Words With Silent Letters

    Many words in English have silent letters. Silent letters are letters that you can't hear when you say the word, but that are there when you write the word.  So, silent letters cause difficulties for both native speakers and English learners, because they make the spelling of words different from their pronunciation. We must learn that the silent letter or letters are part of the standard spelling of these words. Today, this issue was discussed in class on the basis of the following words:

   Not all silent letters are completely redundant.
   Silent letters can distinguish between homophones, e.g. in/inn; be/bee; lent/leant. This is an aid to readers already familiar with both words.
  Silent letters may give an insight into the meaning or origin of a word, e.g. vineyard suggests vines more than the phonetic *vinyard would.
  Silent letters may help to put weight on a certain syllable, telling the reader to put more stress on the syllable. The final 〈fe〉 in giraffe gives a clue to the second-syllable stress, where *giraf might suggest initial-stress.

   As a curiosity, I tell you that in the case of sandwich, listen and often, they can be pronounced with or without the sound of d, in the first case, and t, in the last two.

Silent Vowels

Vowels	Words
a (in a digraph)	aisle, team, spread, boat
e (in a digraph)	great, heist, feud, pie, toe
e (ending vowel)	pale, scene, lime, stove, fuse
i (in a digraph)	pail, receive, believe, juice
o (in a digraph)	people, jeopardy
u (in a digraph)	gauge, laugh, guess, guide

Silent Consonants

Consonants	Words
b	comb, tomb, bomb, debt
c	black, scene, science
d	fudge, bridge, ledge
f	cliff, stuff, staff
g	gnarl, gnaw, gnome, foreign, sign
h	ghost, whistle; school, chord
k	knee, knife, knowledge
l	quill, swell, tall
m	mnemonics
n	condemn, column, solemn
p	pneumonia, receipt
s	brass, fuss, press
t	depot, potpourri, watch
w	window, shadow, answer
z	jazz, buzz

Silent Diagraph

Consonant Digraph	Words
gh	high, daughter

Some silent letters are sounded when other word forms are created.

Base Words	Other Word Forms
sign (silent letter g)	signal, signature
bomb (silent letter b)	bombard, bombardier
solemn (silent letter n)	solemnity, solemnize