More on fatigue, pronunciation

It's not just fatigue that has that funny "gue" at the end of it. For a quick review from yesterday's post, remember that "fatigue" is pronounced with only two syllables, with a sound similar to "proceed" or "succeed". The "gue" isn't pronounced like ギュ, but just like "g" in English. Other words with this sound include "colleague" and "league".

Don't confuse "colleague" with "college"; these two are pronounced very differently. The "g" in college sounds like a "j", but the "g" in "colleague" doesn't. Use this word to mean "coworker". Incidentally, that's another word that is frequently mispronounced. "Co" is a prefix which means "together". Usually in English we don't stress prefixes. However, this is an exception. Most people I know say "CO-worker", not "co-WORKer".

Here's a sentence to help you remember these words:

• My colleagues joined a baseball league to get rid of their fatigue.