American English Phonetics
Another American English Faculty Project
7.5 Gradation of other auxiliaries
The second column gives the SF, the third the WF, and the fourth column gives an illustration of the use of the WF.
In the table below the SFs and the WFs of the remaining auxiliary-forms are given.
| SF | WF | Example | |
| are | ɑr | ər | The boys are there |
| be | biː | bi | I’ll be there |
| was | wʌz | wəz | Mary was here |
| were | wɜr | wər | We were all ill |
| do | duː | də | Do they know this? |
| Before V: du | Do I? | ||
| does | dʌz | dəz | Does Alice like it? |
| can | kæn | kən | They can go now |
| could | kʊd | kəd | He could do it |
| must | mʌst | məs | Must John? |
| Before V: məst | Must Uncle Arnold? | ||
| should | ʃʊd | ʃəd | Mary should know better |
Do not confuse the auxiliaries do and have with the lexical verbs do and have, which are not gradation words:
- He does /dʌz/ the cooking and I do /duː/ the washing up
- She had /hæd/ a hat on
- He had /hæd/ a house built
- I have /hæv/ a holding once a year
Recall that been is always /bɪn/, never /biːn/, as in British English.