SPELLING: WORD FINAL CLUSTERS

1. Catalan tends to end words in consonants, unlike other Southern Romance languages, which prefer vowel endings. Despite regional differences regarding the pronunciation of all consonant clusters, this the standard pronunciation of such combination of consonants, based on the Eastern Catalan pronunciation:

CLUSTER	PRONUNCIATION	CATALAN EXAMPLE	ENGLISH TRANSL.
<lt>	/l/	molt	much; very
<ld>	/l/	cald	warm
<nt>	/n/	important	important
<nd>	/n/	doctorand	PhD student

In some geolects, those clusters sound completely, i.e., both consonants are wholly pronounced.

2. When adding an /-s/ to make up the plural, the pronunciation of the middle element should still be soundless:

CLUSTER	PRONUNCIATION	CATALAN EXAMPLE	ENGLISH TRANSL.
<lts>	/ls/	molts	much; very
<lds>	/ls/	calds	warm
<nts>	/ns/	importants	important
<nds>	/ns/	doctorands	PhD students