TOPIC: “PHONOLOGY OF

ENGLISH AS COMPARED TO
THE PHONOLOGY OF URDU”

Lecture Notes: SHAGUFTA MOGHAL

PHONOLOGY.
Phonology is the branch of
linguistics which studies the
sound system in a language

Lecture Notes: SHAGUFTA MOGHAL

Urdu

 Urdu is considered as a status symbol after English in

educated circles of Pakistan. The Urdu language is the
national language and one of two official languages of the
country of Pakistan. The other official language is English.
It is also a language that is heavily associated with the
Muslim religion, and there are around 65 million speakers
of Urdu worldwide.

Lecture Notes: SHAGUFTA MOGHAL

English

English is the most commonly spoken language in the world.

One out of five people can speak or at least understand
English. English is the official language of 53 countries.
That is a lot of people to meet and speak to. English is
spoken as a first language by around 400 million people
around the world. English is the language of science, of
aviation, computers, diplomacy, and tourism.

Lecture Notes: SHAGUFTA MOGHAL

English and Urdu Phonology

English and Urdu, both languages have

some characteristics which are based on:
1) Place of articulation
2) Manner of articulation

Lecture Notes: SHAGUFTA MOGHAL

Place of articulation

It tells us where the consonants are produced. For each

consonant two parts of the mouth are involved, and the name
given to it reflects it. Starting from the front, some consonants are
made using both lips and these are called bilabial consonants. The
sound made by an interaction between the tongue and the teeth are
just dental sounds. When you run your tongue back behind your
teeth, you come to a bony ridge called an alveolar ridge, several
sounds are made on or just behind the ridge. It produces alveolar
sounds. Moving back from alveolar ridge you come to a hard but
smoother zone called the hard palate.

Lecture Notes: SHAGUFTA MOGHAL

 Notice that there is now a difference in the way the
tongue is used. The velum is the soft part of the palate,
closest to the throat. It is the body of the tongue. The
sounds produced are called velar sounds. And the only
sound left /h/ is produced by air passing from the
windpipe through the vocal cords, or glottis. It’s a
glottal sound.

Lecture Notes: SHAGUFTA MOGHAL

Manner of Articulation

 After Place of articulation, we need to consider Manner

of Articulation, which tells us how consonants are
produced. The comparison of the consonants of English
and Urdu language is mainly based on Place of
articulation and Manner of articulation. Most important
categories are: Plosive sounds also called stop sounds
are formed by the air being completely blocked in the
mouth and then suddenly released. 

Lecture Notes: SHAGUFTA MOGHAL

 Phonology of English and Urdu
* Urdu has 28 consonants and 10 vowels compared to
the 21 consonants and 5 vowels of English.
* The sounds of the Urdu alphabet do not correspond
exactly to any English sounds.
* Urdu speakers may have difficulty in the
pronunciation of certain letters which produce
different sounds. (e.g. Letter ‘c’ produces the
sounds /k/ & /s/ as in ‘cat’ and ‘circus’.)
* Many words in the English language have silent
letters, so Urdu speakers will unknowingly pronounce,
Lecture Notes: SHAGUFTA MOGHAL
 those letters, which will make them mispronounce the
words. (e.g. “knowledge” has the silent ‘k’).
* The range of consonant clusters occurring at the
beginning and end of English words is much wider than
in Urdu. Urdu speakers simplify those clusters. (e.g.
“istation” for “station”, “faree” for “free”, “filam” for
“film”)
* Urdu has a tenser articulation than English, with
vowels produced further forward, leading to the loss of
some distinctions between vowels. (e.g. “sad”
for “said”).

Lecture Notes: SHAGUFTA MOGHAL

Comparison
In English phonology /p/ and /b/ are
plosives having bilabial articulation. /p/ is
voiceless and /b/ is voiced. The alternatives
for these sounds in Urdu phonology are /pe/
(‫)پ‬and /bay/(‫)ب‬which are denoted be /p/
and /b/ respectively. These plosives have the
same characteristics as that of English
plosives
Lecture Notes: SHAGUFTA MOGHAL
 /t/ and /d/ are alveolar sounds. They are plosives. /t/ is
voiceless and /d/ is voiced. In Urdu phonology the same
symbols /t/ and /d/ have a matching characteristics
where /t/ is pronounced as /te/‫ ) )ت‬and /d/ as /daal/
‫ ) )د‬But in comparison with /t/ and /d/ plosives of the
English language we come across sounds /ʈ/ and /ɖ/
pronounced as /ṭe/‫ ) )ٹ‬and /dāl/ (‫)ڈ‬. /t/ is voiceless
and /ɖ/ is voiced.

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 What are sounds?

Something that we can hear are

called sounds

Sounds are divided into :

Consonants

Vowels

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Consonant Sounds

Speech sounds made by

completely or partially stopping
the flow of air being breathed
out through the mouth.

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Vowel Sounds

A speech sound in which

the mouth is open and
tongue is not touching, the
top of the mouth, teeth,
etc.
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URDU.

 Vowels : Urdu has a ten vowels. 3 Lax vowels (ɪ, ʊ, ə) are

phonetically short and 7 tense vowels (i, e, ɛ, u, o, ɔ:, ɑ:)
are phonetically long.
 Consonants Urdu has 41 consonants in total, including 22
stops and affricates, 8 fricatives, 5 nasals, and 6
liquids/glides.

Lecture Notes: SHAGUFTA MOGHAL

Lecture Notes: SHAGUFTA MOGHAL
Lecture Notes: SHAGUFTA MOGHAL
English and Urdu Consonants.
CONSONANTS ENGLISH URDU
b bag, ball barish, badal
f find, fall faltu, filwaqt
v van, vein varzish, vaada
s sun, so safed, sochna
z zoo, zip zameen, zaaya
ʃ shut, shine shaam, shan
j yellow, yes yahan, ye
m moon, my madad, mujhe
n nose, not naam, neela
dƷ judge, jail jugnu, jungle
tʃ church, child chand, chamak
Lecture Notes: SHAGUFTA MOGHAL ŋ sing, wing chalen, gaain.
Partially Similar Sounds

Consonants English Urdu

p pat, cap, pankha, pandra
t Tin, tip Tum, teen
d Dawn, deep Deen, daar
r Red, role Rang, rasta
th Thin, think Dil, thora
h Help, hope Hath, huka
l Language, lungs Laal, lumha

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 Sounds only in
English language;

W- work,
when, war….
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Short Vowels

English Urdu
 u hood u uf
 a above a anaar
 i hit i rizq
Dissimilar Sounds
 ae cat
 o pot
 e met

Lecture Notes: SHAGUFTA MOGHAL

Long Vowels Sounds

English Urdu
 aa car aa taar
 ii meat ii jeet
 uu food uu jhuut
Dissimilar sounds
ƏƏ fur

Lecture Notes: SHAGUFTA MOGHAL

English and Urdu Diphthongs similar
Sounds
Combination of two vowel sounds are called diphthongs.
English Urdu
 ao cow ao gao
 ai eye ai khai
 ua poor ua dua

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Dissimilar Sounds

 eƏ here, there
 Ou go, no
 Oi boy, joy

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conclusion
 The presentation is based on the study of sounds. The presentation includes the
basic characteristics of Urdu and English Phonology, in which some common and
uncommon characteristics of both of the languages are discussed in detail. After
then a comparison is carried out between the Consonant sounds of Urdu and
English languages with respect to its characteristics. As we are the native
speakers of Urdu Language but non-native speakers of the English language, so
this comparison will eliminate the ambiguities of the English language in our
minds as well as point out the differences in both languages.
In this presentation, a speech analysis is also being carried out of a connected
speech with reference to the place of articulation, manner of articulation and its
aspiration. This analysis pointed out major mistakes in pronunciation which are
followed by recommendations.

Lecture Notes: SHAGUFTA MOGHAL