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

em

/ˈɛm/ noun, pronoun, interjection, proper noun

Forms ems emself eir eirs

  1. noun The name of the Latin script letter M/m.
  2. noun (typography) A unit of measurement equal to the height of the type in use. “Insert here a one-em dash or long dash.”
  3. noun (web design) A relative unit of sizing defined in terms of the font size.
  4. pronoun (rare, nonstandard) A gender-neutral third-person singular object pronoun, the objective case of ey or e, equivalent to the singular them and coordinate with him and her.
  5. interjection (Scotland, Ireland) a form of hesitant speech, or an expression of uncertainty “She was abused by, em... David, I think. That was his name, he's a real em... what's the word, narcissist. You should really stay away from him.”
  6. noun The name of the letter м/М in Cyrillic alphabets.
  7. proper noun A diminutive of the female given names Emily, Emma, and Emmeline.

Synonyms

quad em quad mutton mut um umm erm eh uh mutton quad pica em pica

Etymology

Attested since 1808. In typography, the em is named after the em quadrat (later called em quad), from m quadrat, a metal type used in letterpress typesetting, which is as wide as the point size of the font.

Coined by Christine M. Elverson by removing the "th" from them, perhaps influenced by the pre-existing em/'em, now often perceived as apheretic forms of them (though originally unrelated).

Onomatopoeic. Compare um.

From Russian эм (em), Ukrainian ем (em), etc.

Webster’s 1913

  1. noun The portion of a line formerly occupied by the letter m, then a square type, used as a unit by which to measure the amount of printed matter on a page; the square of the body of a type.
  2. noun A prefix. See En-.

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