Confusing English: Silent Letters

One of the most confusing aspects of the English language is most likely silent letters. It is not that difficult to grasp. You just have to focus, and it needs to be explained right.

I am going to use a term that can be difficult and strange to hear for the first time. But I will give its meaning before I start explaining silent letters.

Homophones—are words that sound the same but are spelled differently.

Here are a few pointers to help you distinguish silent letters.

What are silent letters?

They are letters that don’t correspond with any other sound when a particular word is spoken.

You get silent vowels and silent consonants.

They can usually help transform the words that sound the same but have different spellings (Homophones).

Some give you insight into the root of a word.

The English language can be infuriating at times. For example, the letter “y” is a vowel, but sometimes it is not a vowel. “Cough,” “rough,” and “though” all have very distinct pronunciations. Thousands of new words are being added to the dictionary each year. Among all the notions the English language has, silent letters are the most confusing of them all.

Don’t shut your laptop in annoyance just because of the silent letters. Providing honest and thorough explanations about what they do, what they are, and why they exist will bring some order to the chaos and confusion. It will also extend your knowledge.

What are silent letters?

They are letters that aren’t heard when a certain word is pronounced. Basically, almost every letter in the alphabet plays a role of a silent letter in every word.

It is best to learn these troublesome characters. Almost about 60% of English words contain silent letters. Can you believe it? It is quite a lot, right? Just like you get silent vowels, you also get silent consonants. It can be found either at the beginning, middle, or end of a word.

Silent letters exist because they come from another language. For instance, “tsunami” is actually a Japanese word. Because the “ts” don’t actually follow English rules. So the first letter is turned into a silent letter. Another word with a different root from another language is “rendezvous.” It is a French word. The “z” and “s” are also silent letters.

When writing, silent letters help to differentiate homophones, for example, “hour” and “our.” They are almost the same in spelling, but the “h” in “hour” helps identify the word that means “60 minutes.”