Pronouncing ‘had’ and ‘hard’

Welcome back to the oral English class. It is one of those days we try to sharpen how we articulate some common words. Or you believe you have no issue pronouncing ‘had’ and ‘hard’? Hmm. Thank God, mispronunciation is not like naira mutilation, which is an actionable offence.

Compulsory /h/

Before highlighting the differences in the pronunciations of ‘had’ and ‘hard’, we firstly note a feature they have in common. The ‘h’ that starts each is not a silent consonant. It must be clearly pronounced. In other words, the pronunciation of both is different from that of ‘ad’ (advert) or ‘add’. Unfortunately, many do not differentiate between the two pairs when  speaking. They pronounce had/hard the way they do ad/add. Kindly check this if you are guilty of the syndrome.

Ad/add – Pronounced as Ad (No /h/)

had – Pronounced as Had (Compulsory /h/)

hard – Pronounced as Haad (Compulsory /h/)

So, the ‘h’ in had/hard must be articulated like the ones in house, home, handsome, hurry, hurricane and Hindu. It is only in words such as hour and honour that the ‘h’ is silent and should thus not be pronounced.

Between had and hard

Back to the topic of this lesson, it is clear that ‘had’ and ‘hard’ have similar spellings and sounds, but there is a major difference in their pronunciation: one has a short vowel, the other a long one. In ‘had’, the vowel sound is short but in ‘hard’ it is long. This must reflect in the way you say both.

had – hAd

hard – hAAD

I hAd some money yesterday. (Had)

He worked hAAd at school. (Hard)

Based on the above explanation, you must also always observe the differences in the pronunciations of cad and card as well as bad and bard.

Cat vs cart

By now, you should equally know that ‘cat’ and ‘cart’  are not to be pronounced the same way. So also are pat and part, mat and mart as well as hat and hart:

Cat: The cAt is sleeping.

Cart: The cAAt can’t contain the bags.

Mat: The mAt is colourful.

Mart: She bought the mAt from the mAAt.

NOTE

While it is relatively easy to identify words with the short A, it can be tricky recognising the ones with AA (long) because it can be manifested by some other spelling patterns. The long AA is, for instance, present in heard, cast, past, alms, balm and guard. Also, note that it is not every time you see ‘ar’ in a word that it is pronounced as the long vowel AA.  In this wise, don’t be tempted to pronounce ‘war’ as wAA!