Talk:Consonant

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Linguistics: Phonetics Top‑importance

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Rural

In which dialects of English does rural /ˈɹɝl/ or /ˈɹɹ̩l/ rhyme with girl /ˈgɝl/ or /ˈgɹ̩l/? I have always pronounced rural as two distinct syllables. There are better examples. — Solo Owl (talk) 21:18, 3 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Replaced lead img

The img in the lead presented 'consonants' as having casing and serifs. It also claimed that ⟨t⟩ is the most common consonant in English, with a ref to letter frequency, additional evidence that the person who added it didn't know the difference between a sound and a glyph. I replaced it with a chart of the consonants of English, closer to what we have in the lead of vowel. Because the img has been here for 8 yrs (!!), I was advised I should explain myself here. — kwami (talk) 04:38, 14 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I said that after your removal was undone you should have discussed it here per WP:BRD before removing it a second time. I don't object to the new image. Meters (talk) 04:53, 14 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

And the article does refer to letters as consonants: "The word consonant is also used to refer to a letter of an alphabet that denotes a consonant sound." Meters (talk) 04:57, 14 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

That's to clarify the ambiguity to readers who might be confused, to prevent them from making that very mistake. We certainly shouldn't illustrate the lead with a mistake! A "bird" is a synonym for shuttlecock in badminton, but that doesn't mean we should illustrate the lead of bird (biology) with a shuttlecock. — kwami (talk) 05:56, 14 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Is there a diphthong in "key"?

Maybe I am misunderstanding this and/or being pedantic, but:

The Consonant sounds and consonant letters section lists say, boy, key as having diphthongs. Is key's nucleus really a diphthong? It consists of a single (long) vowel, even though it is represented in English as a digraph. The orthography doesn't distinguish mono- from diphthongs, does it? Arachnosuchus (talk) 17:40, 4 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Isn't say the same as key in this way? Cyanman00ffff (talk) 17:52, 2 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I think whether say has a monophthong or a diphthong depends on the dialect. But in Standard English it is a diphthong.

But then again, apparently Old English seċġan is read /ˈsej.jɑn/, [ˈsed.d͡ʒɑn]; which seems to phonetically have a monophthong on the first syllable but phonologically that would be a diphthong? Unless /sej/ is analyzed as a CVC sequence. Depends on what /ej/ is.

key, in its Middle English form keye, is pronounced /ˈkæi̯(ə)/, so it's a di- or triphthong. But there are also the Northern pronunciations, /ˈkeːj(ə)/ or /ˈkeː(ə)/. In Modern English it's monophthongized to /kiː/; but maybe there are dialectal variants that have a diphthong.

Not sure if this clarifies anything for you? It doesn't offer me much help in reaching a conclusion. Arachnosuchus (talk) 18:28, 2 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I don't have an answer to your original question, but if you want to clear up the article, replace the key example with something else. Cyanman00ffff (talk) 20:10, 2 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]