High school

Share on Facebook

maverick88

#73464 Fri, 11 Feb 05 11:53 PM

How would you say:
1-a high school
2-an high school

I tend more to 1... Thanks

maverick88

Joined on Mon, Nov 22 2004

Israel

Regular Member (695)

An English learner

MrPedantic

#73475 Sat, 12 Feb 05 12:56 AM

Yes, I too would say #1, Maverick.

MrP

MrPedantic

Joined on Tue, Oct 12 2004

Veteran Member (12,135)

...opella forensis / adducit febris...

asdf

#73510 Sat, 12 Feb 05 04:00 AM

I am not sure if this is a rule, but when the "h" sound is voiced, you usually use "a" rather than "an."

asdf

Joined on Sun, Oct 29 2006

Junior Member (70)

The difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and the lightning bug.

Casi

#73513 Sat, 12 Feb 05 04:24 AM

Me, too.

As noted already, if is pronounced (it isn't always pronounced, though: dialect variation), then "a" is used. (Note, the symbols represent letters, and the symols [. . .] represent sounds.)

=> a Cool [H]

igh school

If isn't pronounced, then another consonant is provided, notable the in "an", and it straddles the word boundary, like this:

=> an No [N]

orange
=> an No [N]

apple
=> an No [N]

igloo
=> an No [N]

egg

Pronouncing two vowels across a syllable boundary is difficult to do physiologically, so a consonant is added to ease the flow.

As for , there two other ways to pronounce it:

1. an No [N]

igh school
2. a [?]igh school (the symbol [?] represents a glottal stop)

Casi

Joined on Sat, Sep 25 2004

Regular Member (547)

Dialects, Vowels, Consonants, Glottals