d/d/
Touch the tip of your tongue to the roof of your mouth just behind your teeth. Add vocal cord vibration as you release.
How to pronounce despair in American English
duh·SPAIR
Start here
Americans pronounce despair as duh-SPAIR (/dəˈspɛr/). Stress falls on the second syllable — keep everything else short and quick. You'll hear it in sentences like "The despair in the air was hard to bear".
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Sound by sound
Every sound in "despair".
2 syllables, 5 sounds. Tap a syllable to jump to its row, then explore each sound's mouth shape and how it's made.
uh/ʌ/
Relax your lips, jaw, and tongue completely. Drop your jaw slightly and keep the tongue neutral.
s/s/
Place your tongue tip near the roof of your mouth behind your top teeth. Push air through the narrow gap. No voicing.
p/p/
Press your lips together to stop the air, then release. No vocal cord vibration.
air/ɛr/
Start with the 'eh' vowel mouth position. Pull the tongue back and up while flaring the lips for the 'r'.
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Watch out
Common pronunciation mistakes in American English.
The textbook way isn't wrong — it's just not how anyone actually says it.
01
Stressing the wrong syllable.
Stress falls on the second syllable, not the others. Stretch SPAIR — keep everything else short and quick.
DUH·spair→duh·SPAIR
02
Pronouncing the first syllable too fully.
Don't pronounce the first syllable too fully. The unstressed syllable reduces to a schwa — the lazy "uh" sound — in casual speech.
DUH·SPAIR→duh·SPAIR
03
Pronouncing the "R" too clearly.
Americans use a relaxed retroflex R — the tongue curls back rather than rolling. The R is one continuous sound with the vowel before it, not two separate sounds.
… (no R)→… r (curl the tongue)
Questions
Questions people ask about this.
How is "despair" stressed in American English?
Stress falls on the second syllable — say "SPAIR" with a longer, fuller vowel and keep every other syllable short and quick. The respell "duh-SPAIR" marks the stressed syllable in capitals so the rhythm is easy to read at a glance.
Why does the first syllable in "despair" reduce to "uh"?
Unstressed syllables in American English collapse toward a schwa — a lazy, neutral "uh" sound. The full vowel is what textbooks teach, but in actual American speech every unstressed vowel reduces. The respell "duh-SPAIR" shows the reduced form so you can hear the casual rhythm directly.
How do I pronounce the R in "despair"?
Americans use a relaxed retroflex R: the tongue curls back rather than rolling, and the R is one continuous sound with the vowel before it — not two separate sounds. Don't try to pronounce a separate vowel followed by a separate R. Treat them as a single shape.
Is the American pronunciation of "despair" different from British English?
American English uses different vowel shapes, a relaxed retroflex R, and connected-speech tricks like flap-T and glottal-stop T that British Received Pronunciation generally avoids. The respell "duh-SPAIR" reflects the casual American form; British dictionaries typically print a citation form with crisper consonants and different vowel choices.
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