Hard and soft c

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A hard c vs. a soft c is a feature that occurs in many languages, including English in which there are two sounds represented by the letter "c". A hard c is a velar stop /k/ representing by "c" and a soft c is a sibilant /s/ or an affricative /tS/ represented by "c".

[edit] English

In English, the hard c is the sound of the "c" /k/ in "cat" and "cut" distinct from the soft "c" /s/ in "cent" and "city". The soft c occurs when the "c" comes before the letters "e", "i" and "y" (as well as "ae" and "oe" in British English) and the hard c occurs elsewhere.

There are very few exceptions to this rule:

• celt and celtic are pronounced with a hard C (unless referring to the sports teams - see Pronunciation of Celtic for more)
• recce is pronounced with a hard C

[edit] Other

In Italian, the soft c is the "c" sound in "certo" as distinct from the "c" sound in "caffè".

[edit] References