Arpabet

Arpabet is a phonetic transcription code developed by Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) as a part of their Speech Understanding Project (1971–1976). It represents each phoneme of General American English with a distinct sequence of ASCII characters. Arpabet has been used in several speech synthesizers, like SAM for the Commodore 64, Say for the Amiga and TextAssist for the PC. It is also used in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary.

Contents

Symbols

In Arpabet, every phoneme is represented by one or two capital letters. Digits are used as stress indicators and are placed at the end of the stressed syllabic vowel. Punctuation marks are used like in the written language, to represent intonation changes at the end of clauses and sentences. The stress values are:

Stress

Value Description
0 No stress
1 Primary stress
2 Secondary stress

Vowels

Monophthongs
Arpabet IPA Word examples
AO ɔ off (AO1 F); fall (F AO1 L); frost (F R AO1 S T)
AA ɑ father (F AA1 DH ER), cot (K AA1 T)
IY i bee (B IY1); she (SH IY1)
UW u you (Y UW1); new (N UW1); food (F UW1 D)
EH ɛ red (R EH1 D); men (M EH1 N)
IH ɪ big (B IH1 G); win (W IH1 N)
UH ʊ should (SH UH1 D), could (K UH1 D)
AH ʌ but (B AH1 T), sun (S AH1 N)
ə sofa (S OW1 F AH0), alone (AH0 L OW1 N)
AX discus (D IH1 S K AX0 S); note distinction from discuss (D IH0 S K AH1 S)
AE æ at (AE1 T); fast (F AE1 S T)
Diphthongs
Arpabet IPA Word Examples
EY say (S EY1); eight (EY1 T)
AY my (M AY1); why (W AY1); ride (R AY1 D)
OW show (SH OW1); coat (K OW1 T)
AW how (HH AW1); now (N AW1)
OY ɔɪ boy (B OY1); toy (T OY1)
R-colored vowels
Arpabet IPA Word Examples
ER ɝ her (HH ER0); bird (B ER1 D); hurt (HH ER1 T), nurse (N ER1 S)
ɚ father (F AA1 DH ER); coward (K AW1 ER D)
EH R ɛr air (EH1 R); where (W EH1 R); hair (HH EH1 R)
UH R ʊr cure (K Y UH1 R); bureau (B Y UH1 R OW0), detour (D IH0 T UH1 R)
AO R ɔr more (M AO1 R); bored (B AO1 R D); chord (K AO1 R D)
AA R ɑr large (L AA1 R JH); hard (HH AA1 R D)
IH R or IY R ɪr ear (IY1 R); near (N IH1 R)
AW R aʊr This seems to be a rarely used r-controlled vowel. In some dialects flower (F L AW1 R; in other dialects F L AW1 ER0)

Consonants

Stops
Arpabet IPA Word Examples
P p pay (P EY1)
B b buy (B AY1)
T t take (T EY1 K)
D d day (D EY1)
K k key (K IY1)
G ɡ go (G OW1)
Affricates
Arpabet IPA Word Examples
CH chair (CH EH1 R)
JH just (JH AH1 S T); gym (JH IH1 M)
Fricatives
Arpabet IPA Word Examples
F f for (F AO1 R)
V v very (V EH1 R IY0)
TH θ thanks (TH AE1 NG K S); Thursday (TH ER1 Z D EY2)
DH ð that (DH AE1 T); the (DH AH0); them (DH EH1 M)
S s say (S EY1)
Z z zoo (Z UW1)
SH ʃ show (SH OW1)
ZH ʒ measure (M EH1 ZH ER0); pleasure (P L EH1 ZH ER)
HH h house (HH AW1 S)
Nasals
Arpabet IPA Word Examples
M m man (M AE1 N)
N n no (N OW1)
NG ŋ sing (S IH1 NG)
Liquids
Arpabet IPA Word Examples
L l late (L EY1 T)
R r or ɹ run (R AH1 N)
DX ɾ wetter (W EH DX AXR)
Semivowels
Arpabet IPA Word Examples
Y j yes (Y EH1 S)
W w way (W EY1)
(missing) hw or ʍ "when" etc. in some dialects

References

See also

Other ASCII phonetic codes: