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Difficulty: HardDiphthongs

Complete the phonetic analysis statement by identifying the word that contains the specified diphthong sound.

Answer:While words like 'beard', 'tier', and 'pier' all contain the centring diphthong /ɪə/, the word from the list 'clerk', 'pearl', 'tier', and 'heir' that features the centring diphthong /eə/ is 【heir】.

Answer

heir
The word 'heir' is pronounced /eə/ with a silent 'h', containing the exact centring diphthong /eə/ as found in words like 'care', 'bear', and 'air'.

Step-by-Step Solution

1
Transcribe the target word options into Received Pronunciation (RP) International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) symbols.
'clerk' is pronounced /klɑːk/ (monophthong /ɑː/), 'pearl' is pronounced /pɜːl/ (monophthong /ɜː/), 'tier' is pronounced /tɪə/ (diphthong /ɪə/), and 'heir' is pronounced /eə/ (diphthong /eə/).
Phonetic identification requires analyzing the vowel nucleus of each word.
2
Match the target diphthong /eə/ to the correct phonetic transcription.
The word 'heir' contains the silent initial 'h' and is pronounced identically to 'air' (/eə/), which matches the target diphthong.
'heir' is a classic silent-letter orthographic trap in JAMB Use of English.

Key Concept

Identification of the centring diphthong /eə/
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Topics

Diphthongs

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