Pronunciation Practice: Homophones-II
Dear
readers, in the previous post we learnt about Homophones in English. To acquire
good pronunciation, one should have brilliant receptive capacity. To make
distinction between pronunciation of two similar words, one should be good at
listening and observing the sound as well as rapid lip movement. Practising on
listening to different sounds and repeating the heard sounds in the exact way
makes one speak a language with appreciable pronunciation. In this connection,
now we are going to learn what is “Homophone” and how it helps a person in both
listening and speaking.
According
to Cambridge Dictionary, Homophone means “A word that is pronounced the same as another word but has a different meaning or spelling, or both”. In simple
words, “homo” means “same”, and “phone” means sound. Therefore, in English
there a lot of homophones which play pivotal role in communication.
For example,
Sun – Son
See – Sea
Eyes -
Ice
The
above-mentioned words contain the same pronunciation, but they convey different
meanings and spellings. Let us learn some of the popular homophones available
in English.
Fort - Fought
Forth - Fourth
Foul - Fowl
Franc - Frank
Freeze - Frieze
Furs - Furze
Gait - Gate
Genes - Jeans
Gild - Guild
Gilt - Guilt
Great - Grate
Greys - Graze
Hair - Hare
Hall - Haul
Heel - Heal
Hart - Heart
Hear - Here
Higher
- Hire
Hour - Our
Idle - Idol
In - Inn
It’s - Its
Knead - Need
Knew - New
Knight - Night
Knit - Nit
Knot - Not
Knows - Nose
Laps - Lapse
Lead
(Noun) - Led
(Verb)
Lessen - Lesson
Liar - Lyre
Licker - Liquor
Loan - Lone
Made - Maid
Mail - Male
Main - Mane
Mall - Maul
Mask - Masque
Meat - Meet
Naval - Navel
Ode - Owed
One - Won
Packed - Pact
Pause
- Paws
Peace - Piece
Peal - Peel
Plane - Plain
Principal - Principle
Rain - Rein / Reign
Rap - Wrap
Read - Reed
Real - Reel
Right - Rite / Write
Ring - Wring
Road - Rode
Root - Route
Scene - Seen
Sea - See
Son - Sun
Stair - Stare
Stationary - Stationery
Steal - Steel
Storey - Story
Tale - Tail
There - Their
Threw - Through
Throne - Thrown
Tire - Tyre
Vain - Vein
Wail - Whale
Waist - Waste
Wait - Weight
Waive - Wave
Weak - Week
Weather - Whether
Which - Witch
Whit - Wit
Yoke - Yolk
Practising
these homophones certainly helps in refining pronunciation. In the next post,
let us explore British and American English equivalents.
Author:
K.
Nandhakumar
Assistant
Professor of English
Sri
Ramakrishna Mission Vidyalaya College of Arts and Science (Autonomous)
Coimbatore-
641 020
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