Language Supplement for US English (en-US)

This guide contains language specific information referred to in the "Voxeo Enhanced Text-To-Speech (TTS) Guide".

Symbolic Phonetic Representations

The following tables show the inventory of available symbols for use in en-US Symbolic Phonetic Representations (SPRs). Use this chapter in conjunction with the SPR information found in the Voxeo Enhanced Text-To-Speech (TTS) Guide.

Each sound symbol is accompanied by examples illustrating typical spellings of the sound in actual words, with the letters representing the given sound bolded. Due to dialectal differences, the SPR examples shown may not always agree with your own pronunciations.

Vowels

The following table includes the en-US symbols for vowels.

 US English symbol

Example words

a father, lot
A back, had
c law, cough
e cake, pain
E hedge, let
H mug, son
i see, speak, believe
I pick, ill
o both, oak
O toil, boy
R butter, hurt
u zoo, truth
U took, put
W out, cow
x sofa, alone
X roses, hinted
Y life, fly, bonsai, Einstein

Consonants

The following table includes the en-US symbols for consonants.

 US English symbol

Example words

b bad, sob
C chip, witch, nature
d dip, had
D this, breathe
f field, if, graph
F ("flap") writer, fiddle
g good, bug
G sing, finger
h hot, hero
J Jane, huge
k kill, cat, make, back
l low, hall
m man, hum, summer
n never, sun, winner
N ("syllabic n") button, satin, burden
p pit, rip
r borrow, rake
s seal, miss, ceiling
S ship, wish
t tip, pet
T thing, Beth
v vase, save
w wear, quick
y yes, Virginia
z zip, phase
Z treasure, garage

Syllable Stress

The following table includes the en-US symbols for syllable stress.

 

Description 

0

no stress

1

primary stress (most prominent stress in the word)

2

secondary stress

The syllable stress marker should be within the boundaries of the syllable, and to the left of the vowel. If you do not know where the syllable boundaries in a word like construction are located, any of the following SPRs correctly place the primary stress on the second vowel:

construction
\![kX
n1strHkSXn]
\![kXns1trHkSXn]
\![kXnst1rHkSXn]
\![kXnstr1HkSXn]

Syllable Boundary

The following table includes the en-US symbol for a syllable boundary.

 

Description 

. (period or dot)

beginning of a syllable