"library"

Guest   Mon Feb 05, 2007 6:22 pm GMT
How do you pronounce "library"? I pronounce it "lie-brerry".
Lazar   Mon Feb 05, 2007 6:29 pm GMT
I pronounce it the same as you; but to be clear, I put the stress on the first syllable; [ˈlaɪˌbɹɛɹi].

And in light of the "fairy-ferry" discussion, I'll clarify that in my dialect, "library" rhymes with "ferry" and not with "fairy". ;-)
Gabriel   Mon Feb 05, 2007 7:56 pm GMT
I myself pronounce it [ˈlaɪbɹəɹi], with the risk of having it sometimes reduced to [ˈlaɪbɹi] in rapid speech.
Travis   Mon Feb 05, 2007 8:50 pm GMT
I myself for the record pronounce "library" as ["L\a:Ibr\e:Ri:] (or with [M\] rather than [L\] and or with [bR] instead of [br\]).

>>And in light of the "fairy-ferry" discussion, I'll clarify that in my dialect, "library" rhymes with "ferry" and not with "fairy". ;-) <<

That surprises me, as I myself would expect it to have historically had [e:r\] (and thus in your case [E@`] here) from the shifting of Late Middle English [a:] to [e:] (via [E:]).
Lazar   Mon Feb 05, 2007 8:59 pm GMT
<<That surprises me, as I myself would expect it to have historically had [e:r\] (and thus in your case [E@`] here) from the shifting of Late Middle English [a:] to [e:] (via [E:]).>>

Yeah, it is unexpected from the orthography, but the adjectival ending "-ary" is always [Er\i] in my dialect. It's just a weird anomaly. (Perhaps my dialect went through a stage in which the "-ary" got reduced to [@`i] or [@r\i], British-style, and confusion arose when the full vowel was reconstructed.)
Guest   Mon Feb 05, 2007 9:32 pm GMT
I also say /'lai.br?.ri/ with a secondary accent on the "brerry" (which rhymes with "ferry" despite being spelled with an "a"). [I am the same "Guest" from the fun ferry-fairy thing.]

Sometimes, when talking fast, I say /'lai.br.i/ with a syllabic "r", which seems to imply /'laibr?ri/, like Gabriel's pronunciation, and kind of like /'t?m.pr.t?r/ for /'t?m.pr?.t?r/ "temperature".

I have also heard /'lai.b?.ri/ (again with a secondary accent on the "berry"), mostly from black Americans, and /'laibr?r?/ from snooty English people in the movies. ;)
Guest   Mon Feb 05, 2007 9:34 pm GMT
Sadly my IPA looks like question marks. :(

/'laI.brE.ri/

/'laI.br.i/

/'laI.br@.ri/

/'tEm.pr.tSr/

/'tEm.pr@.tSr/

/'laI.bE.ri/

/'laI.br@.rI/
Franco   Mon Feb 05, 2007 10:21 pm GMT
Can it be said "lai-bree"? Sorry I don't understand phonetic alphabet.
Lazar   Mon Feb 05, 2007 10:56 pm GMT
<<Can it be said "lai-bree"?>>

If you're learning British English, definitely. The Cambridge Online Dictionary lists this pronunciation.

If you're learning American English, though, I think you'd be better to go with "brerry", rather than "bree", on the end.
Jim   Tue Feb 06, 2007 3:29 am GMT
/lAe.bri/ i.e. "lai-bree"/"lie-bri" i.e. same as in British English (except with an Aussie accent).

If you're learning British English, Aussie English, Kiwi English, Irish English ..., go with the two-syllable version.

If you're learning North American English, go with the three syllable version.

If you're just learning English, I s'pose you take your pick.
Jonx   Tue Feb 06, 2007 9:54 pm GMT
I pronounce it /laIb3`i/.
MegaBox   Sun Feb 18, 2007 2:21 pm GMT
/laI.brI/