Month VS Months

Cleveland   Thu Aug 09, 2007 9:03 pm GMT
How to pronounce the plural term of Month? "mQnW+z" or "mQns"? I found that it's really hard to pronounce something like "mQnW+z" and all people around me they all pronounce it as mQns, the end of this word just like the end of "tennis" or "Paris"

how to correctly pronounce it? it mustn't be "mQnW+z" cuz I don't think we humanbeings could possibly pronounce something like that.

help me! fellows
Pete   Thu Aug 09, 2007 9:06 pm GMT
I have no problem pronouncing "months" as [mVnTs]. I don't understand why you say it's impossible.
Pete   Thu Aug 09, 2007 9:09 pm GMT
I don't pronounce "months" as [mVns] as that sounds like "munse".
Travis   Thu Aug 09, 2007 9:11 pm GMT
Note that many English dialects have [mV~nts] or like for the plural of "month" [mV~nT] rather than [mV~nTs]. Actually, here "month" is [mV~T] and its plural is [mV~ts] except in very careful speech.
Pete   Thu Aug 09, 2007 9:18 pm GMT
[mV~nts] "munts" would actually be the plural of *"munt" rather than "month". "month" is [mV~nT] thus the plural is [mV~nTs].
Cleveland   Thu Aug 09, 2007 9:18 pm GMT
no, what I meant was when you pronounce the "th" with a phonetic symbol of "W", you have to protrude your tongue between your upper teeth and lower teeth, and when you will pronounce Z, you have to draw back your tongue... so it's what I said, it must not be pronounced "mQnW+z", should be "mQns" or what u suggested "mVnTs". But the problem is, by my opinion, if the end of the words are "th" that they should be pronounced with "z" sound in their pluralities, like if "tooth" wasn't a special noun and had a plurality, you should pronounce it like "tooths[tu:W+z]" right? but how you can pronounce it? if it's not like that, why?
Pete   Thu Aug 09, 2007 9:21 pm GMT
<<no, what I meant was when you pronounce the "th" with a phonetic symbol of "W", you have to protrude your tongue between your upper teeth and lower teeth, and when you will pronounce Z, you have to draw back your tongue... so it's what I said, it must not be pronounced "mQnW+z", should be "mQns" or what u suggested "mVnTs".>>

"Month" does not have the [Q] sound. Rather it's pronounce as though it were spelled "munth", with the [V] sound in "sun".
Cleveland   Thu Aug 09, 2007 9:22 pm GMT
I don't know if my "W" is the equivalent of your "T", I can't type it with my keyboard, for make sure about this, my "W" looks like a slim O with a spot inside
Pete   Thu Aug 09, 2007 9:25 pm GMT
Well I'm using X-sampa http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-sampa. [W] in X-sampa represents a voiceless bilabial approximate, something which certainly doesn't occur in "months".
Cleveland   Thu Aug 09, 2007 9:27 pm GMT
can anybody upload a sound track to explain this? Iv been studying English for a long time and reached a considerable level for this language, but I still don't know how to pronounce them correctly!
Pete   Thu Aug 09, 2007 9:28 pm GMT
<<"W" looks like a slim O with a spot inside>>

Well, then yes, it would be equivalent to [T]. [T] represents that consonant sound of the "th" in "thing" and "month" in X-sampa.
Pete   Thu Aug 09, 2007 9:30 pm GMT
<<can anybody upload a sound track to explain this? Iv been studying English for a long time and reached a considerable level for this language, but I still don't know how to pronounce them correctly!>>

Sorry, but I don't have a microphone.
Cleveland   Thu Aug 09, 2007 9:31 pm GMT
So Pete, what I meant was "T", but when I copied and pasted here that it turned to "W", sorry for this confusing
Pete   Thu Aug 09, 2007 9:32 pm GMT
<<So Pete, what I meant was "T", but when I copied and pasted here that it turned to "W", sorry for this confusing>>

No problem.
Pete   Thu Aug 09, 2007 9:35 pm GMT
Just to clarify again however, the word "month" does not have the [Q] sound. Rather it shares the [V] sound in "sun", "run", "bun" etc.