6

I'm confused about the pronunciation of words like "carry", "marry", and "parry". When checking Vocabulary.com, I see these pronunciations:

parry: US /ˈpɛri/ UK /ˈpɛri/
carry: US /ˈkɛri/ UK /ˈkæri/
marry: US /ˈmɛri/ UK /ˈmæri/

However, other major dictionaries show different pronunciations:

Collins Cobuild: /ˈpæri/, /ˈkæri/, /ˈmæri/
Oxford Learner's Dictionary: US/UK /ˈkæri/, US/UK /ˈmæri/, US/UK /ˈpæri/

I had always understood that the "a" in these words is pronounced as /æ/ in both American and British English. Why does Vocabulary.com show /ɛ/ for these words, especially in US English where I thought the standard pronunciation was /æ/?

Is Vocabulary.com using a non-standard pronunciation, or is there a regional variation I'm not aware of? I would appreciate clarification on which pronunciation is more common or standard in contemporary English.

Improve this question
1

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
9

Vowels are often a bit flexible, and there are many American and many British accents.

Vocabularly.com is indicating the "Marry Merry Mary merger" About 60% of Americans merge the vowel sounds of a and e when they appear before an "r". It's most common in Western and Central dialects, and less common in the North East, although increasing, perhaps due to the influence of Hollywood. A dictionary can't show the pronunciation of every dialect.

It's rare outside of American dialects. Most British dialects distinguish these words. For me, as a British speaker, There is a difference of pronunciation between "parry" (to block a thrust in fencing) and "perry" (pear cider). So while is is reasonable to show the merged pronunciation in American English, I think the British pronunciation should be /ˈpæri/

Improve this answer
4
  • I knew an American (educated, Massachusetts raised, a Longyear) who made 'mirror' sound like 'mere', and 'curry' like 'kirry' to my 19-year-old English ear. Commented 2 days ago
  • 1
    Most American dialects with one or more pre-R mergers produce only close/tense/"long" vowels in this position, so all of Mary, merry, marry have tense /e/ there and never open/lax/"short" /ɛ/ nor lax /æ/. That's because the tense–lax distinction is neutralized before R in the coda by these rhotic speakers, which allows broader phonetic latitude without affecting the phoneme perceived or produced. The same principle explains why they also have tense /o/ or tense /i/ there before R rather than the corresponding lax /ɔ/ or lax /ɪ/ vowels in that position that some other speakers have there. Commented yesterday
  • 2
    thanks. in their guide, vocabulary.com say that they only use /e/ in the diphthong /eɪ/. We should remember that a dictionary only offers a broad phonemic transcription, mostly of use to native speakers who already know the sounds of English, and only need reminding. IPA isn't useless for ESL learners, but when a recording is available too, learners should focus more on the recording rather than the transcription. Commented yesterday
  • 3
    It seems completely arbitrary and bizarre to indicate a merger in BrE in parry, but not in marry and carry. Obviously, parry is a much less common word, so lack of data may play a part, but I have never in my life heard anyone – from anywhere in the Anglosphere – have the marry/merry merger in carry and marry, but not in parry. I can only surmise that this is a simple mistake on Vocabulary.com, and that the UK pronunciation should have been written as /'pæri/. Commented 23 hours ago

You must log in to answer this question.

Start asking to get answers

Find the answer to your question by asking.

Ask question

Explore related questions

See similar questions with these tags.