Uploaded January 2012 | Updated September 2026, 1 day ago
Visit bit.ly/free8-partproncourse to sign up for the FREE Pronunciation Short Course!
Hi, I'm Heather Hansen, Clear Speech Specialist at English Pronunciation Lab, and I'm here again with your Pronunciation Quick Fix.
This is where I help you correctly pronounce a commonly mispronounced word in English.
Today's word is: COLLEAGUE.
Colleague. Colleague.
2 syllables, stress on the first syllable "col".
The second syllable, LEAGUE, should sound the same as the normal word 'league' with a long E sound and a G ending.
You'll notice that this goes against the typical word stress characteristic (see Part 6 of the free course) that says stressed syllables normally have a pure vowel sound while unstressed syllables are often reduced. We see no reduction in this case and the unstressed syllable remains a pure long E.
This is partly due to the fact that 'colleague' has a voiced G ending which forces us to lengthen the E sound so we can better pronounce the G. See Part 3 of the free course for further discussion of voiced consonant sounds.
If you're really having trouble with this one, how about using 'co-worker' instead?
What other words do you have trouble pronouncing? Post them in the comments and I'll highlight them in the "How to Pronounce" series.
Visit bit.ly/free8-partproncourse to sign up for the FREE Pronunciation Short Course!
Hi, I'm Heather Hansen, Clear Speech Specialist at English Pronunciation Lab, and I'm here again with your Pronunciation Quick Fix.
This is where I help you correctly pronounce a commonly mispronounced word in English.
Today's word is: COLLEAGUE.
Colleague. Colleague.
2 syllables, stress on the first syllable "col".
The second syllable, LEAGUE, should sound the same as the normal word 'league' with a long E sound and a G ending.
You'll notice that this goes against the typical word stress characteristic (see Part 6 of the free course) that says stressed syllables normally have a pure vowel sound while unstressed syllables are often reduced. We see no reduction in this case and the unstressed syllable remains a pure long E.
This is partly due to the fact that 'colleague' has a voiced G ending which forces us to lengthen the E sound so we can better pronounce the G. See Part 3 of the free course for further discussion of voiced consonant sounds.
If you're really having trouble with this one, how about using 'co-worker' instead?
What other words do you have trouble pronouncing? Post them in the comments and I'll highlight them in the "How to Pronounce" series.
