one of you reached out to me and said
Rachel will you make a video that goes
over the pronunciation of oh oh there
are many different pronunciations do you
know them all let's learn them and
practice them
as we study the pronunciation of any
given letter or set of letters we have
to remember the sad fact that English is
not phonetic
that's why spelling can be so tricky and
why pronunciation can be so hard a
phonetic language is one where speech
sounds like ah for example are written
just one way but in English the vowel
sound aw appears with many different
spellings in different words the letter
A like in father the letter E like in
Sergeant ah the letter O like in body ah
the letters AAA like in the word bizarre
ah the letters ei like in the word heart
ah for example the same is true for
letters any letter or a set of letters
like Oh Oh might have more than one
pronunciation the most common
pronunciation for the letters Oh Oh is
the sound ooh
this happens in words like zoo food moon
loop ooh
the lips are a bit relaxed and then come
into a tighter circle whoo I have a
video that goes over the pronunciation
of the sound including some close-ups of
the mouth this is in my sounds of
American English series and I'll link to
that video here and in the description
below
another common pronunciation is the
sound like an book cook foot hoody
Oh notice the lips flare a bit for this
sound ah see an in-depth video on that
sound too by clicking here or you know
it's even better I'll link to the
playlist with all the sounds of American
English at the end of this video another
pronunciation in some common words with
au o is the aw as in law sound for this
sound I've only found words where oh oh
is followed by our and that does change
the sound it makes it more round let me
show you what I mean some common words
would be door pour floor all as in law
is pronounced like this ah ah
but in these words the mouth closes more
and the tongue pulls back a little bit
more door oh all dull all door ah law so
the sound is more closed what about the
words flood and blood
what vowel sound do you hear their flood
blood bloody it's the UH as in butter
sound so a fourth sound now we've talked
about food foot floor and flood in all
of these words oh oh is pronounced
differently in food it's ooh in foot
it's a in floor it's all in flood it's
ah look at the four words can you tell
by looking which if I will sound it is
what's the clue how do you know the
pronunciation of the letters oh oh by
looking at a word do you know the answer
it's a disappointing one there's no way
to know by looking at these words really
the pronunciation of a word has to be
memorized when you learn the definition
of a new word I know it's extra work
it's one of the things that makes
communicating in English speaking
English that much harder food foot floor
flood there are even two more
pronunciations though they're not as
frequent first the word cooperation or
for short you might see it as co-op
what's interesting is that they're the
two letters o are actually in different
syllables making two different sounds
the first is the Oh diphthong Co oh oh
and the second is the AH as in father
vowel oh oh coop coop
occasionally you'll see this written
with a dash between these two syllables
but often not co-op this pronunciation
is also in the word zoology where there
is a syllable split between the two O's
Oh
zoology this one is funny because it's
related to the word zoo where the
double-o makes one sound the avowal
zoology this study of animals zoo a
place where animals are kept same root
different pronunciation of oh-oh
also the OO in the word brooch the most
common pronunciation for this in the
u.s. is with the Oh as in no diphthong
Oh bro brooch a brooch is a piece of
jewelry that you can pin to your shirt
or jacket so we've gone over six
pronunciations let's review
double-o makes the Oh diphthong like in
brooch it makes two sounds
the Oh diphthong plus the OO vowel like
in cooperation or zoology there are also
four vowels that can be made with the
double o food foot floor flood for these
four let's go over more words for each
category the as in butter vowel flood
blood and other words or compound words
with blood like bloody or blood work the
aw as in law plus our floor all floor
door anything with a door like doorway
doormat indoor-outdoor also the word
pour which is a homophone with this word
pour pee oh you are like when you pour
water out of a pitcher the as in push
vowel there are lots that end in k book
cook hook look took and any words that
are variations or compound words like
bookshelf bookstore bookworm
bookmark booking books cooking cookbook
fish hook unhook looks looking look out
miss took undertook we have foot and
related words like football barefoot
foothill good hood would and related
words like goodbye lots of words that
end in hood like neighborhood boyhood
girlhood adulthood we have woods
woodpecker woodcutter plywood redwood
hardwood uh we have Brooke booger cookie
and the most common pronunciation the
avowal like in to boot
cool moon mode boom doom food goofy fool
hoop loop noon oops
booze roof soon cartoon bloom aloof
boost booze broom hoop most proof scoop
shoot stoop bamboo Google goose I hope
this video has helped clarify what's
going on with the letters oh oh you have
several different pronunciations but
we've gone over a lot of the most common
words with oo in this video we're any of
the pronunciations different from what
you thought it might not be a bad idea
to watch the video again to solidify the
words for each pronunciation also here's
that playlist I promised you it has a
video for each sound in American English
that of course includes the possible
pronunciations of oo that you learned
today as you go forward speaking English
think to yourself I am now the master of
the letters oh oh that's it
thanks so much for using Rachel's
English if you want to see my absolute
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