The letter 'c' is usually pronounced as a /k/ sound in English. But actually, letter c has two sounds. It can be pronounced as a /k/ or /s/ sound.
Pronounce the letter “C” as an “S” sound if the letter “C” is followed by the letters “E”, “I”, or “Y”. This is true in the words “central”, “city”, and “cyst”. Pronounce the letter “C” as a “K” sound, if the letter “C” is followed by the letters “A”, “O”, or “U”.
C can make two sounds: /k/ or /s/. Similarly, the hard c sound is more common than the soft c sound. The hard c sound makes the /k/ sound as in cat. The soft c makes the /s/ sound as in city.
This alternation is caused by a historical palatalization of /k/ which took place in Late Latin, and led to a change in the pronunciation of the sound [k] before the front vowels [e] and [i]. Later, other languages not directly descended from Latin, such as English, inherited this feature as an orthographic convention.
Usually, a c or g sound is hard or soft depending on the vowel that follows it. Here's the general rule: When c or g meets a, o, or u, its sound is hard. When c or g meets e, i, or y, its sound is soft.
The "Rule of c" covers the pronunciation of the letter "c", indicating when "c" stand for the /s/ sound. The rule is: The letter c represents /s/ before the letters e, i or y; otherwise it represents /k/. And here are several examples to show you how broadly useful this rule actually is.
The letter "C" can make two different sounds based on the rules of English pronunciation. It can make the "hard" sound, as in "cake" and "cut", and it can make the "soft" sound as in "cell" and "cinder".
The rule. Here's the rule: When 'c' comes directly before the letters 'e', 'i' or 'y' we use the /s/ sound. in other cases we use a /k/ sound.
The letter C can represent the sound "k" as in "cut" or the sound "s" as in "cent". Teaching learners how this works and why it's a good thing when we start adding suffixes to words can be tricky, especially if they don't really understand "if-then" sentences yet. Here's a 6 minute video I made about one way to do it.
In 1-syllable words use the letter 'c' with the vowels a, o, u. 'c' is the most common spelling for /k/ at the beginning of words. Use the letter 'k' with the vowels i and e. Use the consonant digraph 'ck' only at the end of 1-syllable words when the /k/ sound IMMEDIATELY follows a vowel.
When c is in front of an i, y, or e, it is soft and says /s/. For example: city, cycle, and race. When c is in front of any other letter, it is hard and says /k/.
The letters C and G. Both the C and the G make a hard sound, like the /g/ sound in the word “goat” or the /c/ sound, like in the word “cup” and a soft sound, like the /j/ sound you hear in the word “germ” or the /s/ sound you hear in the word “city.”
The “c/k” and “g” sounds are usually correct by around 4 years. Check out this post for more information about which sounds to expect when. Since some children in the UK start Year R at the age of just 4, it is not unusual to have children starting school who are not yet saying these sounds correctly.
In Old French, a language that had no [kʰ] or [x] and represented [k] by c, k, or qu, ch began to be used to represent the voiceless palatal plosive [c], which came from [k] in some positions and later became [tʃ] and then [ʃ]. Now the digraph ch is used for all the aforementioned sounds, as shown below.
Because of the influence of Norman French after the Norman Conquest. In Old English <c> was pronounced [k] and sometimes like ModE <ch>. In French, <c> became [s] before <i> and <e>, and English adopted that in French loan words.
The basics of it is they are made the exact same way except the c sound is just breath while the z sound is voiced, meaning you vibrate your vocal cords while producing the sound. Other sounds that contrast only in voice are f and v, t and d, p and b, etc.
In political writing. Replacing the letter c with k in the first letter of a word was used by the Ku Klux Klan during its early years in the mid-to-late 19th century. The concept is continued today within the group. For something similar in the writing of groups opposed to the KKK, see § KKK replacing c or k, below.
When the vowels e, i, or y directly follow the letter C in a word, the C typically makes an /s/ sound. We call this a soft C sound. Some words with soft C sounds are cereal, city, pencil, and celery.
Soft /c/ sounds like an S. C makes a soft sound when it's followed by the letter E, I, or Y. Examples include center, cement, bounce, cereal, ice, privacy, and celery. Fancy words with both sounds: constance, cycle, circle, and cancel.