When to pronounce final consonants in English

A difficulty that often arises for students of French is that many French words end in a written consonant that is not actually pronounced. For example, the French words beautiful and hot rhyme, although the second one ends in a written consonant d while the first one doesn’t. But at the same time, the situation is unfortunately not as simple as saying that final consonants are never pronounced. In this article, I give some tips for deciding when a final consonant is pronounced in a French word.

very general rule of thumb

Before going into a bit more detail, a general rule of thumb is worth mentioning. Roughly speaking, French makes a distinction between what I will call consonants from the tip of the tongue and other consonants. The approximate pattern is that:

• Except for Yo, final consonants on the tip of the tongue are generally not pronouncedexcept binding (see below);
• Final Yo and other consonants are more likely to be pronounced.

By tip of the tongue consonants, I mean the consonants that are normally pronounced with the front part of the tongue: d, you, yes, z, No. (Technically, linguists refer to this type of consonant as coronal and the part of the tongue that makes contact is not always what is strictly called the “tip”. But we can use “tip of tongue consonant” as an informal, non-technical description.) Try pronouncing one of these consonants and you will feel the front of your tongue making contact with the front of your mouth.

So, as a general rule, these consonants from the tip of the tongue are usually not pronounced at the end of a word: for example, in hotdchayoubayesbornzgoodNo, the final consonant is not pronounced. In the case of a final Nothis actually points to the nasalization of the front vowel, a problem that we will mention in passing but not go into detail in this article.

the consonant Yo is a small exception: although it is a consonant from the tip of the tongue, it is usually pronounced at the end of a word, with occasional exceptions ending in -He (e.g gentle, tool).

Bail

The consonants on the tip of the tongue, which we have said are generally not pronounced, are sometimes pronounced in a process called bail. This is a complex topic, but the basic idea is that the consonant is pronounced before another word beginning with a vowel if the following word is “closely linked” to it grammatically. A typical case of two closely linked words would be an adjective and a corresponding noun. So while the No of Good is not pronounced when the word is said in isolation (although it does mark that the word is Oh the vowel is nasalized), is pronounced in WellNo child gold WellNo friend. Similarly, the final d of big not normally pronounced, but can be pronounced in excellentd author. (Much more rarely, p and r may also participate in linking, but it is mainly a feature of the consonants on the tip of the tongue.)

One small complication is that the pronunciation of a consonant bond may actually differ from how you would expect it from the written letter. When yes pronounced en bond (as commonly occurs between a plural adjective and a noun), it actually represents a “z” sound, just like a written X. So Goodyes friends is closer to pronounced “bo’z friend“, with the yes at the end of good like a “z” (that is, link with the following vowel), but the pronounced yes of friends unpronounced (there is no following vowel, so no reason for the link). In conection, d it’s actually pronounced like a “t”. So great authorIf he d is, it would be pronounced “great author”.

Some more details and exceptions

What we have described so far is a rough rule of thumb and it will come as no surprise that there are many exceptions and details to be aware of. It’s impossible to go into all of these here, but below are some more detailed rules and patterns that it’s worth gradually familiarizing yourself with certain letters. First, some more details about the consonants on the tip of the tongue:

d: pronounced at the end of acquaintanced and one or two names. The letter d occurs silently at the end of many verb forms (eg. he drinks) However the d pronounced at the end of a verb form when followed by a pronoun beginning with a vowel (i.e., in inverted forms like he drinks, we sell etc). At the end of an adjective like big, -d it can be pronounced before a noun beginning with a vowel as shown above, although this is actually rare in everyday speech.

No (sometimes written meter): these special consonants usually mark the nasalization of the previous vowel, and are not pronounced as such; but at the end of “learned” or borrowing words, they are likely to be pronounced, for example maximummeter, sampleNo;

yes: some common words where the ending -s pronounced is included son (“sound”) and March (“March”/”March”). Note that the final -s is in pronounced but (“corn”) but not in but (“aim”).

you: This letter appears at the end of many adjectives and verb forms, and is generally not pronounced in such cases. But as same as dmust be pronounced at the end of a verb when it is followed by a pronoun beginning with a vowel (i.e. in inverted forms like He, they say etc).

Finally, here are some details about various other spelled consonants when they appear at the end of a French word:

against: practically never pronounced afterwards No at the end of a word (exception: Donagainst), but pronounced at the end of some common short words, notably with, bag, dry, shock, lake, park;

F: although it is usually pronounced, it is not pronounced at the end of key (commonly written key nowadays), deer, nerveand in the plural eggs and oxen (while in singular egg and beefthe end -F is pronounced as expected);

p: for the purposes of everyday speech, it can generally be assumed that -p it is never pronounced at the end of a word. One notable exception that intermediate learners may encounter is disability. Very occasionally, essentially in a very formal speech, it may be delivered in link at the end of too much and a lot.

r: is usually pronounced when the preceding vowel is not my (why, flower, tower etc); is not pronounced in many cases when it follows a myparticularly at the end of a -er verb or at the end of -er gold -ier suffix on a large number of “longer” adjectives and nouns (including job titles such as firefighter etc); there are some common short words that end in -er where it is pronounced, including bitter, dear, iron (“iron”), proud (“proud”), winter sea.

X: This letter is pronounced, like “ks”, at the end of a bunch of “learned” words like index. Otherwise, it usually occurs as a silent card, effectively a variant of yes-on the ending of several common adjectives and nouns. At the end of a plural adjective followed by a noun or adjective beginning with a vowel, along with a few other cases, it is pronounced in the linking process described above. As mentioned above, it is then pronounced as a “z” sound. So oldX friends would be pronounced closer to “old friend”.

Conclusion

As we have seen, whether or not a final consonant is pronounced in a French word can be tricky, but it is not entirely arbitrary. By learning a few general rules, we can obtain a good degree of certainty in many common cases.