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Welcome to our third pronunciation lesson! In my previous blogs we discussed about the monophthongs - the single vowel sounds. In case you haven’t learned them yet, I posted a couple of blogs, merely about the schwa /ə/ and the /iː / sounds. You can still join our pronunciation challenges there!

This time, we’re going to learn about diphthongs. Dip what? Alright, there’s no need to panic just chillax for a bit and let’s learn this term together as simple as possible, shall we? Actually I did some digging about this word online.

What is a diphthong?

Let me quote the meaning of this term that I read from really-learn English website. The word diphthong comes from the Latin word “diphthongus” and the Greek word “diphthongos”, meaning ‘having two sounds’.

In other words, a diphthong is a combination of two vowel sounds. There are still slight changes when we make this sound. The /ɪə/ sound is a perfect example of a diphthong. It comprises of the short /ɪ/ (ih) and the schwa /ə/ with a slight /r/ sound at the end. Therefore, it becomes /ɪə/ (with /r/) as in the words ‘ear’ and ‘near’. Other double vowel sounds are /eɪ/, /ʊə/, /aʊ/ and so on. We’ll tackle these sounds in my future blogs, so please hold your horses.

To better understand the /ɪə/ sound, below is a video from the BBC Learning English website. Try to listen attentively and practice pronouncing this sound as much as you can. I’m sure after a few tries, you’ll get used to it. It’s perfectly fine to laugh at yourself while doing this sound.

Please take note in some American dictionaries such as Oxford and Merriam-Webster, they use the /ɪr/ symbol for the /ɪə/ sound. They’re basically the same.

Pronunciation Challenge

Now that you’ve understood the lesson, would you dare to take part in our pronunciation challenges? Check out our interactive phonemic chart as your guide for all IPA sounds. You could also record the following words and sentence if you like. The letters in bold indicate the stress for the /ɪə/ sound.

cashmere       near     pier      Zaire

The Scottish woman left her cashmere near the pier of Zaire.

IPA Challenge

Can you translate the following pronunciation words into standard English words? Write your answers on the comment box below. Numbers 7 and 8 are a bonus!

Example : /hɪə(r)/ hear

1. /ˌʃændəˈlɪə(r)/
2. /klɪə(r)/
3. /ˈsætaɪə(r)/
4. /ˌəʊvə(r)ˈhɪə(r)/
5. /tɪə(r)/
6. /ˈtɪə.ri/
7. /ˈkæʃˌmɪə(r)/
8. /zaɪˈ ɪər/

How did you do? I hope you didn’t find this a weary lesson. I’m looking forward to your participation. Good luck!