In this Ask Pete Anything episode of Aussie English I answer our listener Julia’s question “How do I pronounce these sounds in words like orgaNIsation, constiTUent and aMUse?”

Ask Pete Anything: How do I pronounce these sounds in words like orgaNIsation, constiTUent and aMUse?

G’day guys. Welcome to this episode of Aussie English.

Today’s going to be an Ask Pete Anything episode, and the question for today comes from our listener Julia. And Julia’s just asked me to sort of just help her a little bit with pronunciation of words such as “Oganisation”. So, the “-NIsation” in the middle of the word, “Organisation” and other words that sound like that. As well as the word, “Constituent” and how to pronounce the “TU” in there as a “Chew” kind of sound. I’ll get to that. And the word “Amuse” and how to pronounce the “Mew” sound in there as well. So, I thought I would find 10 words for each of these sort of sounds, and we can practice our pronunciation.

So, the first one we’ll go through words that sound like “Organisation”. The emphasise in these words tends to be on the second last syllable, that “Za-“ part of “-Zation”. So, “OrganiZAtion”, and it’s said like a “Z” instead of an “S”. In Australian English and UK English you’re going to see words like “Organisation” spelt with an “S” with the end there for “-Sation”, for the word, an “S”, but in American English you’ll see it with a “Z”. And it actually sounds like a “Z” sound, a “Zeh, zeh”, “-Zation”, when you say these words not “OrganiSation” it’s OrganiZation”. And the “N-I” in there sounds like you’re saying the word “Eye” like the eye in your head, but with an “N” in front of it. So, “-Nization”. And I think Julia was telling me she had a little bit of trouble with how to pronounce that “N-I” in words like “Organisation”, “Organisation”.

So, I’ll just go through 10 of these words.

Listen and repeat:

Organisation

Disorganisation

Immunisation

Colonisation

Urbanisation

Synchronisation

Modernisation

Homogenisation

Dehumanisation

(Apparently I can’t count. So, 9 words*)

A lot of these words too I’m sure are going to be a little complex, you can look them up. These were just the only ones I could really find with “-Nisation” in the endings. So, obviously they were going to be long words to begin with.

Um.. we can move onto the second part now where I will go through words like “Constituent” with that “T-U” in there. The “-Tuent”, “Chew” sound. So, the “T-U” in the following words that I’m going to go through like “Constituent”, the “T-U” sounds like a “Chew” sound. It’s a “C-H” [sound], a “Ch”, “Ch” followed by “U”, “Chu, Chu”, and unfortunately, as is the case quite often in English, not all words with “T-U” are pronounced “Chu”, but the following 10 words are. So let’s go through them.

Listen and repeat:

Constituent

Impromptu

Student

Virtue

Spiritual

Stupid

Statue

Mutual

Maturity

(I screwed up the count again…)

And to finish off we’ll go through these words like “Amuse” where the sound is “Use” that these words will have in common with one another. And again this is said like you’re saying the pronoun “You” followed but I a “Z” sound. “Use”, “Use”.

Listen and repeat:

Amuse

Abuse

Use

Confuse

Fuse

Refuse

Accuse

Rescues

Overuse

Choose

(I finally counted correctly!)

So yeah, that’s today’s Ask Pete Anything episode. I hope it helps Julia. I hope this helps you practice your pronunciation of these words. If any of you guys listening have any questions or any suggestions for episodes that you would like me to do in the future feel free to send me a message on Facebook or put a comment on one of these podcast episodes on Facebook and let me know what you would like help with. Until next time guys, all the best!