Consonants - Voiceless and Voiced

Consonants are often described as the backbone of the language.  In spoken English, they are responsible for giving meaning to the language.  A rough 'rule of thumb' is this, if the consonants are clear and complete it is likely that the speaker will be understood.

Consonants can be categorised according to the presence of voice, the quality of their sound and to the physical location where they are created in the vocal mechanism.

When it comes to quality of sound, we find a group of voiced and voiceless consonants in English.  This means that the output and location of the sound being made is the same except for the presence or lack of voice in the final result.

This is a confusing concept for many language speakers where all consonants are given voice.  The voiced and voiceless consonants are given here in pairs.  In this list, the voiceless consonant appears first, followed by the voiced equivalent of the sound:

put          butter
ten          den
come      go
church    judge
full          very
thin         then
some      zeal
ship        pleasure

For more information, visit this page on the Voice & Word website.

If you struggle with any of these sounds, feel free to submit an audio snapshot of this list to me.

You can listen here to the words and sounds.