How to find the stress in long words (words with suffixes) | American English

Hi there, it's Hadar.

And this is the Accent's Way, your way to finding clarity,

confidence, and freedom in English.

And today we are going to talk about how to pronounce long words.

Like antidisestablishmentarianism.

No, not this word.

But we are going to discuss how to pronounce words with

three, four, or more syllables.

Usually, longer words in English have suffixes.

What is a suffix?

A suffix is this a little addition to the word, it's a small unit that

you add to the end of the word.

And it turns the word into a different one, a new word.

For example, if you take the word "wonder" and you add 'ful', 'ful'

as the suffix, you get "wonderful".

Or "possible" - when you add 'ity' turns into "possibility".

Now the one thing you need to remember, or probably one of the most important

things about English pronunciation, is where you place the stress in a word.

What is a stress?

A stress is the one syllable that sticks out the most, it's the most

dominant syllable, and it's usually longer, louder, and higher in pitch.

For example, in the word "possible" the stress falls on the first

syllable - 'po' - "POssible".

But here's the thing, once I add the suffix 'ity', it changes the

stress - the placement is changed.

So it turns into ""possibility.

So let's deduce from this the general rule.

In most words with suffixes - that's relevant for most suffixes, not all

of them - once you add the suffix, it changes the position of the stress to

the one syllable before the suffix.

So no matter where the stress is at the beginning, once you add the

suffix, the stress falls on the one syllable before the suffix, the one

syllable to the left of the suffix.

Now let's go through a few suffixes, how to pronounce the suffix,

and I'll give you example words.

Let's stay with the 'ity' suffix.

Now, listen to the pronunciation of the suffix.

The Y turns into an 'uh', the T is a flap T, so it's a D sound; and

then a high E the end - 'uhdee'.

'possiBI-l'dee'.

'acTI-v'dee'.

'responsiBI-l'dee'.

You see, it's not "resPONsible", it's 'responsiBI' - this is the

primary stress - "responsiBIlity".

Let's take a suffix 'ical', as in "alphabetical".

The suffix is 'ical', primary stress one syllable before

the suffix - 'alphaBE-d'k'l'.

'poLI-d'k'l'.

'psychoLO-g'k'l.' "psychological".

Let's take the suffix 'logy' 'logy', as in "biology".

'biO' - primary stress, 'ah' open 'ah' as in "father", and then 'l'gee'.

Although there is an O here, it's not 'biolOgy', it's not 'lOgy'.

And it's definitely not 'bioLOgy', right?

It's 'biO-l'gee'.

'techNO-l'gee''.

'sociO-l'gee'.

And finally, let's take the suffix 'meter' 'meter', as in "kiLOmeter".

"paRAmeter".

Not "paraMEter", the stress falls on the one syllable before the suffix,

and suffixes are usually reduced.

"paRAmeter".

"therMOmeter".

All right, that's it.

I hope this was helpful.

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And that's it for today.

Have a wonderful week.

And I will see you next week in the next video.

Bye.