s/s/
Place your tongue tip near the roof of your mouth behind your top teeth. Push air through the narrow gap. No voicing.
How to pronounce someone's in American English
SUHM·wuhnz
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Americans pronounce someone's as SUHM-wuhnz (/ˈsʌmwʌnz/). Stress falls on the first syllable — keep everything else short and quick.
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Sound by sound
Every sound in "someone's".
2 syllables, 7 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.
m/m/
Press your lips together. Air flows through your nose. Vocal cords vibrate.
w/w/
Round your lips into a tight circle. Lift the back of your tongue toward the soft palate and add voice.
uh/ʌ/
Relax your lips, jaw, and tongue completely. Drop your jaw slightly and keep the tongue neutral.
n/n/
SyllabicThe schwa before N disappears — N becomes the vowel of the syllable. Go straight from the previous consonant to N.
z/z/
Same position as S, but add vocal cord vibration. Feel the buzz.
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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 first syllable, not the others. Stretch SUHM — keep everything else short and quick.
suhm·WUHNZ→SUHM·wuhnz
02
Pronouncing the unstressed 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.
SUHM·WUHNZ→SUHM·wuhnz
Questions
Questions people ask about this.
How is "someone's" stressed in American English?
Stress falls on the first syllable — say "SUHM" with a longer, fuller vowel and keep every other syllable short and quick. The respell "SUHM-wuhnz" marks the stressed syllable in capitals so the rhythm is easy to read at a glance.
Why does the second syllable in "someone's" 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 "SUHM-wuhnz" shows the reduced form so you can hear the casual rhythm directly.
Is the American pronunciation of "someone's" 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 "SUHM-wuhnz" reflects the casual American form; British dictionaries typically print a citation form with crisper consonants and different vowel choices.
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