⟨au⟩

⟨au⟩ is a vowel digraph that occurs in English.

Examples

As /ɔː/

• assault, auction, audience, audio, audit, August, authentic, author, authority, automatic, autumn, caught, cause, clause, daughter, exhaust /ɪɡˈzɔːst/, fault, fraud, launch, laundry, Laura, naughty, Paul, pause, sauce, taught

As /ɒ/^BrE or /ɔː/^AmE

• Aussie, Australia, Austria, cauliflower

As /ɑː/^BrE or /æ/^AmE

• aunt, draught,^BrE laugh, laughter

The following sounds only appear in loan words.

As /əʊ/

• aubergine, au gratin, au revoir, au lait, au pair, chauffeur

As /aʊ/.

• sauerkraut /ˈsaʊərkraʊt/

Spelling anomalies

• As /eɪ/: gauge
• Silent "au": restaurant /ˈrestrɒnt,^BrE ˈrestərənt/^AmE

The word “because"

In Received Pronunciation “because" is normally pronounced /bɪˈkɒz/ but it is one of the few instances in which it is possible to have a stressed schwa: /bɪˈkəz/.

In General American “because" is pronounced /bɪˈkɔz/ or /bɪˈkʌz/. In American English a stressed schwa is pronounced as /ʌ/.

Homophones

• /ɔː/: aural, oral; clause, claws; pause, paws;
• General American /æ/: aunt, ant
• Non-rhotic accents /ɔː/: sauce, source
• /ɑː,^BrE æ^AmE/: draught^BrE (flow of air), draft (rough version, flow of air^AmE)

Variant pronunciatons

• astronaut /ˈæstrənɔːt,^{BrE AmE} ˈæstrənɒt^AmE/
• austerity /ɒˈsterəti,^BrE ɔˈsterəti^{AmE BrE}/
• Austin /ˈɒstɪn, ˈɔstɪn, ˈɔstən/
• Saudi /ˈsaʊdiː, ˈsɔdiː/
• sauna /ˈsɔnə, ˈsaʊnə/

Spanish L1

Many Spanish speakers (who probably don’t hear their teachers, and who also their teachers don’t hear them), pronounce "au" as /aʊ/ which is the way "au" sounds in Spanish. For example, "automatización" sounds like [aʊtomatiθaˈθjon] or [aʊtomatisaˈsjon], and it is very common to hear Spanish speakers saying */aʊtəˈmeɪʃən/ instead of /ɔːtəˈmeɪʃən/. Shorter and more common words, such as “cause" or "author" (which also have cognates in Spanish with the sound [aʊ]) apparently don’t suffer this problem.