Minimal Pair List Vowels 10 and 20, /ʌ/ versus / ʊə / 8 pairs
The /ʌ/ vowel is spelled with <u>. The /
ʊə
/ vowel is spelled <our> or <oor>.
This is a contrast between a short vowel and a diphthong, fairly close in starting tongue positions. It is potentially a problem for learners, but there are so few pairs that it does not matter.
The density figure is 0.66%. The set makes 5 semantic contrasts for a loading of 62.5%.
buzz boors
bun bourn
buns bourns
bus bourse
buses bourses
hurry houri
hurries houris
mud moored
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John Higgins
John Higgins retired in 2000, having spent the bulk of his career as a British Council English Language Officer working in Thailand, Turkey, Egypt and Yugoslavia and the last fifteen years in lectureships at Bristol University and then running an M.Sc. programme at Stirling University. His main field was EFL, with a special interest in CALL (computer-assisted language learning) in which, together with Tim Johns of Birmingham, he was responsible for important developments in methods and materials.
His publications include A Guide to Language Laboratory Material Writing, Universitetesforlaget, 1969, Computers and Language Learning, Collins, 1984, Language Learners and Computers, Longman, 1988, and Computers in English Language Learning, Intellect Press, 1992, together with numerous papers, reviews and pieces of software. He maintains a web page on minimal pairs and homographs for teachers of English pronunciation skills.
