English: Pronunciation of words ending in 'ary'

[josh2020]

Hi all,

Great to be part of this forum. I have a question about the prounciation of words ending in 'ary' in the English language.
When is the 'a' non-audible? Some examples: primary, secondary, military, hereditary, speciality, exemplary, commentary.

Some of the times, I would swear that I hear 'secondah-ry' but some times I have heard 'secondry'. Similar example is for 'speciality' I have heard 'specia-lee-ty' and 'specialty'. Comment-ah-ry and comment-ry.

Is there a rule on when to swallow the 'a' and in general shorten the word?

[Miss_French_2020]

Welcome Josh
Speciality (UK) and specialty (US) are two different spellings (and pronunciations) depending on the country.
Here in Australia, both are used but specialty is more common. However, when using it to refer to a branch of medicine e.g. a doctor's specialty, they are not interchangeable - only specialty is used in this case and we will never say/spell it with the extra i. There may be other cases like that but that's the only one that came to my mind.

For the other words, both pronunciations are fine and common and it just depends on the person or region. I personally say those words both ways and it only depends on if I'm enunciating or how fast I'm speaking.

[Dragon27]

If you want to know the proper pronunciation of a word for certain just consult the dictionary. Pronunciation can be different in different dialects, obviously. Compare the pronunciation of "dictionary" in British RP and General American from wiktionary:
(Received Pronunciation) IPA: /'dɪkʃ(ə)n(ə)ɹi/
(General American, Canada) enPR: dĭk'shə-nĕr-ē, IPA: /'dɪkʃənɛɹi/

And this generally applies to other words with this ending: in the neutral British accent the pronunciation is /əɹi/ with schwa /ə/ being optional (i.e. it can be dropped, especially in quick speech), while in GA it's usually /ɛɹi/ (/ɛ/ is not a schwa).

"ory" have a similar pronunciation pattern, for example, laboratory:
(UK) IPA: /lə'bɒɹət(ə)ɹiː/
(US) IPA: /'læb(ə)ɹətɔɹi/ (notice the difference in stress position)
or inventory
(UK) IPA: /'ɪnvəntɹi/, /ɪn'vɛntəɹi/
(US) IPA: /'ɪnvəntɔɹi/


/ɔɹi/ and /ɛɹi/ bear the secondary stress, I've omitted it from the transcription.

[SCMT]

When is the 'a' non-audible? Some examples: primary, secondary, military, hereditary, speciality, exemplary, commentary.

In the US, you would pronounce the a in all of the ary words. The cial in specially is pronounced like shall, a slurring of the vowels with a soft c, so specialty just has a ty added to the end.

[Cainntear]

As a general pattern, we almost always pronounce the a when it's directly after the stressed syllable of the word:
eg primary, exemplary

... and we generally drop it in casual speech when that's not the case, but people do have a tendency to "add it back in" when speaking carefully and consciously. You're particularly likely to hear it reappear in secondary, because people tend to thing "prim-a-ry, therefore se-con-da-ry".

Speciality/Specialty is an interesting case.
The -ity ending seems to force the syllable before it to take the stress:
simple -> simplicity
universe -> university

...so when Americans kept the stress of "special" and dropped the "i", well it wasn't an -ity word any more, so they write it specialty.

[Gordafarin2]

primary, secondary, military, hereditary, exemplary, commentary

I want to note that in this list of words, 'exemplary' doesn't follow the pattern for me (American English). Compare AmEng primary with the full "ary", and AmEng exemplary which is similar to British with the reduced "əry".

[golyplot]

primary, secondary, military, hereditary, exemplary, commentary

I want to note that in this list of words, 'exemplary' doesn't follow the pattern for me (American English). Compare AmEng primary with the full "ary", and AmEng exemplary which is similar to British with the reduced "əry".

Seconded. When I was sounding out the list mentally, exemplary was the only one I pronounced without the "air". Even when I deliberately try to pronounce it to rhyme with primary, secondary, etc. I just can't.

[Dragon27]

Random House Kernerman Webster's College Dictionary mentions the existence of an alternative pronunciation /'ɛgzəmplɛri/ with the stress on the first syllable. Does anyone even use this pronunciation?

[SCMT]

primary, secondary, military, hereditary, exemplary, commentary

I want to note that in this list of words, 'exemplary' doesn't follow the pattern for me (American English). Compare AmEng primary with the full "ary", and AmEng exemplary which is similar to British with the reduced "əry".

Yep, although I would pronounce it as above, with the 'a' making the scwa sound, rather than dropped, as in the British pronunciation of 'militry.'

How do you type a schwa, anyway?

[Gordafarin2]

How do you type a schwa, anyway?

Search Google for "schwa", copy and paste it
Maybe there are specialised input tools for this... but even when I was doing linguistics in uni, there was a lot of searching for 'wikipedia ipa chart' and copy-pasting from there.