducted on this system.
  2. noun Government officials, collectively.

Etymology [Bureau + Gr. bureaucratie.]

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