Why is there a difference in pronunciation between island and inland.?

Answer 1

Because in island you do not pronounce the "s" and in inland you do pronounce the "n". The "s" in Island is a called a "silent s", because you don't pronounce it.

There is no "reason" for it. It's just the way it is, because English is an idiosyncratic language. The spelling and pronunciation don't always make sense and in fact are sometimes different from one country to another.

There is a very good book called "Mother Tongue" by Bill Bryson. about how the English language has evolved and is different around the world. While the above answer is sufficient, we could also look at it in a humorous manner. The difference is in the vowel "i". Both words contain the land part. It is the vowel that makes the difference. In island, the vowel is a long "eye" sound while the inland vowel is a short "en" sound. We could see that island is pronounced as such because the land is "eye"solated from any other land surface. Also, to avoid confusion, inland is pronounced with a short vowel sound because to pronounce it as "eyenland" would have you believe you're from Germany.