English Vowels. Two Sounds for Long-U? Who Knew?

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Here is audio for some of the examples in my article on this topic on Medium.

Long-U2 /uw/

  • Long-U2 is used after consonants that are made with the front part of the tongue.
  • For English, these consonants are: T / D / S / Z / L / R / TH / SH / CH / J.
    Some examples are: tube / duty / clue / suit / rule / enthused / June.
  • Sometimes this vowel sound has other spelling patterns:
    >> “EW”, “EU”: dew / chew / blew / flew / deuce / sleuth
    >> “OO”: choose / soon / zoom / shoot / loose / mood / cool

Long-U1 /yuw/

  • Long-U1 is used for all other contexts. That means after any consonant sound that is NOT made with the front part of the tongue.
  • For English, those consonants are: P / B / F / V / M / C (K) / G / H.
    Some examples are: pupil / bugle / fuel / music / cube / argue / huge.
  • In addition, “other contexts” also includes when Long-U is the first letter of a word.
    For example: use / union / unit.
  • Some alternative spellings are:
    >> “EW”, “IEW”, “EU”: few / mew / view / feud / eulogy / eucalyptus

NOTE—

Words with “N” are not predictable, so they need to be learned individually. When you see a new word that has “N” before Long-U, just remember to check how to say it.

  • Some that always use Long-U1 are: annual / continue / genuine / granule / innuendo / January / manual / manufacture / menu / minuet / monument / venue. These all sound odd if they are pronounced with Long-U2.
  • Some examples with Long-U2 are: avenue / manure / nuance / nude / nucleus / numeric / new / news. (Some of these can also be pronounced with Long-U1, but that makes them sound more old-style.)

Try It!  

Using the patterns explained above, you now can figure out how the Long-U should be pronounced in these words, even if some of the words are unfamiliar for you. (You can find the answers are at the bottom of this post.)

astute
deputy
duplex
elude
fusion		humic
intrude
jute
mule
nebula		ocular
sumac
urine
zucchini  

Exciting news!

There is a supplementary lesson on this topic with more information and practice activities on my Patreon page! You can join my English pronunciation learning community on Patreon! Patreon tiers range from $2 to $100 USD per month and support the creation of a comprehensive English pronunciation learning platform!! Come and learn, get help, and interact — I hope to see you there!

ANSWERS to “Try It!”

Long-U1Long-U2
deputy / fusion
humic / mule
nebula / ocular / urine		astute / duplex
elude / intrude
jute / sumac / zucchini

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