Careful of the Silent Letters! How to Pronounce 'Clothes' in American English

Aaaah! The silent letters.  If only English could be pronounced like it is written. If only.

Sorry to tell you though, English will probably never be pronounced like it's written.   :(

That's why I've made this series for you! One reason English can be so hard to pronounce (especially if you learned from a grammar book or your foreign speaking English teacher) is that so many words in English that have letters that are silent. If you saw last week's video, you learned how the letter 'I' in 'family' can be silent as well.

Here's how to pronounce another common word that has multiple silent letters: 'clothes.':

Click on the CC button on the video player to turn on the subtitles

Or, you can follow along by reading the full transcript here:

.....
​Hey! Sabrina from Speak English Live here!  I put on some nice CLOTHES for you today
because today's word is just that: CLOTHES!

Welcome to Wednesday Word, where I give you a word that I commonly hear mispronounced
so that you can pronounce it like a native English speaker. I'm from the U.S. so I will be helping you with your American accent.

Today's word is: CLOTHES

Sometimes I hear the mistake where people are trying to pronounce the TH in clothes like:
"closs-es"
"cloths"
"close-iz"
... I don't know. I've heard a lot of different versions of this word but native speakers are most likely to say "cloz."

So, if you know the pronunciation of the word for: 'Close the door' ...you now know that that is the same way that we say "clothes."

All these great clothes!

Okay, so if you can say a OOH and a Z sound: OOH-Z ...then you will be able to say able to say this word:
CLOZ = (CLOTHES)

If the L gives you a little bit of trouble, make sure to put the tip of your tongue on the back of your front teeth. It could be touching your teeth, like this...or even a little bit higher.

So it'll sound like this
CLOZ  (CLOTHES)
CLOZ (CLOTHES)

It looks like this from the side.
CLOZ

And here's a little bit of a close-up for you...There's my camera.
CLOZ

Here is your sample sentence:
"Wow! You have a lot of clothes!"
...
"Wow! You have a lot of clothes!"
...
​
All right! Have a great day and make sure to put a comment down in the comment area if there's a word that you'd like me to pronounce for you and also make sure to subscribe.

And if you would like to get access to my free pronunciation course I'll put the link down here for you. Make sure to click on that and get on my list. You won't regret it! Bye!!
.....

What's another word that YOU know that has silent letters in it? 

<<How to Pronounce 'Chocolate' in American English

NEW Pronunciation Video Series: Today's Word is 'Family' >>