Homonyms, homographs, homophones and minimal pairs 1

 I have been too busy to do much on this blog for the past year, but I'm hoping to revive it in the coming months. Keep your fingers crossed.

Today's post concerns four seemingly basic categories of relationships between words that can be rather confusing for first-year students of English Studies, let alone learners with no background in linguistics. Today's post will be followed by one with exercises.

1. Homonyms are words which are spelt and pronounced the same and which have different, unrelated meanings. They may have very different etymological origins or they may be traced back to the same word, but in this case their connection is no longer relevant to modern-day speakers, who may just as well be unaware of it. The most popular example is that of the words bank, meaning: 1) the edge of a river, 2) a financial institution. 

2. Homographs are two words that are spelt the same but pronounced differently and usually have unrelated meanings, e.g. you can sow /səʊ/ seeds in a field or a flowerpot, but a female pig is called a sow /saʊ/, with two different diphthong phonemes despite the same spelling. The spelling <ow> is often pronounced in the two ways given above. Interestingly, sometimes two grammatical forms of a word have different pronunciations despite having the same spelling: the infinitive and present tense of read is pronounced /riːd/, whereas the past form read is pronounced /red/.

3. Homophones are the opposites of homographs in that they are pronounced the same despite different spelling. The negative particle no and the verb know are pronounced the same, i.e. /nəʊ/, as are the letter name C, the verb see and the noun sea /siː/. Owing to the complex history of English spelling homophones as well as homographs abound, particularly one-syllable words.

4. If two words, regardless of their spelling, are pronounced with just one phonemic difference between them, they are a minimal pair. Not particularly significant in more theoretical phonological studies, minimal pairs are of paramount importance in pronunciation teaching and speech therapy: exercises based on minimal pairs allow teachers and therapists to study phonemic hearing skills (can a student/patient perceive the difference between two or more distinct sounds?) and production skills (can they pronounce the sounds in question differently?).

For practical purposes it makes sense to present minimal pairs where the sounds in question are similar and thus likely to be confused. Contrasting thin and fin (voiceless dental/labio-dental fricatives) or bet and bat (short front monophthong vowels) is more justified than contrasting the vowels of bat and boot or the initial consonants of what and shot. 

Sometimes two words which are spelt similarly but one of them is one sound longer than the other are also called minimal pairs. One example pair is thing /θɪŋ/and think /θɪŋk/: here despite similar spelling the former word contains just one velar consonant at the end while the latter contains two, a voiced nasal and a voiceless plosive/stop.

In some cases it is possible to produce a long minimal set (of more than two items). Consider these examples: 1) pat-bat-mat-fat-vat-that-tat-lat-gnat-chat-rat-cat-hat (C + /æt/)
2) bit-beat-bet-bat-but-Bart-bot-bought-boot-Bert-bait-bite-boat-bout (/b/ + V + /t/)

5. It is worth noting that different accents of English have different homographs and homophones. In non-rhotic accents like RP, the words caught and court are pronounced the same, i.e. /kɔːt/, while in rhotic ones like GA, court naturally contains an /r/ sound. Likewise, the words ant and aunt are pronounced the same as /ænt/ in accents without the TRAP-BATH split, e.g. GA, while in accents with the split, including RP, the word aunt is pronounced /ɑːnt/. Changes occur over time as well: in modern-day RP speakers do not pronounce /ʊə/ in pour, hence pour and pore are homophones (/pɔː/). The disappearance of a voiceless [ʍ] as a phoneme marked as <wh> in spelling also means that which and witch, whales and Wales have become homophones in RP and many other accents (/w/ in both rather than /ʍ/ as opposed to /w/).

Devoicing of voiced consonants

Voice and voicelessness in English consonants can be a complicated topic. Describing the phonology of English has never been an objective of this blog, which is why in today's post I describe the basics which can be confusing to Polish students of English in particular and may also be similarly difficult to speakers of other languages where the devoicing of consonants works in a comparable way, e.g. other Slavic languages, German or Finnish.

English has a few pairs of voiced-voiceless consonants, namely /b/-/p/, /d/-/t/, /g/-/k/, /v/-/f/, /z/-/s/, /ð/-/θ/, /ʒ/-/ʃ/, /dʒ/-/tʃ/. All of these are separate phonemes, distinct categories in the English speaker's mind. In languages such as Polish in some environments (around voiceless consonants, at the end of a word) a voiced consonant clearly becomes a voiceless one: the word mewa 'seagull' has /v/ represented by the letter <w>, but the Genitive plural mew before a pause contains /f/, as does mewka, a diminutive form (a small or young seagull) with the sequence /fk/ represented by <wk>. The same could be said about /b/ in żaba 'frog' and /p/ in żab 'frog-Gen-pl' and żabka 'little frog'.

Now when we look at the English words bird and frog, we will see that they are not spelt phonemically the same as Bert and frock respectively. Even though the /d/ and /g/ are devoiced at the end of a word before a pause or a consonant (i.e. excluding the bird is, the frogs where /d/ and /g/ clearly remain), these are not the same as /t/ or /k/. What is the difference then and why do English speakers distinguish between these consonants?

The difference lies in two things: vowel length and fortis-lenis. Before a voiced consonant, even when devoiced, the vowel is a fraction of a second longer: a short vowel becomes relatively longer (but we do not use the length mark [ː] to indicate that) and a long vowel or diphthong becomes even slightly longer than it would be when followed by a voiceless sound. The fortis-lenis distinction is just a Latin way of naming the force or loudness with which consonants are produced. A voiceless consonant like /p/, /s/ or /f/ is pronounced somewhat more loudly than a devoiced version (allophone) of /b/, /z/ or /v/. 

In the 20th century linguists described devoicing in English as partial. These days, however, they tend to write about devoicing, though bearing in mind that a devoiced consonant does not sound identical to a voiceless one.

Devoicing matters in learning about the pronunciation of the Past Simple or past participle <-ed> as well as the Present Simple, plural or possessive (Saxon genitive) <-s>, <-es> and <-'s>. When a textbook mentions that /d/ or /z/ should be pronounced after a voiced consonant, semi-vowel or vowel, that does not mean no devoicing can occur - that depends on the environment, the surrounding sounds or pauses. The vowel length and fortis-lenis differences apply regardless.

As time goes by and pronunciation changes some new distinctions can appear and others can be lost. One good example is /ʍ/, the voiceless equivalent of /w/. Nowadays heard in the speech of some speakers of regional dialects in the UK and the USA, it was the recommended standard pronunciation of <wh> in words like what, when, where, whale, overwhelm and whence. These days the distinction is omitted e.g. in RP-based pronunciation textbooks and words like whales and Wales are treated as homophones.

The final remark is that what I know about the issue is based on studying British RP and occasionally learning about the American GA accent. Other rules may apply in Englishes spoken by native speakers, bilinguals or non-natives around the world.

I deliberately used no reference sources to create this post. Let me know in the comments if anything requires correction. I may be a linguist but I do not consider myself an expert on the theoretical side of phonology.

Pronunciation of digraphs beginning with "i"

Ex. 1 Look at the following words and write how to pronounce the digraphs beginning with the letter "i". Note that in the letters in question may belong to different syllables (so the letter combinations are not technically digraphs).

IA aria, diary, liar, pariah, piano, tiara, via

IE achieve, believe, fiery, pliers, retrieve, supplier

IO biology, ion, lion, Zion
IU diuretic

Ex. 2 Do these words rhyme?

a. belief - relief   b. aria - Maria   c. liar - dire   d. lion - lying   e. liege - league


KEY

1. IA /ˈɑːrɪə/, /ˈdaɪəri/, /ˈlaɪə/, /pə'rɪə/, /pɪˈænəʊ/, /tɪˈɑːrə/, /ˈvaɪə/ 

IE /əˈʧiːv/, /bɪˈliːv/, /ˈfaɪəri/, /ˈplaɪəz/, /rɪˈtriːv/, /səˈplaɪə/

IO /baɪˈɒləʤi/, /ˈaɪən/, /ˈlaɪən/, /ˈzaɪən/
IU /ˌdaɪjʊəˈretɪk/
2. a. yes, b. no, c. yes, d. no, e. no

I used toPhonetics at https://tophonetics.com/. 

Silent "-e" and changes in pronunciation

English contains thousands of words in which the final letter "e" is called 'silent e'. In fact, however, it is a sign that the previous vowel sound is a long vowel or a diphthong. Sometimes other changes in spelling and pronunciation occur as well. Some sources call it 'magic e', as it is supposed to 'make a vowel say its name'. Look at the following example:

The vowel "e" is called 'ee' /iː/. The word 'pet' is pronounced /pet/, and the name 'Pete' is pronounced /piːt/.

The same is sometimes true of the letters "a", "i", "o" and "u". Of course there are exceptions: 'come', 'some' 'one' have a 'silent e' but retain a short vowel.

When a vowel letter is followed by the letter "r" and "-e" is added, the 'magic e' rule does not apply and other changes take place. Note that Exercise 3 describes non-rhotic pronunciation (no /r/ after vowels).

Ex. 1 Add an "-e" to the following words and write how the vowels change when a new word is formed (look at the example above).

A: mat, man, pan, can, tap, fat, hat, pal

E: met, den

I: thin, lit, pin, spit, spin, win

O: cod, con, mod

U: hug, cut

Ex. 2 Change the letters "-ck" to "-ke" to form new words and write how the vowels change when a new word is formed.

A: back, lack, rack, tack   I: lick, pick, hick   O: jock, pock, stock   U: duck, luck

Ex. 3 Add an "-e" to the following words and write how the vowels change when a new word is formed (look at the example above).

A: bar, car, far, mar, scar, star   E: her, sever I: sir, fir  O: cor, for, lor

KEY

Ex. 1
A: mat-e, man-e, pan-e, can-e, tap-e, fat-e, hat-e, pal-e /æ/ - /eɪ/
E: met-e, den-e /e/ - /iː/ 

I: thin-e, lit-e, pin-e, spit-e, spin-e, win-e /ɪ/ - /aɪ/, NB. thin /θɪn/, thine /ðaɪn/
O: cod-e, con-e, mod-e /ɒ/ - /əʊ/
U: hug-e, cut-e /hʌg/ - /hjuːdʒ/, /kʌt/ - /kjuːt/

Ex. 2
A: bake, lake, rake, take /æ/ - /eɪ/, I: like, pike, hike /ɪ/ - /aɪ/ O: joke, poke, stoke /ɒ/ - /əʊ/, U: duke, Luke /ʌ/ - /uː/

Ex. 3
A: bar-e, car-e, far-e, mar-e, scar-e, star-e /ɑː/ - /eə/
E: her-e, sever-e /hɜː/ (weak /hə/) - /hɪə/, /ˈsevə/ - /sɪˈvɪə/
I: sir-e, fir-e /ɜː/ - /aɪə/
O: cor-e, for-e, lor-e no change /ɔː/

This time I got a little help from:

Tophonetics https://tophonetics.com/

Wordplays https://www.wordplays.com

Magic -e is described at Teflpedia: https://teflpedia.com/Magic_e

Minimal pairs: /n/ and /ŋ/

The velar nasal consonant /ŋ/ is often a challenge for Polish speakers despite the fact that it also exists in Polish. Here are some errors typical of Polish speakers of English:
A. pronouncing the "-ing" sequence (as either a suffix or just part of a larger morpheme) as [-ink] or [-ing] (sometimes [-ink]);
B. pronouncing the vowel preceding /ŋ/ as the Polish "ą" or "ę" (nasal vowels/diphthongs; here I prefer to avoid phonetic transcription of Polish sounds);
C. pronouncing /ŋ/ instead of /n/, e.g. 'Poland', 'and' with "ę" and /ŋ/ (see C. above);
D. mispronouncing "g" in words such as 'singer' vs 'finger'.

To create the exercises, I took a few words from Baker (2006).

Ex. 1 Look at the following words containing the consonant /n/ and find their counterparts containing the consonant /ŋ/.

ban, Dan, done, fan, kin, pin, ran, Ron, run, sin, thin, win, ton

Ex. 2 Look at the following words containing the consonant /ŋ/ and find their counterparts containing the consonants /ŋk/.

bang, bring, dung, king, ping, ring/wring, rang, sing, sting, thing, wing


KEY

1. bang, dang, dung, fang, king, ping, rang, wrong, rung/wrung, sing, thing, wing, tongue
2. bank, brink, dunk, kink, pink, rink, rank, sink, stink, think, wink

Baker, Ann. 2006. Ship or Sheep? An intermediate pronunciation course. 3rd ed. Cambridge: CUP.

Minimal pairs: /f/, /v/ and /w/

Ex. 1 Look at the following words containing the voiceless consonant /f/ and find their counterparts containing the voiced consonant /v/.

a. fail, fan, fast, fat, fault, fee, feign, fender, ferry, file, fine

Are these words minimal pairs?

b. laugh - love, phase - vase, feast - vast, fake - vague, cough - cove, often - oven

Ex. 2 Look at the following words containing the voiced consonant /v/ and find their counterparts containing the semivowel /w/.

vain, vary, veg, veil, vent, verse, vest, vet, via, vie, vile, vine, viva, volley, vow

KEY
Ex. 1 a. veil, van, vast, vat, vault, V (vee), vain/vane/vein, vendor, very, vile, vine
b. None of these is a minimal pair - there is more than difference between the words.

Ex. 2 wane, wary, wedge, wail, went, worse, west, wet, wire, why, while, wine, weaver, Wally, wow

Minimal pairs: /ʃ/, /s/ and /tʃ/

Ex. Look at the following words containing 1. /s/, 2. /tʃ/ and find their counterparts containing the consonant /ʃ/.

1. a. Mars, mass, sag, sale, same, sell, sin   b. seek, seep, sock, sod, sue/Sue   

c. lease, save, sea/see, seat, sort

2. a. catch, hatch, latch, match, watch, which/witch   b. chi/qi, cheap, chin, chips, chose, choose

KEY

1. a. marsh, mash, shag, shale, shame, shell, shin   b. chic, sheep, shock, shod, shoe   c. leash, shave, she, sheet, short

2. a. cache/cash, hash, lash, mash, wash, wish   b. she, sheep, shin, ships, shows, shoes

English voiceless plosives: aspiration 2

The English voiceless plosives are not aspirated in word-final position. Voiced plosives are not aspirated.

Ex. For each word beginning with an aspirated plosive find its minimal pair beginning with a voiced plosive and a phonetic (not spelling) anagram where the /p/, /t/ or /k/ comes at the end of the word.
e.g. [p^h] pan - [b] ban - [p] nap

[p^h] pack, pat, peak, pill, pin, post, pot
[t^h] tab, talk, tan, teal, teem, torn, tuck
[k^h] cab, cap, coast, cot, curl, cut, Kate, kit

KEY
pack-back-cap, pat-bat-tap, peak-beak-keep, pill-bill/Bill-lip, pin-bin-nip, post-boast-stop, pot-bot-top
tab-dab-bat, talk-dork-caught/court, tan-Dan-gnat, teal-deal-lead (verb), teem-deem-meet/meat, torn-dawn-naught, tuck-duck-cut
cab-gab-back, cap-gap-pack, coast-ghost-Stoke (town name), cot-got-tock, curl-girl-lurk, cut-gut-tuck, Kate-gate/gait-take, kit-git-tick

Reduplication-based idioms 3

The words used below can be found in Wiktionary at https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Category:English_reduplications

Ex. I Unscramble the letters of the following idioms, collocations or slang words. How are they pronounced?
a. yoko-kopsoy   b. yintt-itgrty   c. gygip wyggi   d. ttperi-pttaer   e. gurger burgeg   f. eh idas ehs dias   g. ylsli Bylil   h. opipssll   i. eetny-eenyw   j. arew nad arte

Ex. II Fill in the gaps in the following sentences using the phrases from Exercise I.

1. The haunted house at the funfair was ............................ .
2. The student claimed Dr Jones had treated her unfairly, and Dr Jones claimed she hadn't come to his examination. ............................ - you can't really tell who was right.
3. Do you want to sleep with the blue bunny or with the pink ...............................?
4. I like it when a lecturer explains the ............................ instead of making a long introduction to the topic. In this way I know when to take notes.
5. On our holiday in Scotland we spent all days listening to the ............................. of rain on the windows instead of sunbathing.
6. Let's not invite Jane's boyfriend. He's a nasty ........................... who swears, drinks beer and talks about his rugby team all the time.
7. The writer's first essays were described as .......................... . That did not discourage him, however.
8. The machine isn't broken. Just push the red button, you .......................... .
9. The tourist took out a .......................... smartphone out of her pocket and started taking pictures. At first I thought that wasn't even a real phone.
10. Every car is subject to fair ................................. no matter how carefully you drive.
 

KEY
I. a. ooky-spooky, b. nitty-gritty, c. piggy wiggy, d. pitter-patter, e. rugger bugger, f. he said she said, g. silly Billy, h. slipslop, i. teeny weeny, j. wear and tear
a. /'uːki-ˈspuːki/, b. /ˈnɪti-ˈgrɪti/, c. /ˈpɪgi wɪgi/, d. /ˈpɪtə-ˈpætə/,e. /ˈrʌgə ˈbʌgə/, f. /hi sed ʃi sed/, g. /ˈsɪli ˈbɪli/, h. /ˈslɪpslɒp/, i. /'tiːni 'wːni/, j. /weər_ənd teə/ (linking /r/)
II. 1a, 2f 3c, 4b, 5d, 6e, 7h, 8g, 9i, 10j

English voiceless plosives: aspiration 1

When /p/, /t/ and /k/ appear on their own in word-initial position or at the beginning of a stressed syllable, they are aspirated, i.e. pronounced with more force applied than for example in consonant clusters, in other positions or in unstressed syllables. The spelling of these allophones (for they are not phonemes in English) is [p^h], [t^h] and [k^h].

Ex. The following words contain aspirated plosives. Find their counterparts that contain one more sound before them so that the plosives are unaspirated.

[p^h] paid, pan, park, pat, pay, peck, pie, pill, pin, pit, pot, port

[t^h] tab, tack, tag, talk, tan, tart, Tate, team, tick, till, top, tuck

[k^h] cam, can, cool, coop, cot, kale, Kate, key, kill, Kim, kin, kit

KEY

spade, span, spark, spat, spay, speck, spy, spill, spin, spit, spot, sport

stab, stack, stag, stalk, Stan, start, state, steam, stick, still, stop, stuck

scam, scan, school, scoop, Scot, scale, skate, ski, skill, skim, skin, skit,

Reduplication-based idioms 2

The words used below can be found in Wiktionary at https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Category:English_reduplications

Ex. I Write the following idioms using ordinary (orthographic) English spelling.

a. /'tʃʌŋki 'mʌŋki/ b. /'krɪsˌkrɒs/ c. /'fʌdi-ˌdʌdi/ d. /'heltə 'skeltə/ e. /'hɒdʒˌpɒdʒ/ f. /'dʒɪbə-ˌdʒæbə/ g. /'nɪk-ˌnæk/ h. /ˌlʊki-'luː/

Ex. II Fill in the gaps in the following sentences using the phrases from Exercise I.

1. David Mitchell often plays posh, ..................... characters trying to cope with the standards of modern society.

2. The students were running ........................... instead of coming back to the classroom.

3. Do you think it's a valuable ornament or just an old glass ..................... ?

4. Sally's on a diet. She's always been a ...................... and now she wants to lose weight before summer.

5. Instead of playing games on your phone, you could go outside and play ....................... or hide-and-seek.

6. Let's stop the .......................... and get back to work.

7. When Jason fell off a ladder and spilled blue paint all over himself, several ......................s gathered around him but no one helped him.

8. Our old furniture was a .......................... of the things we'd inherited or bought cheaply in our twenties. It was time to buy something new.

KEY

I. a. chunky monkey   b. crisscross   c. fuddy-duddy   d. helter-skelter   e. hodgepodge   f. jibber-jabber   g. knick-knack   h. looky-loo

II. 1. fuddy-duddy, 2. helter-skelter, 3. knick-knack, 4. chunky monkey, 5. crisscross, 6. jibber-jabber, 7. looky-loos, 8. hodgepodge

Reduplication-based idioms 1

Some English idioms are based on reduplicated pairs or sets of words. The words often rhyme - they can also be minimal pairs - and the exercises below deal with such rhyming pairs (spelt separately, together or hyphenated). Some of these words come from children's puns or nursery rhymes while others can be 'adult' words, even taboo expressions.

The words used below can be found in Wiktionary at https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Category:English_reduplications

Ex. I Write the following idioms using ordinary (orthographic) English spelling.

a. /ˈɑːdʒi ˈbɑːdʒi/ b. /breɪn dreɪn/ c. /'klæptræp/ d. /'dɪli 'dæli/ e. /'iːzi 'piːzi/ f. /'hændi 'dændi/ g. /'heərəm 'skeərəm/ h. /'hʌm,drʌm/

Ex. II Fill in the gaps in the following sentences using the phrases from Exercise I.

1. The journey was exhausting. The kids had a/an .......................... over where to stop for lunch and there were traffic jams on the motorway.
2. A good comedian should not resort to cheap ........................... like a circus clown.
3. Countries that don't pay their scientists enough usually suffer from .......................... .
4. Now that my Spanish holiday is over, I'm back to my ......................... existence.
5. I don't want you to ............................. and play computer games all night. Your maths exam is tomorrow, remember?
6. 'Young people can be so ......................... - no wonder so many of them can't hold down a job,' said Mr Grumpy.
7. The new online shop has all sorts of clever, ....................... tools for gardeners.
8. Paolo is Italian and fluent in French, and he says learning Spanish was .......................... for him.

KEY

I. a. argy-bargy, b. brain drain, c. claptrap, d. dilly-dally, e, easy peasy, f. handy dandy, g. harum-scarum h. humdrum

II. 1. argy-bargy, 2. claptrap, 3. brain drain, 4. humdrum, 5. dilly-dally, 6. harum-scarum, 7. handy dandy, 8. easy peasy

Minimal pairs: /ɜː/, /ɪə/ and /eə/

Ex. 1 Look at the following words containing a. /ɜː/, b. /ɪə/ and find their counterparts containing the diphthong /eə/.

a. burr, err, fir/fur, her, purr

b. beer, clear, dear/deer, ear, fear, hear/here, leer, mere, peer, spear, steer, tear (crying), year

Ex. 2 Choose the correct option. 

a. All is fare/fair/fir in love and war.   

b. Please open the window. We need some air/heir.

c. Who was the air/heir/hare to the Spanish throne?   

d. Have you met the mare/mayor/mere of Paris?

e. Some teenagers start smoking because of pare/peer/pear pressure.   

f. Please be careful on the wooden stares/stairs/steers.   

g. It's best to stare/steer/stair well clear of criminals. 

h. Men shouldn't leer/lair at women. 

i. The RSPCA rescued a young deer/dear/dare in the city park yesterday. 

j. The right to bare/bear/beer arms is an often quoted American law.

k. "Nothing to fear/fir/fare but fear/fir/fare itself."  

KEY

1. a. bare/bear, air/heir, fair/fare, hair/hare, pear

    b. bare/bear, Claire, dare, air/ere, fair/fare, hair/hare, lair, mare/mayor, pair, spare, stair/stare, tear (apart), yeah

2. a. fair, b. air, c. heir, d. mayor, e. peer, f. stairs, g. steer, h. leer, i. deer, j. bear, k. fear, fear,

Minimal pairs: /iː/ and /ɪə/

Ex. 1 Look at the following words containing the vowel /iː/ and find their counterparts containing the diphthong /ɪə/.

be/bee, bead, dee, E, fee, he, knee, me, pea, tea/tee, we, ye

Ex. 2 In each group of words find the one which does not contain the diphthong /ɪə/.

a. friar, career, superior, sphere

b. dearest, bear, King Lear, Caribbean

c. pianist, leer, foreign, area

d. misdemeanour, we're, gear, nearer

e. pier, peer, pear, beer

KEY

1. beer, beard, dear/deer, ear, fear, hear, near, mere, pier, tear (eye), we're/weir, year

2. a. friar, b. bear, c. foreign, d. misdemeanour, e. pear

Minimal pairs: /ɑː/, /aʊ/ and /əʊ/

Ex. Look at the following words containing 1. /ɑː/, 2. /əʊ/ and find their counterparts containing the diphthong /aʊ/.

1. bar, Bart, can't, car, Carl, grass, maths, tart

2. boat, bro, clone, foal, goat, gross, hoe, no, road/rode, woe

KEY

1. bough, bout, count, cow, cowl, grouse, mouths, tout

2. bout, brow, clown, foul/fowl, gout, grouse, how, now, rowed (argued), wow 

Minimal pairs: /ɔː/, /ɜː/ and /əʊ/

Ex. 1 Look at the following words containing the vowel 1. /ɔː/, 2. /ɜː/ and find their counterparts containing the diphthong /əʊ/.

a. boar/bore, call, called, corpse, door, floor, gnaw, morn/mourn, prawn, raw/roar, soar/sore, stork, tore

b. Bert, burn, curt, earn, earth, fir, girl, hurl, learn, nurse, perk, sir, stern, turn, were

Ex. 2 How does the 'silent -e' change the pronunciation of the following words?

cod - code, cop - cope, hop - hope, mop-mope, ton-tone

KEY
1. a. bow, coal, cold, copes, dough, Flo/floe/flow, know/no, moan, prone, roe, so, stoke, toe
b. boat, bone, coat, own, oath, foe, goal, hole, loan/lone, nose, poke, sew/so, stone, tone, woe

2. In the first four words the letter <o> stands for /ɒ/ on its own and in ton it is /ʌ/, but when there is a silent <-e>, the vowel is /əʊ/.

Minimal pairs: /ɔː/, /aɪ/ and /ɔɪ/

Ex. 1 Look at the following words containing the vowel /ɔː/ and find their counterparts containing the diphthong /ɔɪ/. What are the homophones of boar, oar and soar?

all, ball, boar, call, core, corn, fall, oar, roar, soar, tall, tore

Ex. 2 Look at the following words containing the vowel /aɪ/ and find their counterparts containing the diphthong /ɔɪ/.

aisle, bile, buy, eye, Kyle, file, lighter, rye, sigh, tied, try, vied
 
KEY
1. /ɔɪ/: oil, boil, boy/buoy, coil, coy, coin, foil, oy, Roy, soy, toil, toy; homophones: bore, ore, sore
2. oil, boil, boy/buoy, oy, coil, foil, loiter, roy, soy, toyed, Troy, void

Minimal pairs: /ɑː/, /aɪ/ and /eɪ/

Ex. 1 Look at the following words containing the vowel /ɑː/ and find their counterparts containing the diphthong /aɪ/.

arm, bar, bard, bark, Carl, cart, darn, mar, mart, par, scar, star, tar

Ex. 2 Look at the following words containing the diphthong /eɪ/ and find their counterparts containing the diphthong /aɪ/.

bake, brain, day, hate, hay, lane, lay, mane/main, may/May, neigh, pay, praise, pray, raise, ray, say, stay

Ex. 3 In each group of words choose the word which does not have /aɪ/ or /eɪ/.

/aɪ/ a. incline, pine, blinder, consider   b. achieve, blight, apply, drive

/eɪ/ c. Maine, Spain, train, said   d. afraid, Norway, quay, laid

KEY

1. I'm, buy, bide, bike, Kyle, kite, dine, my, mite, pie, sky, sty, Thai

2. bike, brine, die, height, hi/high, line, lie, mine, my, nigh, pie, prize, pry, rise, rye, sigh, sty

3. /aɪ/ a. consider, b. achieve

/eɪ/ c. said, d. quay

Minimal pairs: /e/ and /eɪ/

Ex. 1 Look at the following words containing the vowel /e/ and find their counterparts containing the diphthong /eɪ/.

bed, Ben, Bess, den, fell, gel, get, Jen, Ken, let, Mel, men, met, pen, red, rend, sell, tell, wed, well, when, wet, wreck, wren

Ex. 2 The following borrowings contain a final /-e/ in the original French. Which sound is used in English?

ballet, bouquet, chalet, crochet, duvet, fiancé(e), pâté, soirée, soufflé

KEY
1. bade, bane, base, Dane, fail, gaol/jail, gate, Jane, cane, late, mail/male, main/mane, mate, pain/pane, raid, rained, sale, tale, wade, wail, wane, wait, rake, rain

2. /-eɪ/ is pronounced because English phonology does not allow most short vowels to occur in the final position.

When in doubt in Exercise 2, I used the Cambridge Dictionary at dictionary.cambridge.org.

Minimal pairs: /e/ and /ɜː/

Ex. Look at the following words containing the short vowel /e/ and find their counterparts containing the long vowel /ɜː/.

bed, Ben, bet, Beth, bled, deck, en (letter), Fens, lend, lent/Lent, Ned, nest, sled, ten, tent, wed, wedding, weld, west

Ex. 2. Would the answers to Ex. 1 be pronounced differently in a rhotic accent? Provide examples of such accents.

KEY
1. bird, burn, Bert, birth, blurred, Dirk, earn/urn, ferns, learned, learnt, nerd, nursed, slurred, turn, turned, word, wording, world, worst
2. Yes, all of the answers to Ex. 1. would contain /r/ following /ɜː/ in a rhotic accent, e.g. that of Standard American English, Canadian English, Irish English or Scottish English. Some sources use the symbol /ɝ/ instead.