1047: Syllabic Consonants Oct 21, 2017

Syllables can be fairly complicated, but the procedure for dividing them is fairly objective. In English, a syllable has an optional onset, which is a group of one or more consonants, then a nucleus which is usually—though not necessarily—a vowel (more on that later) followed by the optional coda. For example, in 'hugs' /həgz/, /h/ is the onset, /ə/ is the nucleus, and /gz/ is the coda. There will be a post explaining how this can be determined in the near future. Some consonants however, even in English, can be considered to compose the nucleus and the coda, which together is called the 'rhyme'. The sounds [m], [n], [ɹ], and [l] all can do this, such as in the end of the word 'column' where the pronunciation can be argued to switch from /l/ to /m̩/ (marked with a small diacritic underneath) without a vowel in the middle, though also sometimes it is written with the schwa [ə] in the middle for simplicity. In other words like 'hmm', it is even clearer, because one doesn't even need to open ones mouth. It is for this reason that the verb 'can' in a sentence is often not pronounced with the [æ] (for Americans) but may sound more like /cn̩/, even in words like 'cannot'.