A silent letter in an alphabetic writing system is a letter that in a word does not match to any sound in the word’s pronunciation.
A silent letter—a term used informally in English pronunciation—is a letter or letter combination of the alphabet that is frequently not uttered in a word. The b in subtle, the c in scissors, the g in design, the t in listen, and the gh in thinking are all examples.
Silent letters can be found in a lot of words. “Roughly 60% of words in English have a silent letter in them,” according to Ursula Dubosarsky, author of The Word Snoop (Dubosarsky 2008). Continue reading to learn about the many sorts of silent letters and how they effect pronunciation and language development in English.
Silent Letters Come in a Variety of Forms
A Survey of English Spelling author Edward Carney divides silent letters into two categories: auxiliary and dummy. He divides the two groupings into the following categories.
Auxiliary Letters
Auxiliary letters are part of a set of letters that spell a sound that isn’t represented by a single letter. As an example,
There’s /th/ thing /th/ there /sh/ share /zh/ treasure /ng/ song.” “
Dummy Letters
“There are two types of dummy letters: inactive letters and empty letters.
Inert letters are letters that are sometimes heard and sometimes not heard in a word segment. As an example,
resignation (g is not heard)
withdrawal (g is heard)
heinous (g is not heard)
(There is a g heard).”
“Like auxiliary letters and inactive letters, empty letters have no purpose. The letter u in the word gauge, for example, is blank. Silent consonants can be found in the following words:
d: bridge, ledge, edge c: indict ch: yacht
g: sign, design, assign, foreign
h: spaghetti, rhinoceros
knuckle, knee, knit, knob, knob, knob, knob, knob, knob, knob, knob, knob, knob, knob, knob, knob, knob, knob
m: mnemonic n: autumn, column l: calf, talk, could, should, would m: mnemonic
p: raspberry, receipt
t: castle, whistle
w: “answer,” “wrap,” “wring,” “wring,” “wring,” “wring,” “wring,” “wring,” “wring,” “wring,” “w (Carney 1994).
Silent letters are more difficult to predict than empty letters in new words. “There are no standards that we can apply to words with empty letters[;] you just have to use them and remember their spelling,” Strausser and Paniza, authors of Painless English for Speakers of Other Languages, say. (Strausser and Paniza 2007, for example).
In the spelling sequences mb and bt, the letter b is always silent in the word-final position: comb, numb, bomb, limb, debt…
In the spelling sequence dj: adjective, adjunct, neighboring…, the letter d is always silent.
In the spelling sequence gm or gn, the letter g is silent: phlegm, gnarl, champagne, sign, gnat, gnaw…
In the spelling sequence gh and in the word-final position: ghost, ghetto, aghast, ghastly, ah, eh, oh… h is silent in the spelling sequence gh and in the word-final position: ghost, ghetto, aghast, ghastly, ah, eh, oh…
In the word-initial spelling sequence kn, the letter k is always silent: kneel, knee, knob, knight, knave, knowledge, knife, knock,” (Sadanand and colleagues, 2004).
Silent N in mn words
The silent N appears at the conclusion of every syllable. It’s always following the letter M, too. When you see -MN at the end of a word, it’s safe to presume you’re only saying the MN. Unlike G, which can be silent at the beginning or end of a word, there are no popular words that begin with silent N.
ISN’T -MN ALWAYS Silent?
Sometimes you’ll see -MN- in the middle of a word that has something to do with these silent N words.
Autumnal is the adjective form of autumn, and damnation is the noun form of damn. A hymnal is a book of songs. You normally pronounce the N in words like these where the first letter after MN is a vowel. We pronounce the N in autumnal, hymnal, and damnation.
However, in other circumstances, the sound that follows the MN is a consonant sound. Columns, for example, and solemnly. We normally do not pronounce the N when the next sound after the MN is a consonant sound.
WHY DOES N GO SILENT AT TIMES?
“Silent Letters are the ghosts of past pronunciations,” The Independent puts it eloquently. These words used to have pronounced Ns in them.
The majority of them are Latin speakers who have learned English. Autumn, for example, is derived from the Latin autumnus, whereas column is derived from the Latin columna. The N was spoken in these words. If you try to pronounce them, you’ll notice that the N in autumnus is relatively simple to pronounce. It’s not simple to pronounce the letter N at the end of fall. Because the N in autumnus is preceded by a vowel, this is the case. It is the beginning of a new syllable.
When Latin words became English terms throughout time, most of them lost their Latin suffixes, such as -a and -us, and -ae and -i. The MN got really difficult to say once we eliminated those last syllables, so we just quit!
Conclusion
Once you understand the rules, most languages that use phonetic alphabets are rather simple to read and pronounce. Simply put, you speak what you see. Some languages, such as English and French, do, nevertheless, utilize a lot of silent letters. This is a list of letters that have been written but not spoken. These letters are frequently left over from when the term was pronounced differently than it is now. Silent letters can be mastered by understanding the laws of the language and remembering typical silent letter words. You can seek up the pronunciation or ask a native speaker if you’re still unsure whether a letter in a word is silent.
All these words have the letters mn. The letter n is silent.
Autumn- It’s usually cool in the autumn.
condemn -The judge had to condemn the man to a life sentence.
column -You can’t support a building with just one column.
solemn -The mood was solemn.
hymn - We stood to sing the hymn.
