English permits many consonant clusters in the syllable onset and coda. This is in contrast to many other languages. However, the consonant clusters in the onset and coda are not identical.
English allows a maximum of three consonants in the onset. Examples include scream, splash, spray, square and stripe. In these words the first consonant is always /s/, the voiceless alveolar fricative.
The coda also allows many consonant clusters. Here the maximum number of consonants is four. This is the case in the word twelfths.
The following words have three consonants in the coda:
asked
barked
darts
eighths
faults
hands
parks
shelves
shields
tastes
In non-rhotic varieties of English, words such as barked and parks have only two consonants in the coda. However, if one classifies the vowel as an r-coloured vowel, the number of consonants is also two. The final consonant in the illustrated words is either the voiceless alveolar fricative /s/ or the voiceless alveolar plosive /t/.
It is clear that English allows many consonants in both the syllable onset and the syllable coda. If the onset has three syllables, the first consonant must be /s/. However, this is not the case in the coda. The permissible consonant clusters in the onset and in the coda are different.
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