I before e except after c
Encyclopedia
lang=en
"I before E, except after C" is a mnemonic
rule of thumb
for English spelling. If one is unsure whether a word is spelled with the sequence ei or ie, the rhyme suggests that the correct order is ie unless the preceding letter is c or the combination is being pronounced as an 'A' (that is, like the name of the letter 'A' in English: eɪ), in which case it is spelled ei. For example:
The rule is very well known; Edward Carney calls it "this supreme, and for many people solitary, spelling rule". However, its short form as above has many common exceptions; for example:
More exceptions are listed below.
The proportion of exceptions can be reduced by restricting application of the rule based on the sound represented by the spelling. Two common restrictions are:
Some authorities deprecate the rule as having too many exceptions to be worth learning.
James Stuart Laurie from the work of a Tavistock schoolmaster named Marshall. Michael Quinion
surmises the rhyme was already established before this date. An 1834 manual states a similar rule in prose; others in 1855 and 1862 use different rhymes. Many textbooks from the 1870s on use the same rhyme as Laurie's book.
The restriction to the "long e" sound is explicitly made in the 1855 and 1862 books, and applied to the "i before e except after c" rhyme in an 1871 manual. Mark Wainwright's FAQ
posting on the alt.usage.english newsgroup
characterises this restricted version as British. The restriction may be implicit, or may be explicitly included as an extra line such as "when the sound is e" placed before or after the main part of the rhyme.
A longer form excluding the "long a" sound is found in Rule 37 of Ebenezer Cobham Brewer
's 1880 Rules for English Spelling, along with a list of the "chief exceptions":
"Dr Brewer" is credited as the author by subsequent writers quoting this form of the rhyme, which became common in American schools.
A Dictionary of Modern English Usage has an entry "i before e except after c". Henry Watson Fowler
's original 1926 edition called the rule "very useful", restricting it to words with the "long e" sound, stating further that "words in which that sound is not invariable, as either, neither, inveigle, do not come under it", and listing exceptions. The entry was retained in Ernest Gowers
's 1965 revision. Robert Burchfield
rewrote it for the 1996 edition, stating 'the rule can helpfully be extended "except when the word is pronounced with /eɪ/"', and giving a longer list of exceptions, including words excluded from Fowler's interpretation.
As to the usefulness of the rule, he says:
The converse of the "except after c" part is Carney's spelling-to-sound rule E.16: in the sequence, the is pronounced /iː/. In Carney's test wordlist, all eight words with conform to this rule, which he thus describes as being a "marginal" rule with an "efficiency" of 100%. Rarer loanword
s not in the wordlist may not conform; e.g. the Gaelic
word ceilidh
is pronounced /keɪliː/.
Mark Wainwright's FAQ posting interprets the rule as applying only to the FLEECE vowel, not the NEAR vowel; he regards it as useful if "a little common sense" is used for the exceptions. The FAQ includes a 1996 response to Wainwright by an American, listing variations on the rule and their exceptions, contending that even the restricted version has too many exceptions, and concluding "Instead of trying to defend the 'rule' or 'guideline', "'i' before 'e' except after 'c'", why don't we all just agree that it is dumb and useless, and be content just to laugh at it?"
Kory Stamper of Merriam-Webster
has said the neighbor-and-weigh version is "chocked with tons of exceptions", listing several types. On Language Log
in 2006, Mark Liberman
suggested that the alternative "i before e, no matter what" was more reliable than the basic rule. On the same blog in 2009, Geoff Pullum wrote, 'The rule is always taught, by anyone who knows what they are doing, as "i before e except after c when the sound is 'ee'."'
The 2009 edition of Support for Spelling, by the English Department for Education
, suggests an "Extension activity" for Year Five (nine-year-olds):
In the Appendix, after a list of nine "useful spelling guidelines", there is a note:
There were widespread media reports of this recommendation, which generated some controversy.
The Oxford Dictionaries website of Oxford University Press
states "The rule only applies when the sound represented is ‘ee’, though. It doesn’t apply to words like science or efficient, in which the –ie- combination does follow the letter c but isn’t pronounced ‘ee’."
Words which break each half of the rule include cheiromancies, cleidomancies, eigenfrequencies, obeisancies, and oneiromancies.
Few common words have the cei spelling handled by the rule: verbs ending -ceive and their derivatives (perceive, deceit, transceiver, receipts, etc.), and ceiling. The BBC
trivia show QI
claimed there were 923 words spelled cie, 21 times the number of words which conform to the rule's stated exception by being written with cei. These figures were generated by a QI fan from a Scrabble
wordlist.
The larger categories, above, inform the stricter forms of the I before E rule: excluding all those with the /eɪ/ FACE sound, or excluding anything that does NOT have the /iː/ FLEECE sound. With either of these additional restrictions, the I before E rule has far fewer exceptions. Even with the strictest form, however, miscellaneous words still break the rule, and some even fall outside of this lengthy list of categories. Some of these exceptions are listed below.
s (sounds) corresponding to ei or eir in the spelling; each phoneme each represented phonetically as at Wikipedia:IPA for English and, where applicable, by the keyword in John C. Wells
' lexical set
s.
An asterisk* after a word indicates the pronunciation implied is one of several found. Some have an /iː/ variant more common in America than Britain
(e.g. sheikh, leisure, either have /eɪ/, /ɛ/, /aɪ/ respectively). In these cases, the British pronunciation is a corollary
of the British "long e" rule (i.e., when spelt ei, the pronunciation cannot be /iː/).
/eɪ/ FACE: these exceptions are excluded by the American version: abseil, beige, cleidoic, deign, dreidel, eight, feign, feint, freight, geisha, gleization, greige, greisen, heigh-ho*, heinous*, inveigh, inveigle*, neigh, neighbo(u)r, nonpareil*, obeisance*, peignoir*, reign, rein, seiche, seidel, seine, sheikh*, skein, sleigh, surveillance, veil, vein, weigh. (This sound is never spelled ie, except perhaps in lingerie).
/ɛər/ SQUARE: these exceptions are excluded by the American version: heir, their. (This sound is never spelled ier)
/iː/ FLEECE: these exceptions are the only ones that slip through the strictest interpretation of the British version: either*, heinous*, inveigle*, keister, leisure*, monteith, neither*, obeisance*, seize, seizin, sheikh*, teiid (see also the chemical names such as caffeine listed above).
/ɪər/ NEAR: these exceptions may slip through the British version: weir, weird. (This sound may also be spelled ier, as in pierce.)
/aɪ/ PRICE: eider, either*, einsteinium, feisty, gneiss, heigh-ho*, height, heist, kaleidoscope, leitmotiv, neither*, Rotweiller, seismic, seismograph, stein, zeitgeist. This sound may also be spelled ie, but only at the end of a morpheme
as in die, pie, lie, fie, cried.
/ɨ/ (see weak vowel merger): counterfeit, foreign, forfeit, reveille*, sovereign, surfeit
/ɛ/ DRESS: heifer, leisure*, nonpareil*, peignoir*. (This sound may also be spelled ie, as in friend.)
/æ/ TRAP: reveille*
e and i in separate segment
s: albeit, atheism, deify, deity, herein, onomatopoeia
s, including A Boy Named Charlie Brown
, The Simpsons
episode "I'm Spelling as Fast as I Can
", and an episode of Arthur
.
I Before E (Except After C): Old-School Ways To Remember Stuff was a miscellany released in the UK for the Christmas 2007 "stocking filler" market, which sold well.
"I Before E Except After C" is a song on Yazoo
's 1982 album Upstairs at Eric's
. The Jackson 5
's 1970 hit "ABC
" has the lyric "I before E except after C". "I before E except after C" was a 1963 episode of the TV series East Side/West Side
.
I Before E is the name of both a short-story collection by Sam Kieth
and a music album by Carissa's Wierd
, in each case alluding to the unusual spelling of the creator's name.
Until the 1930s, Pierce City, Missouri
was named "Peirce City", after Andrew Peirce. A 1982 attempt to revert to the original spelling was rejected by the United States Census Bureau
.
"I before E, except after C" is a mnemonic
Mnemonic
A mnemonic , or mnemonic device, is any learning technique that aids memory. To improve long term memory, mnemonic systems are used to make memorization easier. Commonly encountered mnemonics are often verbal, such as a very short poem or a special word used to help a person remember something,...
rule of thumb
Rule of thumb
A rule of thumb is a principle with broad application that is not intended to be strictly accurate or reliable for every situation. It is an easily learned and easily applied procedure for approximately calculating or recalling some value, or for making some determination...
for English spelling. If one is unsure whether a word is spelled with the sequence ei or ie, the rhyme suggests that the correct order is ie unless the preceding letter is c or the combination is being pronounced as an 'A' (that is, like the name of the letter 'A' in English: eɪ), in which case it is spelled ei. For example:
- ie in believe, fierce, collie, die, friend
- ei after c in deceive, ceiling, receipt, ceilidh
- ei sounds like an 'A' as in vein,
The rule is very well known; Edward Carney calls it "this supreme, and for many people solitary, spelling rule". However, its short form as above has many common exceptions; for example:
- ie after c: ancient, species, science, sufficient, society
- ei not preceded by c: seize, weird, eider, either, height, foreign, leisure, counterfeit, forfeit, neither, atheist, their, queueing, Keith, reinsure, reika
More exceptions are listed below.
The proportion of exceptions can be reduced by restricting application of the rule based on the sound represented by the spelling. Two common restrictions are:
- excluding cases where the spelling represents the "long a" sound (the lexical setLexical set- Wells Standard Lexical Sets for English :The Standard Lexical Sets for English introduced by John C. Wells in Accents of English are in wide usage...
s of FACE and perhaps SQUARE) - including only cases where the spelling represents the "long e" sound (the lexical sets of FLEECE and perhaps NEAR and happY)
Some authorities deprecate the rule as having too many exceptions to be worth learning.
History
The mnemonic (in its short form) is found as early as 1866, as a footnote in Manual of English Spelling, edited by schools inspectorHer Majesty's Inspector of Schools
Her Majesty's Inspector of Schools can refer to:* Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Education, Scotland* Her Majesty's Chief Inspector of Schools In England...
James Stuart Laurie from the work of a Tavistock schoolmaster named Marshall. Michael Quinion
Michael Quinion
Michael Quinion is a British etymologist and writer. He runs the web site World Wide Words, devoted to linguistics. He graduated from Cambridge University, where he studied physical sciences after which he joined BBC radio as a studio manager.-Writer:...
surmises the rhyme was already established before this date. An 1834 manual states a similar rule in prose; others in 1855 and 1862 use different rhymes. Many textbooks from the 1870s on use the same rhyme as Laurie's book.
The restriction to the "long e" sound is explicitly made in the 1855 and 1862 books, and applied to the "i before e except after c" rhyme in an 1871 manual. Mark Wainwright's FAQ
FAQ
Frequently asked questions are listed questions and answers, all supposed to be commonly asked in some context, and pertaining to a particular topic. "FAQ" is usually pronounced as an initialism rather than an acronym, but an acronym form does exist. Since the acronym FAQ originated in textual...
posting on the alt.usage.english newsgroup
Newsgroup
A usenet newsgroup is a repository usually within the Usenet system, for messages posted from many users in different locations. The term may be confusing to some, because it is usually a discussion group. Newsgroups are technically distinct from, but functionally similar to, discussion forums on...
characterises this restricted version as British. The restriction may be implicit, or may be explicitly included as an extra line such as "when the sound is e" placed before or after the main part of the rhyme.
A longer form excluding the "long a" sound is found in Rule 37 of Ebenezer Cobham Brewer
Ebenezer Cobham Brewer
The Reverend Dr. Ebenezer Cobham Brewer , was the compiler of Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, and The Reader's Handbook, Victorian reference works.-Education and travels:E...
's 1880 Rules for English Spelling, along with a list of the "chief exceptions":
- The following rhymes contain the substance of the last three rules : —
- i before e,
- Except after c,
- Or when sounded as "a,"
- As in neighbor and weigh.
"Dr Brewer" is credited as the author by subsequent writers quoting this form of the rhyme, which became common in American schools.
A Dictionary of Modern English Usage has an entry "i before e except after c". Henry Watson Fowler
Henry Watson Fowler
Henry Watson Fowler was an English schoolmaster, lexicographer and commentator on the usage of the English language...
's original 1926 edition called the rule "very useful", restricting it to words with the "long e" sound, stating further that "words in which that sound is not invariable, as either, neither, inveigle, do not come under it", and listing exceptions. The entry was retained in Ernest Gowers
Ernest Gowers
Sir Ernest Arthur Gowers GCB GBE Hon. D.Litt Hon. ARIBA was a British civil servant, now best known for work on style guides for writing the English language.-Life:...
's 1965 revision. Robert Burchfield
Robert Burchfield
Robert William Burchfield CNZM CBE was a scholar, writer, and lexicographer.Born in Wanganui, New Zealand, he studied at Wanganui Technical College and Victoria University in Wellington...
rewrote it for the 1996 edition, stating 'the rule can helpfully be extended "except when the word is pronounced with /eɪ/"', and giving a longer list of exceptions, including words excluded from Fowler's interpretation.
Modern views
Edward Carney's 1994 Survey of English Spelling describes the rule as "peculiar":- Its practical use is ... simply deciding between two correspondences for /iː/ that are a visual metathesisMetathesis (linguistics)Metathesis is the re-arranging of sounds or syllables in a word, or of words in a sentence. Most commonly it refers to the switching of two or more contiguous sounds, known as adjacent metathesis or local metathesis:...
of each other. It is not a general graphotactic rule applicable to other phonemes. So, although seize and heinous (if you pronounce it with /iː/ rather than /eɪ/) are exceptions, heifer, leisure with /e/≡or rein, vein with /eɪ/≡ are not exceptions; is not a usual spelling of /e/ or /eɪ/.
As to the usefulness of the rule, he says:
- Such rules are warnings against common pitfalls for the unwary. Nevertheless, selection among competing correspondences has never been, and could never be, covered by such aids to memory.
The converse of the "except after c" part is Carney's spelling-to-sound rule E.16: in the sequence
Loanword
A loanword is a word borrowed from a donor language and incorporated into a recipient language. By contrast, a calque or loan translation is a related concept where the meaning or idiom is borrowed rather than the lexical item itself. The word loanword is itself a calque of the German Lehnwort,...
s not in the wordlist may not conform; e.g. the Gaelic
Goidelic languages
The Goidelic languages or Gaelic languages are one of the two branches of the Insular Celtic languages, the other consisting of the Brythonic languages. Goidelic languages historically formed a dialect continuum stretching from the south of Ireland through the Isle of Man to the north of Scotland...
word ceilidh
Céilidh
In modern usage, a céilidh or ceilidh is a traditional Gaelic social gathering, which usually involves playing Gaelic folk music and dancing. It originated in Ireland, but is now common throughout the Irish and Scottish diasporas...
is pronounced /keɪliː/.
Mark Wainwright's FAQ posting interprets the rule as applying only to the FLEECE vowel, not the NEAR vowel; he regards it as useful if "a little common sense" is used for the exceptions. The FAQ includes a 1996 response to Wainwright by an American, listing variations on the rule and their exceptions, contending that even the restricted version has too many exceptions, and concluding "Instead of trying to defend the 'rule' or 'guideline', "'i' before 'e' except after 'c'", why don't we all just agree that it is dumb and useless, and be content just to laugh at it?"
Kory Stamper of Merriam-Webster
Merriam-Webster
Merriam–Webster, which was originally the G. & C. Merriam Company of Springfield, Massachusetts, is an American company that publishes reference books, especially dictionaries that are descendants of Noah Webster’s An American Dictionary of the English Language .Merriam-Webster Inc. has been a...
has said the neighbor-and-weigh version is "chocked with tons of exceptions", listing several types. On Language Log
Language Log
Language Log is a collaborative language blog maintained by University of Pennsylvania phonetician Mark Liberman.The site is updated daily at the whims of the contributors, and most of the posts are on language use in the media and popular culture. Google search results are frequently used as a...
in 2006, Mark Liberman
Mark Liberman
Mark Liberman is an American linguist. He has a dual appointment at the University of Pennsylvania, as Trustee Professor of Phonetics in the Department of Linguistics, and as a professor in the Department of Computer and Information Sciences. He is the founder and director of the Linguistic Data...
suggested that the alternative "i before e, no matter what" was more reliable than the basic rule. On the same blog in 2009, Geoff Pullum wrote, 'The rule is always taught, by anyone who knows what they are doing, as "i before e except after c when the sound is 'ee'."'
The 2009 edition of Support for Spelling, by the English Department for Education
Department for Education
The Department for Education is a department of the UK government responsible for issues affecting people in England up to the age of 19, including child protection and education....
, suggests an "Extension activity" for Year Five (nine-year-olds):
- Children investigate the rule i before e except after c. Does this always apply? What sound does ie make in these words?
In the Appendix, after a list of nine "useful spelling guidelines", there is a note:
- The i before e except after c rule is not worth teaching. It applies only to words in which the ie or ei stands for a clear /ee/ sound and unless this is known, words such as sufficient, veil and their look like exceptions. There are so few words where the ei spelling for the /ee/ sound follows the letter c that it is easier to learn the specific words: receive, conceive, deceive (+ the related words receipt, conceit, deceit), perceive and ceiling.
There were widespread media reports of this recommendation, which generated some controversy.
The Oxford Dictionaries website of Oxford University Press
Oxford University Press
Oxford University Press is the largest university press in the world. It is a department of the University of Oxford and is governed by a group of 15 academics appointed by the Vice-Chancellor known as the Delegates of the Press. They are headed by the Secretary to the Delegates, who serves as...
states "The rule only applies when the sound represented is ‘ee’, though. It doesn’t apply to words like science or efficient, in which the –ie- combination does follow the letter c but isn’t pronounced ‘ee’."
Exceptions
The following sections list exceptions to the basic form; many will not be exceptions to the augmented forms.Words which break each half of the rule include cheiromancies, cleidomancies, eigenfrequencies, obeisancies, and oneiromancies.
cie
Some large groups of words have cie:- InflectionInflectionIn grammar, inflection or inflexion is the modification of a word to express different grammatical categories such as tense, grammatical mood, grammatical voice, aspect, person, number, gender and case...
s of words ending -cy (fancied, policies, etc.) These are exceptions to the "long e" restriction for those with happy tensing accents, who pronounce the -cies/-cied endings [siz]/[sid] rather than [sɪz]/[sɪd]. - SuffixSuffixIn linguistics, a suffix is an affix which is placed after the stem of a word. Common examples are case endings, which indicate the grammatical case of nouns or adjectives, and verb endings, which form the conjugation of verbs...
es -ier or -iety after a root ending in -c(e) (financier, glacier, society, etc.), or after a root ending in -cy, to make a comparison from an adjective (e.g., bouncier), or a noun from a verb (e.g., fancier -- one who fancies) - species and specie
- words ending -cient, -cience, and -ciency, including:
- words derived from the Latin verb ficio: pro-/suf-/de-/efficient and their inflections. Note: deficiencies, efficiencies, sufficiencies, proficiencies have cie twice each.
- science and related words and inflections (conscience, prescient, etc.)
- ancient
Few common words have the cei spelling handled by the rule: verbs ending -ceive and their derivatives (perceive, deceit, transceiver, receipts, etc.), and ceiling. The BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
trivia show QI
QI
QI is a British comedy panel game television quiz show created and co-produced by John Lloyd, hosted by Stephen Fry, and featuring permanent panellist Alan Davies. Most of the questions are extremely obscure, making it unlikely that the correct answer will be given...
claimed there were 923 words spelled cie, 21 times the number of words which conform to the rule's stated exception by being written with cei. These figures were generated by a QI fan from a Scrabble
Scrabble
Scrabble is a word game in which two to four players score points by forming words from individual lettered tiles on a game board marked with a 15-by-15 grid. The words are formed across and down in crossword fashion and must appear in a standard dictionary. Official reference works provide a list...
wordlist.
ei not preceded by c
Many words have ei not preceded by c. Some groups are:- the "silent g" words: neigh, neighbor, sleigh, sleight, weigh, weight, height, eight, freight, inveigh, plus the French loanwords reign (and its derivatives foreign, sovereign), deign, feign
- Many proper nameProper name"A proper name [is] a word that answers the purpose of showing what thing it is that we are talking about" writes John Stuart Mill in A System of Logic , "but not of telling anything about it"...
s, often because they are adopted from other languages; Carney says "As one might expect of any rule, there are likely to be even more exceptions in names, many of which are Scottish":- forenames and surnames Keith, Neil, Sheila, Stein, etc.
- placenames LeithLeith-South Leith v. North Leith:Up until the late 16th century Leith , comprised two separate towns on either side of the river....
, KeighleyKeighleyKeighley is a town and civil parish within the metropolitan borough of the City of Bradford in West Yorkshire, England. It is situated northwest of Bradford and is at the confluence of the River Aire and the River Worth...
, Rheims, RaleighRaleigh, North CarolinaRaleigh is the capital and the second largest city in the state of North Carolina as well as the seat of Wake County. Raleigh is known as the "City of Oaks" for its many oak trees. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the city's 2010 population was 403,892, over an area of , making Raleigh...
, etc. - Eid in the names of Muslim holidaysMuslim holidaysThere are two main holidays in Islam, Eid Al-Fitr and Eid Al-Adha. The way that holidays are recognized can vary across cultures, as well as across sects of Islam, Sunni and Shia. Muslim holidays generally follow the lunar calendar, and thus move each year relative to the solar calendar. The...
(Eid ul-FitrEid ul-FitrEid ul-Fitr, Eid al-Fitr, Id-ul-Fitr, or Id al-Fitr , often abbreviated to Eid, is a Muslim holiday that marks the end of Ramadan, the Islamic holy month of fasting . Eid is an Arabic word meaning "festivity," while Fiṭr means "breaking the fast"...
, Eid al-Adha, etc.) - yet more proper names taken from other languages, e.g: Rotweiller, CassiopeiaCassiopeia (mythology)Cassiopeia is the name of several figures in Greek mythology.-Wife of Cepheus:The Queen Cassiopeia, wife of king Cepheus of Æthiopia, was beautiful but also arrogant and vain; these latter two characteristics led to her downfall....
- PrefixPrefixA prefix is an affix which is placed before the root of a word. Particularly in the study of languages,a prefix is also called a preformative, because it alters the form of the words to which it is affixed.Examples of prefixes:...
es de- or re- before words starting with i (deindustrialize, reignite, etc.) - Chemical names ending in -ein or -eine (caffeine, casein, codeine, phthalein, protein, etc.) Here -ein(e) was originally pronounced /iː.ɪn/
- yet other loanwordLoanwordA loanword is a word borrowed from a donor language and incorporated into a recipient language. By contrast, a calque or loan translation is a related concept where the meaning or idiom is borrowed rather than the lexical item itself. The word loanword is itself a calque of the German Lehnwort,...
s apart from the proper names, e.g., abseil, dreidel, kaleidoscope, stein, leitmotiv (German), reveille, nonpareil, peignoir (French), geisha (Japanese), sheikh (Arabic) - Inflection -ing of those verbs with roots ending in e which do not drop the e (being, seeing, swingeing, etc.)
- other /eɪ/ FACE sounding words: veil (and derivatives unveil, surveil, etc), vein, rein, heinous, beige, feint, skein, inveigle, obeisance
- Scottish EnglishScottish EnglishScottish English refers to the varieties of English spoken in Scotland. It may or may not be considered distinct from the Scots language. It is always considered distinct from Scottish Gaelic, a Celtic language....
words (deil, deid, weill, etc.)
The larger categories, above, inform the stricter forms of the I before E rule: excluding all those with the /eɪ/ FACE sound, or excluding anything that does NOT have the /iː/ FLEECE sound. With either of these additional restrictions, the I before E rule has far fewer exceptions. Even with the strictest form, however, miscellaneous words still break the rule, and some even fall outside of this lengthy list of categories. Some of these exceptions are listed below.
ei exceptions by sound
In the list which follows, most derived forms are omitted; for example, as well as seize, there exist disseize and seizure. Words are grouped by the phonemePhoneme
In a language or dialect, a phoneme is the smallest segmental unit of sound employed to form meaningful contrasts between utterances....
s (sounds) corresponding to ei or eir in the spelling; each phoneme each represented phonetically as at Wikipedia:IPA for English and, where applicable, by the keyword in John C. Wells
John C. Wells
John Christopher Wells is a British phonetician and Esperanto teacher. Wells is a professor emeritus at University College London, where until his retirement in 2006 he held the departmental chair in phonetics....
' lexical set
Lexical set
- Wells Standard Lexical Sets for English :The Standard Lexical Sets for English introduced by John C. Wells in Accents of English are in wide usage...
s.
An asterisk* after a word indicates the pronunciation implied is one of several found. Some have an /iː/ variant more common in America than Britain
American and British English pronunciation differences
Differences in pronunciation between American English and British English can be divided into:* differences in accent...
(e.g. sheikh, leisure, either have /eɪ/, /ɛ/, /aɪ/ respectively). In these cases, the British pronunciation is a corollary
Corollary
A corollary is a statement that follows readily from a previous statement.In mathematics a corollary typically follows a theorem. The use of the term corollary, rather than proposition or theorem, is intrinsically subjective...
of the British "long e" rule (i.e., when spelt ei, the pronunciation cannot be /iː/).
/eɪ/ FACE: these exceptions are excluded by the American version: abseil, beige, cleidoic, deign, dreidel, eight, feign, feint, freight, geisha, gleization, greige, greisen, heigh-ho*, heinous*, inveigh, inveigle*, neigh, neighbo(u)r, nonpareil*, obeisance*, peignoir*, reign, rein, seiche, seidel, seine, sheikh*, skein, sleigh, surveillance, veil, vein, weigh. (This sound is never spelled ie, except perhaps in lingerie).
/ɛər/ SQUARE: these exceptions are excluded by the American version: heir, their. (This sound is never spelled ier)
/iː/ FLEECE: these exceptions are the only ones that slip through the strictest interpretation of the British version: either*, heinous*, inveigle*, keister, leisure*, monteith, neither*, obeisance*, seize, seizin, sheikh*, teiid (see also the chemical names such as caffeine listed above).
/ɪər/ NEAR: these exceptions may slip through the British version: weir, weird. (This sound may also be spelled ier, as in pierce.)
/aɪ/ PRICE: eider, either*, einsteinium, feisty, gneiss, heigh-ho*, height, heist, kaleidoscope, leitmotiv, neither*, Rotweiller, seismic, seismograph, stein, zeitgeist. This sound may also be spelled ie, but only at the end of a morpheme
Morpheme
In linguistics, a morpheme is the smallest semantically meaningful unit in a language. The field of study dedicated to morphemes is called morphology. A morpheme is not identical to a word, and the principal difference between the two is that a morpheme may or may not stand alone, whereas a word,...
as in die, pie, lie, fie, cried.
/ɨ/ (see weak vowel merger): counterfeit, foreign, forfeit, reveille*, sovereign, surfeit
/ɛ/ DRESS: heifer, leisure*, nonpareil*, peignoir*. (This sound may also be spelled ie, as in friend.)
/æ/ TRAP: reveille*
e and i in separate segment
Segment (linguistics)
In linguistics , the term segment may be defined as "any discrete unit that can be identified, either physically or auditorily, in the stream of speech."- Classifying speech units :...
s: albeit, atheism, deify, deity, herein, onomatopoeia
Allusions
The rhyme is mentioned in several films and TV episodes about spelling beeSpelling bee
A spelling bee is a competition where contestants, usually children, are asked to spell English words. The concept is thought to have originated in the United States....
s, including A Boy Named Charlie Brown
A Boy Named Charlie Brown (1969 film)
A Boy Named Charlie Brown is a 1969 animated film, produced by Cinema Center Films, distributed by National General Pictures, and directed by Bill Meléndez, it is the first feature film based on the Peanuts comic strip...
, The Simpsons
The Simpsons
The Simpsons is an American animated sitcom created by Matt Groening for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The series is a satirical parody of a middle class American lifestyle epitomized by its family of the same name, which consists of Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa and Maggie...
episode "I'm Spelling as Fast as I Can
I'm Spelling as Fast as I Can
I'm Spelling as Fast as I Can is the twelfth episode of The Simpsons fourteenth season. The episode aired on February 16, 2003. Twenty-two million people watched this episode, making it the second-most watched episode since 2002.-Plot:...
", and an episode of Arthur
Arthur (TV series)
Arthur is an American/Canadian animated educational television series for children, created by Cookie Jar Group and WGBH for the Public Broadcasting Service...
.
I Before E (Except After C): Old-School Ways To Remember Stuff was a miscellany released in the UK for the Christmas 2007 "stocking filler" market, which sold well.
"I Before E Except After C" is a song on Yazoo
Yazoo (band)
Yazoo are a British synthpop duo from Basildon, Essex. They had a number of Top 10 hits in the UK charts in the early 1980s...
's 1982 album Upstairs at Eric's
Upstairs at Eric's
Upstairs at Eric's is Yazoo's first album produced by the band and E.C. Radcliffe with assistance from Daniel Miller. It reached # 2 in UK and # 92 in US...
. The Jackson 5
The Jackson 5
The Jackson 5 , later known as The Jacksons, were an American popular music family group from Gary, Indiana...
's 1970 hit "ABC
ABC (song)
"ABC" is a 1970 number-one hit song by The Jackson 5. "ABC" was written with the same design as "I Want You Back", and was first heard on American Bandstand in February 1970. "ABC" knocked The Beatles song "Let It Be" out of the number one spot on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1970...
" has the lyric "I before E except after C". "I before E except after C" was a 1963 episode of the TV series East Side/West Side
East Side/West Side
East Side/West Side is an American drama series starring George C. Scott, Elizabeth Wilson, Cicely Tyson, and later on, Linden Chiles. The series aired for only one season and was shown Monday nights on CBS.-Synopsis:...
.
I Before E is the name of both a short-story collection by Sam Kieth
Sam Kieth
Sam Kieth is a New York Times best-selling American comic book writer and illustrator, best known as the creator of The Maxx and Zero Girl.-Comics career:...
and a music album by Carissa's Wierd
Carissa's Wierd
Carissa's Wierd was an indie rock band from Seattle that formed in 1995 and disbanded in late 2003. Their sound has been described as "chamber rock". The band deliberately misspelled the word "Weird" in their name...
, in each case alluding to the unusual spelling of the creator's name.
Until the 1930s, Pierce City, Missouri
Pierce City, Missouri
Pierce City is a city in Lawrence County, Missouri, United States. The population was 1,385 at the 2000 census. In 2010, the town annexed down Missouri Route 97 into Barry County to a point just north of US Route 60.-Geography:...
was named "Peirce City", after Andrew Peirce. A 1982 attempt to revert to the original spelling was rejected by the United States Census Bureau
United States Census Bureau
The United States Census Bureau is the government agency that is responsible for the United States Census. It also gathers other national demographic and economic data...
.