Minimal Pair List Vowels 5 and 15, /ɑ/ versus / ɔɪ / 48 pairs

The /ɑ/ vowel is usually spelled <ar> but we also find <a> in ta and <aa> in baa . The / ɔɪ / diphthong is spelled <oi> or <oy>.

This contrast is between a long vowel and a diphthong. The starting tongue positions are fairly close but confusions are unlikely.

Interesting pairs include:

carnage coinage
harden hoyden

The density value is 6.12%. The pairs make 26 semantic contrasts, giving a loading of 54.2%.

baa boy
  baas boys
baa buoy
  baas buoys
  baa'd buoyed
  baaing buoying
bar boy		
  bars boys
bar buoy
  barred buoyed
  bars buoys
calf coif
Cali coyly
Carl coil
carnage coinage
cart quoit
  carts quoits
fa Fowey 
fast foist
  fasted foisted
  fasting foisting
  fasts foists
garter goitre
  garters goitres
harden hoyden
  hardens hoydens
jar joy
  jarred joyed
  jars joys
khan coign
  khans coigns 
lards Lloyd's 
larn loin
  larns loins
marl moil
mast moist
parrs poise
pars poise
parse poise
  parsed poised
  parses poises
  parsing poising
rah Roy 
ta toy
tar toy
  tarred toyed
  tars toys
vast voiced

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.