117: Suffixes with /ʧ/ (ch sound)

The -tion, -tial, -ure, and -al suffix and how they relate to the ch sound

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 117th episode.

If you've looked at any of the new spelling and pronunciation lessons that have been published to Pronuncian, hopefully you've noticed that we've also added a section for suffixes that contain a certain sound. We added this because suffixes often appear to be non-phonetic. However, by digging deep enough, patterns can be found.

Do you know what sound is usually pronounced at the beginning of the -tion and -tial suffixes? Examples of the more common pronunciation are in the words station and initial. It is the sh sound (sh sound), station, initial.

However, when the -tion suffix is preceded by an s sound and the -tial suffix is preceded by an n sound both of those suffixes are likely to be pronounced as the ch sound (ch sound).

Remember how similar the sh sound and the ch sound are. The sh sound is produced by placing the tip of the tongue close to the back of the tooth ridge (the tooth ridge is that bump behind your top front teeth). There is a sort of groove running down the center of your tongue that the air travels through, creating the sh sound (sh sound).

To create the ch sound, the tip of the tongue briefly touches the back of the tooth ridge, and then the tip is released into a shape much like the sh sound.

Listen to both sounds to compare them to one another. I'll say the sh sound first, then the ch sound.

sh sound, ch sound

Repeat these sounds after me:

sh sound, ch sound

Here are a few examples of the ch sound in the -tion suffix. Remember, these words have an s sound preceding the -tion, which causes the ch sound.

question
suggestion
exhaustion

Next are examples of the -tial suffix pronounced with a ch sound because it is preceded by an n sound:

essential
potential
confidential

I hope you're following along with me, because I'm about to make it more complicated. There are also two suffixes that don't have the ch sound within them, but cause the letter t to be pronounced as a ch sound when it precedes them. This will be less confusing after I give a few examples.

First, the -ure suffix. When the letter t is immediately before the -ure suffix, the t is usually pronounced as a ch sound. Here are a few examples:

feature
adventure
literature

Next is the -al suffix: this is a bit more complicated than the -ure suffix even was. Listen carefully: when the letters t+u precede the -al suffix, the letter t is often pronounced as a ch sound. Here are a few examples:

actual
virtual
habitual

Be careful with this pattern, and don't assume that it means that just the letter t can precede the -al suffix and be pronounce as the ch sound. It doesn't work that way. In words that end in t+al all the other t sound allophones, like the quick d sound, glottal stop, or omitted t sound still apply.

Now I hope you can see why we are including suffix patterns along with each sound's spelling and pronunciation page; they're complicated! But they can be explained, and they can be helpful to be aware of.

To help you set these patterns a little deeper into memory, I'm going to say all twelve examples I gave above. I'll leave time for you to repeat after me:

question
suggestion
exhaustion

essential
potential
confidential

feature
adventure
literature

actual
virtual
habitual

I'll link to the new ch sound lesson from this episode's transcripts page. You can find the transcripts for this, and all of our episodes, by visiting www.pronuncian.com/podcast. Pronuncian is spelled p-r-o-n-u-n-c-i-a-n.

That's all for today everyone. This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. SLA is where the world comes to learn.

Thanks for listening.

Bye-bye.

116: Using 'ain't'

When is (and when isn't) 'ain't' appropriate?

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 116th episode.

Today's topic originally came from the Pronuncian forums. User _kinhow_ commented:

I know it's informal, but I think it's important for us to know when it's used and how it's pronounced. I'm talking about the contraction ain't. I hear it a lot in movies and in some music.

User Mikola agreed that ain't would be a good podcast topic. So, here it is. What is ain't, and how do we use it?

First, yes, ain't is a word; it has meaning that native speakers understand and generally agree on. Some people may not like that it's a word, and may not like hearing it in conversation, but that does not take it out of our vocabulary.

In order to effectively use ain't, you have to be able to pronounce it correctly. Otherwise you'll just sound funny. When I'm saying ain't out of context (for teaching purposes), I'm adding more of a t sound to the end of it than you would hear in conversation. The word ain't is pronounced as a long a, then an n sound, then either a t sound, or more commonly, a glottal stop. A glottal stop is the sound in the word uh-oh and has been covered in previous podcasts that I'll link to from this show's transcripts.

I'll say ain't with a t sound, then a glottal stop.

ain't (t sound)
ain't (g.s.)

Listen to ain't in a couple of sentences and notice that I'm using the glottal stop instead of the t sound:

I ain't going out there!
I ain't gonna ride in that.

If you say the final t sound you are adding formality to a very informal word; it just doesn't work very well. I'll say those sentences with a nice clear t sound.

I ain't going out there!
I ain't gonna ride in that.

Informality must come naturally. If you can't sound comfortable doing it, it is better to leave your speech a little more formal. That would mean not using ain't!

Of course, like most uses of the t sound allophones such as the glottal stop, if the word is given extreme emphasis, the t sound can pop back into the word. Here are those sentences with added emphasis.

I AIN'T going out there!
I AIN'T gonna ride in that.

So, how do we use ain't? The word ain't is an extremely informal replacement of contractions created by the auxiliary verb be + not. In informal conversation only, you can use ain't to emphasize a negative. Here is an example.

Perhaps it's snowing and really, really cold outside and your friend wants to go for a walk. You could say, "I ain't going out there!" to mean that there is no possible way you will go outside in the cold and snow.

Or maybe you're offered a ride in a really old car that looks terribly unsafe. There is no way you would get into that car. You could say, "I ain't gonna ride in that." Notice the second informal contraction gonna. "I ain't gonna ride in that."

Both of these examples are replacing I'm not with I ain't, but it can be used with any noun or pronoun plus be+not. Here are examples:

You're not going or you aren't going becomes you ain't going
He's not going or he isn't going becomes he ain't going
It's not going or it isn't going becomes it ain't going

I hope you get the idea.

If you use ain't inappropriately out of context or in a situation that is anything but extremely informal or for extreme emphasis, people may think you have bad grammar.

It's this notion of bad grammar associated with the word ain't within Standard English that sometimes creates tension among differing dialects of English. I feel the need to cover it here because movies and music were part of the original forum question.

The topic gets touchy here because it gets tied to racial subjects connected to African American English.

I'm going to use the word dialect to refer to African American English, since the differences in speech are based both on pronunciation and vocabulary.

According to Word. The Online Journal on African American English and some websites they link to in their blog as references to African American English, ain't is used as a common replacement contraction for haven't and didn't.

This means that when speaking African American English, ain't has more uses than I mentioned above. It's also important to realize that those uses are considered grammatically correct and acceptable within the dialect. For your listening comprehension, I want to mention that the use of ain't does not necessarily carry the same meaning of emphasis on the negation of the verb that I explained a bit ago. It's a more general-use contraction.

You will come across speech in movies and music that also use that word ain't, aren't speaking African American English, and don't necessarily mean to add emphasis. In those cases, dialect is also coming into play. The incidences of this usage are far too broad to explain in one single podcast. Hopefully what I've talked about so far will cover most of the cases you will come across for hearing ain't.

Using ain't is a personal choice you need to make. You can be safe and never use it, or you can play with it within the context of Standard English, informally and very casually.

I'm going to say one last thing on the ain't topic; don't use it in emails or on forums. In written language, it's very difficult to express the nuance you may intend, and it generally does not reflect well on yourself if you are writing too informally to people who may not know you. This actually goes for all informal contractions in English.

Okay, let's change the subject. Last week I said I'd tell you about The Story of Edgar Sawtelle. I'll admit, I downloaded this audiobook from Audible because it takes place in rural Wisconsin. While I'm not from the exact location of this story, I grew up pretty close by, outside of a town that nobody outside of the state knows of. In fact, most people in the state have never heard of it either.

I was very pleased when listening to the story and the narrator had a perfect pronunciation of Wisconsin words. For instance, the word Chequamegon. The Chequamegon National Forest is a huge forest in northern Wisconsin that I spent many youthful days playing in. Chequamegon is spelled c-h-e-q-u-a-m-e-g-o-n. It is not phonetic by any standard we have, yet everyone from there knows the pronunciation, even if not the spelling. One entire part of the story takes place in the Chequamegon.

I also like how the author found ways to bring a local beer called Leinenkugels into the story. For people who drink it, Leinenkugels gets shortened to Leinies. The author of The story of Edger Sawtelle, David Wroblewski, obviously knew this fact.

The story is about a boy named Edgar who cannot talk. He grows up on his parents farm where they raise a special breed of dog. The story is based on Shakespear's very notorious play, Hamlet. So, if you're aware of the plot of Hamlet, you can already guess the themes of The Story of Edgar Sawtelle. It is very interesting how the author parallels the major plot points of Hamlet with a story set in a totally different time and place.

One last thing about this story; it is very, very long: over 21 hours long. If you have a long daily commute, this book will last you quite a few days.

You can get a free audio copy of The story of Edgar Sawtelle by visiting www.audiblepodcast.com/prouncian and signing up for a free 14-day trial. If you like the service, keep it and keep getting more audiobooks. Or you can grab any book that sounds good to you and then cancel your subscription. Audible is a safe, credible company that I truly feel you can trust. So, try it out if you like.

That's all for today everyone. This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. SLA is where the world comes to learn.

Thanks for listening.

Bye-bye.

115: Sound combinations: sp-, st-, sk-, sc-

What happens to unvoiced stops after the s sound?

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 115th episode.

Before I begin today, we're going to do a little listening experiment. If you have a pen and something to write on near you, please get it ready. This little observation will help you understand today's topic. I'm going to spell the words of a few sets minimal pairs. Then I'll play an audio clip from Merriam Webster's online audio files. I want you to write down which word you hear.

Ready? First I'll spell the words so you know what options to listen for, then I'll play the audio.

1. p-a-r-k or b-a-r-k

2. p-a-n or b-a-n

3. t-i-l-e or d-i-a-l

4. c-o-l-d or g-o-l-d

5. c-o-m-e or g-u-m

Keep your answers ready. We'll come back to them later in this episode.

So, what is this all about? To understand this show, you must remember that the unvoiced stop sounds are the p sound, t sound, and k sound and the voiced stops are the b sound, d sound, and g sound.

Wait! Before we go any further, it is really helpful to have a basic understanding of stops before listening to this episode. If you don't know what a stop sound is, go back and listen to episode 114, then return to this show.

Today I'm going to make it a little more complicated and talk about what happens when the unvoiced stops (that's the t sound, p sound and k sound), aren't the first sound of a word or a stressed syllable, namely when these sounds occur after the s sound. I know, it seems like the details of these sounds never end!

Let's explore. In the English spelling system, words that begin with the letter s can be followed by the letters representing unvoiced stops. Those are the letter p (as in the word spell), t (as in the word star), and k (as in the word sky), or c (as in the word scare). Words that begin with the letter s cannot be followed by the letters representing voiced stops. Those are the letters b, d, or g. That spelling combination just doesn't exist in English.

I've learned from the forums that some students are taught to pronounce unvoiced stops as voiced stops after an s sound. So, the combination sp- is pronounced as sb-. With this idea, students are taught to think about the pronunciation of the word s-p-a-r-k as s-b-a-r-k.

That's why we began this show with the listening experiment. The audio files I had you listen to at the beginning of this show were altered files. The audio I played for you was not from either of the options I spelled. Instead, I took the words spark, span, style, scold, and scum, and digitally removed the s sound from the beginning of each word. I didn't change the audio in any other way. You heard the remainder of the word. In all honesty, I was very surprised how much every example I could find repeated the theory: after an s sound, unvoiced stops are pronounced very, very similarly to their voiced counterparts.

Since there is no chance of accidentally saying a different word with this option, there's no harm in thinking about it this way. Remember, there are no words in English that begin with the sb-, sg-, or sd spelling.

So, in our listening experiment, if you heard the word from the pair that began with the voiced stop sound, you might benefit from thinking of sp-, st-, sk-, and sc- as actually being pronounced as sb-, sd-, and sg-.

There is one very important detail to remember here, and it's regarding dictionaries. Dictionaries don't show allophones. The allophones you may be familiar with are the alternative t sounds, such as the quick d sound or the glottal stop. Dictionaries will only show a t sound, no matter which allophone of the t sound is commonly used. Likewise, you will not find any dictionaries showing you the voiced stop sounds after the s sound. While doing so might make the dictionary more useful for you, it would horribly confuse native speakers who don't realize that allophones exist. So dictionaries keep it simple, and generally don't show allophones.

I'm very curious about s sound plus stop sound topic, so I've started another forum topic, which I'll link to from this episode's transcripts. Please tell me which way you heard the audio files, and which way makes more sense for you to personally learn the pronunciation patterns. Or maybe you wish I hadn't talked about it at all because I've just made it more confusing for you and you were doing just fine before I brought it up. You can tell me that as well. Of course, you can also post any questions or comments you have about any pronunciation topic to our forums at www.pronuncian.com/forums. Obviously, I learn from your questions!

As always, you can find the transcripts for this, and all of our shows at www.pronuncian.com/podcast.

And one last thing: I know I haven't talked about the free audiobooks from Audible for a while now. I really wanted to tell you about The Story of Edgar Sawtelle for this show, but this episode ended up being complicated enough all by itself. So I'll tell you about it for episode 116. In the meantime, you can still visit www.audiblepodcast.com/pronuncian and get a free audiobook by signing up for a free 14-day trial.

That's all for today everyone. This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. SLA is where the world comes to learn.

Thanks for listening.

Bye-bye.

114: 'Puff' (aspiration) details of stop sounds

Stops are /b/, /p/, /k/, /g/, /d/, nd /t/, and the amount of "puff" we give to them matters.

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 114th episode.

We've put a new Introduction to Stops lesson up on Pronuncian, and, since a little extra explanation never hurts, I thought I'd cover some of the subtle details of it. If you've been listening to these podcasts for a while, you probably already know that stop sounds are consonant sounds that require the air to be completely stopped at the beginning of the sound. You probably also know that they all occur in voiced/unvoiced pairs.

You get bonus points if you can name all six stops sounds right now? I'll gave you a few seconds to think about it...

How many did you get? You probably got the t sound and d sound, since I talk about them so much, and maybe the p sound and b sound, since we recently compared them to the v sound and f sound. Did you also remember the k sound and g sound? If so, great job.

Here they are again:

t sound/d sound (t sound, d sound)
p sound/b sound (p sound, b sound)
k sound/g sound (k sound, g sound)

There are three details of those sounds that I want you to be aware of, although we're only going to explain two of them today.

1. The aspiration (that's the puff of air as the stop is released) is greater for unvoiced sounds than voiced sounds.

2. The aspiration is greatest at the beginning of words and the beginning of stressed syllables.

3. The duration of vowel sounds before voiced stops is greater than the duration of a vowel before an unvoiced stop.

First, let's talk about the difference in aspiration between voiced and unvoiced stops. This actually matters for listener comprehension. It seems like such a trivial fact, but actually, it is rather important. If your listeners ever heard a voiced sound (the d sound, b sound, or g sound) when you were saying an unvoiced sound (the t sound, p sound or k sound), it may have been because you were not releasing the unvoiced sound with enough puff of air. We expect that puff, and if it isn't there, we might interpret a different sound.

Listen to the difference in the following minimal pairs. I'm going to say two pairs for each set of voiced/unvoiced set. I'll say the word with the unvoiced sound (that's the word with more puff) first, then the word with the voiced sound. Listen carefully:

time dime
tear dare
pig big
pack back
cane gain
curl girl
 

Could you hear the difference? The first word of each pair had more of a puff of air. That's because it was an unvoiced sound. I'll say each pair again, and give you time to repeat after me:

time dime
tear dare
pig big
pack back
cane gain
curl girl

Now let's talk about point number 2, The aspiration (again that's the "puff") is greatest at the beginning of words and the beginning of stressed syllables. This means that in the middle of a word, syllable stress is important for knowing how to correctly aspirate a stop sound. We're going to use heteronyms to help hear the difference with these sounds. Heteronyms are words that are spelled the same, but are pronounced differently. These are all 2-syllable heteronyms. If the word is stressed on the first syllable, the word is usually a noun or adjective. If it's stressed on the second syllable, it is probably a verb.

Let's play with the words spelled r-e-c-o-r-d. The verb version is reCORD, with the second syllable stressed. An example sentence would be, "I record podcasts almost every week." Listen the the amount of aspiration of the k sound in the middle of the word:

reCORD

Now, compare it with the noun version of that word:

REcord

An example sentence with the word record is, "She broke the record for the number of doughnuts eaten in an hour."

The k sound has less aspiration when the cord syllable is unstressed:

REcord

I'll say them both again, first the verb form, then the noun:

reCORD
REcord

Here are a few more heteromyns that follow the same pattern. I'll say the noun/adjective (first syllable stressed) version, then the verb (second syllable stressed) version. I'll leave time for you to repeat the set after me:

PROtest, proTEST
SUSpect, susPECT
CONduct, conDUCT
ADdress, adDRESS

These details in aspiration really are details, and are less significant than your overall articulation of the sound. I care more that your vocal tract is in the right place during these sounds than that you have native-like aspiration. You can give this detail as much attention as you like. That said, I will tell you that I have misheard non-native speakers based only on the amount of aspiration given to sounds, so it does matter, just not as much as some other things.

As I mentioned at the beginning of this show, I have just published a new Introduction to Stops lesson, and I'll link to it from this show's transcripts page. You can find the transcripts for this, and all past episodes, at www.pronuncian.com/podcast.

I'll also link to the six stop sounds' word lists from this show's transcripts. You can find lots of minimal pairs (with audio) to help you practice on each sound's page. You can also practice the minimal pairs listening drills to check your listening comprehension. Subscribers should log in before practicing so you can keep loading new sets of pairs to practice. That's just one of the many benefits of subscribing to Pronuncian, as well as giving financial support to this show, which we always appreciate!

That's all for today everyone. This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. SLA is where the world comes to learn.

Thanks for listening.

Bye-bye.

113: The /h/, like a chameleon

No sound can become more like surrounding sounds than the h sound.

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 113th episode.

A chameleon is a kind of lizard that changes color to match its surroundings. This helps it blend in and avoid being eaten by other animals. The American English h sound also blends in with its surroundings, and that is one of the reasons it is so hard to hear, analyze, and understand.

When I say it "blends in," I mean that takes on the characteristics of the sounds before and after it. It doesn't go away, and it does still make its own distinct sound, but it manages to do it while having the front of the vocal tract, take the shape of surrounding vowels.

First, what is the h sound? It is a fricative, meaning that the vocal tract is constricted in some way, causing turbulence of air, and sound. For the h sound, the constriction of air happens deep in the throat. Because it's so deep, it's very hard to feel. In fact, if you can feel it, you're probably overproducing it.

Fricatives are continuous consonants, so I can hold the sound for a long time. Holding the h sound sounds like this (h sound).

When speaking, I don't ever have a need to hold the sound like that, but it is good practice for learning where in the vocal tract the sound is coming from.

The h sound is unvoiced in American English, and it has no voiced counterpart. This is unusual, since all of the other English fricatives come in voiced/unvoiced pairs.

Now, to learn what I mean when I say that the h sound is a chameleon sound, let's compare the h sound (h sound) in the words he and hot.

I'll say those words, and I want you to repeat them:

he
hot

Were you able to get a nice, soft, unvoiced h sound?

Let's looks at these words again. I want you to notice if your tongue is already in the place of the long e sound in the word he before the h sound is even produced:

he

Is the front of your tongue high inside your mouth for that entire word? Mine is.

he

The front of my tongue does not move during the entire sound.

he

The vowel sound in the word hot is the short o sound. My mouth is much more open for the short o than it was for the long e. Also, instead of the front of my tongue being high, the back of my tongue is higher, and also pushed back. Listen to the word and repeat it again:

hot

Let's compare the two sounds again:

he hot

The placement of the front of my tongue is quite different during the h sound portion of the words.

he hot

Now let's compare the shape of the mouth during the h sound of some other words. I'll leave time for you to repeat each word after me:

happy
him
heavy
who
whole

Let's examine those last two a little more closely, because there are two things we can learn from the words who and whole. First, the spelling. The wh spelling, when followed by the oo sound or the long o sound, is pronounced as an h sound. Otherwise, it is pronounced as a w sound, as in the words when and why and whale.

Second, getting back to the h sound, notice how different the shape of you lips is for the h sound in the word who as compared to the h sound in the word whole. Your lips are rounded for both the oo sound, who, and the long o sound whole, but are much more closed during the oo sound. That lip shape begins right at the beginning of the word, during the h sound.

Listen to and repeat those words are me:

who
whole

One more time:

who
whole

Here's a practice sentence to help you build up to perfect h sounds, no matter which other sounds surround them.

Are you ready? I'll leave time for you to repeat the sentence.

Perhaps he hoped hurrying would help.

Let's say it again:

Perhaps he hoped hurrying would help.

And one more time:

Perhaps he hoped hurrying would help.

Also, there is a new, free h sound spelling and pronunciation lesson up on Pronuncian! I'll link to it from this episode's transcripts, which you can find at www.pronuncian.com/podcast.

That's all for today everyone. This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. SLA is where the world comes to learn.

Thanks for listening.

Bye-bye.

112: Dropping the /d/

Here is a little-discussed rule about omitting the d sound in certain consonant clusters.

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 112th episode.

Here is a little-talked about topic, omitting the d sound. Yes, I said d sound, not t sound. Not this time.

Way back in episode 63, I talked about the t sound being omitted when it occurs after an n sound and before a vowel sound, l sound, r sound, or schwa+r. Examples include pronouncing the words printer, percentage, and disappointed, as printer, percentage, and disappointed. If you're not familiar with the concept that the letter t can be pronounced in many different ways depending on the sounds that surround it, go back and listen to episodes 63, 65, and 66 before listening to this one.

A few weeks ago I was teaching an advanced pronunciation class to a group of about 20 engineers. I love teaching engineers because, to give a broad stereotype, engineers like rules. Engineers want to know why something is the way that it is, and so do I. So we get along very well in the classroom. In this group, the word grandmother came up. I was asked if I say the d sound in the middle of the word: grandmother.

No, I don't and I was impressed that this student had caught the pronunciation. The word grandmother perfectly illustrates that, like the t sound, the d sound can be omitted in certain words. Before I tell you when it can be omitted, me also tell you that this can be considered informal. I would say, however, that most native speakers do omit this sound much of the time without ever thinking about it, no matter how formally they are trying to speak.

The rule is pretty straightforward:

When a d sound occurs after the n sound and before another consonant sound, the d sound can be omitted.

This rule is true whether the d sound is in the middle of a word, such as in the word grandmother, or happens to be at the end of a word with the next word beginning with a consonant sound, as in the phrase second_month. The main point is that the d sound must occur between an n sound and another consonant.

Let me first give you some easy examples. These words all end in the n sound, then d sound, and can have an s sound added to make the word plural or to conjugate a verb. I'm going to say the word, then spell it, so I can be sure you hear me correctly:

sends: s-e-n-d-s
pounds: p-o-u-n-d-s
errands: e-r-r-a-n-d-s

If I actually tried to say any of those words with a d sound included, it would sound like I was trying to be very, very formal. Listen to me saying them formally:

sends
pounds
errands

And here it is in within some other words; I'm not going to spell these words:

grandmother
handsome
sandwich

Likewise, if I were having a conversation with another native speaker and I said the d sound in those words, the listener might think I was talking a little oddly. It would sound like this:

grandmother
handsome
sandwich

I'll say those three again, first informally, then formally. I'll leave time for you to repeat after I say the pair:

grandmother, grandmother
handsome, handsome
sandwich, sandwich

Now let's play with linking. I'll say a short phrase or sentence that links a word ending in the n sound followed by the d sound to a word that begins with another consonant sound. The d sound will be omitted in these examples. I'm going to say the phrase, then a short sentence, then the phrase again so you really get a chance to hear it:

second_month
February is the second month of the year.
second_month

end_by
The game should end_by 10:0
end_by

found_someone
Grandma found_someone to help her.
found_someone

Now I'll say the phrases again, first with the omitted d sound, then by keeping it in place. I'll leave time for you to repeat me after the pair.

second_month, second_month
end_by, end_by
found_someone, found_someone

Like everything I seem to teach you to do, I immediately turn around and teach you when to not do it as well. So, here it is: you cannot omit the d sound when it is added due to an -ed ending. So, if a verb ended in the n sound, and the -ed ending would be pronounced as a d sound (because the n sound is a voiced sound), the d sound should be linked to the word that follows it, not omitted. This link can be hard to hear because the d sound is a discontinuous consonant, but the stop for it still exists, and is important to include.

Listen for the -ed ending in the following phrases:

planned_my party
remained_confident

Yes, I know it was hard to notice. I'm going to say those phrases one more time, first in the simple past with the -ed ending, then in the simple present (with no -ed):

planned_my party, plan_my party
remained_confident, remain_confident

Since I know those are SO hard to hear, I'm going to repeat them one more time. I'll leave time for you to repeat the pairs after me:

planned_my party, plan_my party
remained_confident, remain_confident

The moral of today's show is not that it is necessary to learn every minute, tiny rule of English pronunciation, the moral is to learn to trust your ear and ask questions when you think you heard something surprising. Many of you have no choice but to be autonomous learners, meaning that you are responsible for finding ways to learn by yourself. The best way to do that is by paying close attention, and by noticing the things that don't seem to follow the rules you know so far. English pronunciation is a deep, deep subject, and there are many lessons still to learn. Always listen closely, trust what you think you've heard, and ask questions.

Don't forget that you can always ask questions on our forums, and I will answer them as quickly as I can get to them. Just go to: www.pronuncian.com/forums. You can also learn a lot by reading through and commenting on other people's questions. The forums are a free service of pronuncian.com.

I'll link to related t sound rules and the discontinuous consonant linking lesson from this show's transcripts. You can find transcripts for all of our shows at www.pronuncian.com/podcast.

That's all for today everyone. This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. SLA is where the world comes to learn.

Thanks for listening.

Bye-bye.

111: Linking /v/ and /f/

Practicing a few simple techniques can make it much easier to transition to and from the v sound and f sound.

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 111 podcast.

In our last show, I talked about the v sound and f sound and the similarities between those sounds and the b sound, p sound, and w sound. There are three main points I want you to remember from that show:

1) The v sound is voiced, and the f sound is unvoiced.

2) The f sound and v sound are fricatives, and fricatives are continuous consonants. To create continuous consonant sounds, air must come out of the mouth smoothly and softly and evenly; the air must never completely stop during an f sound or a v sound or something similar to a b sound or p sound may accidentally occur.

3) The f sound and v sound are created when the air is pushed out of the mouth between the backside of the bottom lip and the frontside of the top teeth; the top lip must not be involved in a v sound, or a sound similar to a w sound may accidentally occur.

Today I'm going to expand on those ideas to tell you how to link to and from a v sound and f sound. Linking is smoothly transitioning from word to word in connected speech. The problem I most hear when non-native speakers are linking other sounds to or from a v sound or an f sound is that the speaker adds a slight vowel sound between the words. This usually occurs because the speaker is curling the bottom lip under the top teeth.

I blame us, the ESL/ELL teachers for this mistake! When we are teaching very new English language learners the sounds of English, we tend to over-emphasize the sounds. We make the sounds big and dramatic so that the learners can see and hear what we're doing. If your first language does not include a v sound or f sound, your teacher probably taught you to curl your bottom lip under your top teeth, then blow air out your mouth. Sure, with your bottom lip curled like that, you can make a big, beautiful, loud sound. Your teacher probably said you were doing it perfectly. And, indeed, the sound you were producing was very nice. It sounded exactly like we wanted it to sound.

However, what you were doing made it nearly impossible to move to and from certain other sounds, namely sounds that also require our lips to move a lot: the b sound, p sound, w sound, and the m sound.

If your lip is curled under your top teeth for the v sound, it is very hard to move from that sound into the b sound without accidentally adding a small, quick, vowel between the words. You would have a very hard time saying the sentence, "I've been practicing."

Did you hear the link between the words I've and been? There should be no break in sound between the words, and no added vowel sound either. I'll say it a few more times:

I've been
I've been
I've been

All it takes for a v sound or an f sound is a very small, soft vibration between the back of my bottom lip and the lower front of my top teeth. My jaw needs to be nearly closed for that to occur. My bottom lip does not curl into my mouth, it simply tips backward a little bit so that it is very near my top front teeth.

Let's practice a few words that include the v sound or f sound. These words will then be in a short paragraph that you can practice as often as you like, maybe even every day for a while, if you want to get really good at it! I want you to move your lips as little as possible, not curling them under your top teeth. Repeat the following words:

have
fricatives
five
from
vowel
very

Now let's link those words to other words in small phrases. Practice moving between words without ever stopping the sound completely, and also not adding an accidental vowel sound between words. I'll leave time for you to repeat after me:

have_problems
linking_fricatives
practice_for_five_minutes
Don't add_vowel sounds
Move_from word to word
blending the sounds_very softly

Now here is the whole paragraph. I'll read a part, then wait for you to repeat it:

If you have_problems linking_frictives, practice_for_five_minutes every day. Don't add_vowel sounds between the words. Move_from word to word, blending the sounds_very softly.

If you would like a simple, short sentence to practice every day to help you practice getting from a v sound to a b sound, just say:

I've been practicing.
I've been practicing.

Free transcripts for this podcast episode can be found online at www.pronuncian.com/podcast. I'll also link to the Pronuncian lessons about linking with this show's transcripts.

If you'd like even more linking practice, you can become a subscriber to Pronuncian and have full access to all of our online exercises and quizzes, or you can purchase our Rhythm and Intonation ebook. The Rhythm and Intonation ebook has a whole chapter about linking to and from different kinds of sounds in English.

That's all for today everyone. This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. SLA is where the world comes to learn.

Thanks for listening.

Bye-bye.

110: Troublesome /v/ and /f/

Be careful with the /b/, /p/ and /w/ when working with the /f/ and /v/.

Transcript

Hi everyone, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 110th episode.

Listen to the end of today's show to hear about another novel I love, The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald. I'm going to encourage you to read and listen to it as a great study aid for the TOEFL, or GRE vocabulary prep, or just for your own entertainment. At the end of this show I'll tell you how you can, and why you should, get a free audiobook copy of The Great Gatsby from Audible.com.

Like many of my podcast topics, I chose this week's topic based on a few good forum questions. The forums are free for anyone to use and post questions to. Just go to www.pronuncian.com/forums.

Forum user myword from India was having some trouble linking from the f sound and v sound. Issues with the v sound and f sound are very common, not only for people from India, but also native Spanish, Korean, Japanese, German, Czech, and Russian speakers (and those are just the languages I regularly come across)! It is a little odd to have such unrelated languages struggling with the same problem, but f and v problems seem to span the globe!

I find a lot of students who think they are correctly creating the f sound and v sound, but actually aren't. As a somewhat separate issue, I also hear a lot of non-native speakers accidentally creating these sounds when they don't mean to.

Let's begin by exploring these sounds in more detail.

The v sound and f sound are a voiced/unvoiced pair. The v sound uses the vocal cords, and the f sound does not. For ESL/ELL students, the v sound seems to cause greater trouble than the f sound. For that reason, I'm going to focus on the v sound for this episode. Remember though, that pronunciation techniques for a voiced sound are usually also true for an unvoiced sound.

These sounds are also fricatives (just like the s sound, z sound, sh sound, and zh sound from our last episode). I seem to keep coming back to this term fricative again and again. Fricatives are smooth sounds that we can hold for a few seconds. Fricative sounds are created by forcing air out our mouth through a small opening.

For a bit of comparison between a fricative, which can be held for a few seconds, and a stop sound, which can only occur for a tiny bit of time, I'm going to compare the v sound, which is a fricative, to a b sound, which is a stop. The v sound I can hold, the b sound I can't; the b sound can only happen quickly, and then it's done:

v sound (v sound)
b sound (b sound)

Here they are again:

v sound (v sound)
b sound (b sound)

I can hold the v sound because I never fully stop the air from leaving my mouth. The v sound is created by using continuous friction.

Many non-native speakers make a rather large range of sounds that get interpreted by native English speakers as a v sound or an f sound, even though the speaker didn't intend to be creating those sounds. This is a different kind of issue than I normally talk about. Today I'm telling you when you might be accidentally creating a sound.

This difference in interpretation between native and non-native speakers occurs because even a slight vibration between the bottom lip and the top front teeth can sound like a v sound or f sound to us, even if it is much more slight than your normal v sound or f sound. I've heard this happen most often when Spanish, Korean or Japanese speakers are intending to make a b sound or p sound.

So how do you fix this potential miscommunication?

As I said earlier, the p sound and b sound are stops. All of the air gets stopped when the lips come together for these sounds. When the air is released, it is released equally from the top and bottom lip. If the release occurs unevenly, with more of the upper lip letting go than the bottom, the bottom lip still has the opportunity to vibrate against the top teeth during the release. That combination b sound/v sound can get interpreted as either of those sounds by native English speakers.

Now let's talk about what native speakers from India and German, Czech, and Russian speakers do; create a w sound instead of a v sound. With the w sound, make absolutely certain that the vibration of that sound is, first, softer than a v sound, and second, created equally between the top and bottom lip.

A w sound is not a fricative; it's a glide. The important difference between a fricative and an glide is that the turbulence of air leaving the mouth is softer for an glide than it is for a fricative. Think of a w sound as a soft vibration occurring equally between both lips.

The word "soft" and the phrase "equally between the lips" are the keys to the w sound. This is because any vibration between the bottom lip and top teeth might get interpreted as a v sound, even if it is very slight. That said, if it is the v sound that you cannot say correctly, and it always seems to come out as a w sound, remember that only a slight vibration between the bottom lip and top front teeth is necessary for the v sound.

In fact, overdoing a v sound, though it may be a very clear sound, causes a lot of trouble in connected speech. It's really difficult to link to and from an over-produced v sound. I'll talk more about that in episode 111.

For now, let practice noticing the difference in sound between a v sound and b sound and between a v sound and w sound.

Here are some v sound/b sound minimal pairs. I'll say both words as a pair, with the v sound first. I'll give you time to repeat after me.

vest, best
vase, base
vanish, banish
vent, bent
curve, curb

And here are v sound/ w sound pairs. I'll say the v sound first, and again leave time for you to repeat.

vest, west
verse, worse
vet, wet
vine, wine
veil, whale

A new lesson for both the v sound and f sound has been created on Pronuncian, and I'll link to those lessons from this week's transcripts. You can find those transcripts by going to www.pronuncian.com/podcast.

Now I'm going to take the opportunity to tell you about the fantastic book, The Great Gatsby. The Great Gatsy is known as a Great American Novel, meaning it does a good job of representing the United Stated at the time it was written. F Scott Fitzgerald wrote the book in 1925, which is known as the Roaring Twenties because of the expanding US economy after World War I.

I like using this book with my more advanced students not only for its cultural significance, but because of its more demanding vocabulary. The other books I've talked about so far are suitable for a high-intermediate student, the of level anyone who can listen to and understand this podcast, but may also rely on the transcripts for a full comprehension. The Great Gatsby is an advanced book. If you want to expand your English from a book, this is the book to choose. The vocabulary is rich and beautiful, and the story is great. I'd recommend listening to and reading this book at the same time to assure comprehension.

Audible has this book with a choice of three different readers. A great thing about Audible is that you can listen to a sample of the reading before downloading a book. I recommend the Alec Sand version for his clear voice and understandable reading.

Remember, you can try Audible for free by going to www.audiblepodcast.com/pronuncian. When you sign up, you get to choose any audio book to download for free. Then you can keep your account and continue buying books, or you can cancel your account. If you cancel before the free trial ends, you can keep your free book, and you are charged nothing.

That's all for today, everyone. Remember, I'll continue the topic of the v sound/f sound next week by explaining how to link to and from these sounds.

This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. SLA is where the world comes to learn.

Thanks for listening. Bye-bye.

109: /s/, /z/, /ʃ/, /ʒ/ (s, z, sh, and zh sounds) compare and contrast

Four sounds that are quite similar, but different in a few very important ways.

Transcript

Hi everyone, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 109th episode.

It's still free audiobook time! Listen at the end of today's show to hear about this week's pick for a great audiobook for non-native speakers: The Giver, by Lois Lowry.

Also, a quick announcement that we are going to go to an every-other-week schedule through summer. Seattle weather is often thought of as grey and dreary and rather unpleasant. But that is only in the winter. We have beautiful warm and sunny summer weather, and instead of writing and recording every week, I'm going to cut back and spend more time enjoying the beautiful place I live. We plan to resume our weekly schedule at the end of September. I hope you all understand.

For today's show, I'm going to compare four sounds that are all really close to one another: the s sound, z sound, sh sound, and zh sound. Today's show is full of vocabulary relating to learning about pronunciation. Hopefully you're familiar with at least some of it. If not, don't worry, I'll explain everything that is necessary for understanding these sounds.

The s sound, z sound, sh sound, and zh sound sounds are all fricatives, which means we produce the sound by closing the vocal tract enough that friction, and sound, is created when we push the air out our mouth. Fricatives are continuous consonants, which means that the sound is smooth. This is in contrast to stops and affricates, where the air is briefly stopped before being released.

I can tell that the s sound, z sound, sh sound, and zh sound are continuous because I can hold the sound for a few seconds, if I want to. I'm not saying that these sounds should last for a few seconds during words; I'm only saying that it's possible.

To show you what I mean, I'm going to hold each of these sounds for a few seconds right now:

s sound (s sound)
z sound (z sound)
sh sound (sh sound)
zh sound (zh sound)

A little reminder of voiced and unvoiced pairs is in order today, as well, because knowing the difference between a voiced sound and an unvoiced soundis a key to these sounds.

In voiced/unvoiced pairs, the major difference is that the vocal cords vibrate during the production of voiced sounds, and do not vibrate during unvoiced sounds. At first, this can be easier to physically feel than hear. Let's compare the s sound and z sound, since they are usually easier sounds for non-native speakers to produce than the sh sound and zh sound.

I'd like you to put two fingers on the front of your throat. While your fingers are in place, say the z sound for a few seconds (z sound). Yes, you have to actually do it in order to feel it; you can't just pretend this, and you can't whisper it. Let's say the z sound, with our fingers in place, one more time (z sound). You should be able to feel a vibration on your fingers.

Now let's say the s sound for a few seconds (s sound). Don't add any extra sound to it. Don't say (su) or anything, just the s sound (s sound). The vibration you felt during the z sound should not be there during this sound (s sound).

Let's compare them. Say the z sound with me, then the s sound (z sound, s sound). If the feeling on your fingers is exactly the same for both of them, you are doing one or both of them wrong. These sounds must feel different. The z sound should vibrate, meaning it is voiced, and the s sound should not, meaning it is unvoiced. We call the z sound/s sound a voiced/unvoiced pair.

The sh sound and zh sound have the same difference. The zh sound is voiced, and will vibrate, the sh sound is unvoiced and will not vibrate. The zh sound and sh sound are also a voiced/unvoiced pair.

Now let's compare the two unvoiced sounds we're talking about today, the s sound and the sh sound. Listen to the difference between these sounds; I'll say the s sound first, then the sh sound (s sound, sh sound). The difference in these sounds is where the friction is created inside my mouth.

Both of these sounds rely on how close the front of the tongue is to the top front teeth and the tooth ridge. The tooth ridge is that bump inside our mouths, right behind the top front teeth.

To make the s sound, the tip of the tongue should be close to the backside of the top front teeth. The tongue is kept tense as air is pushed through the small opening between the front of the tongue and the tooth ridge, then into the top front teeth. The front sides of the tongue touch the side teeth toward the front of the mouth. That is a lot of stuff going on at once! This is because it takes a lot of friction to create the s sound!

Create the s sound with me (s sound).

To create the sh sound, the tongue is a little farther back, away from the top front teeth. The air is forced between the tip of the tongue and the back of the tooth ridge. The front sides of your tongue will touch your side teeth farther back in your mouth than where they touch during the s sound.

Create the sh sound with me (sh sound).

So remember, the s sound is more forward in the mouth, and uses more of the front of the tongue, more tooth ridge, and even the top front teeth. The sh sound is farther back, and uses the back of the tooth ridge, and just the tip of the tongue.

Say both sounds with me; I'll say the s sound first, then the sh sound (s sound, sh sound).

If you can say both of those sounds, you can also say the z sound and the zh sound (unless you're wondering what I'm even talking about when I say zh sound).

The zh sound is pronounced (zh sound). It is the sound in the words usual, vision, and measure. Can you hear it? I'll emphasize it in those words to help you hear it. (zh sound, usual, vision, and measure).

Now, think back to earlier in this show when I said that the major difference between voiced and unvoiced sounds is the vibration of the vocal cords. That means I am going to give you the same instruction for the z sound and zh sound as I gave you for the s sound and sh sound, except that I'm also going to tell you to voice the sounds.

Let's try it.

To make the z sound, the tip of the tongue should be close to the backside of the top front teeth. The tongue is kept tense as air is pushed through the small opening between the front of the tongue and the tooth ridge, then into the top front teeth. The front sides of the tongue touch the side teeth toward the front of the mouth. Don't forget to voice the sound.

Create the z sound with me (z sound).

To create the zh sound, the tongue is farther back, away from the top front teeth. The air is forced between the tip of the tongue and the back of the tooth ridge. The front sides of your tongue will touch your side teeth farther back in your mouth than where they touch during the z sound. Again, don't forget to voice the sound.

Create the zh sound with me (zh sound).

Let's practice.

I'm going to say the s sound, then four words that include the s sound. I'll leave time for you to repeat after me:

s sound
sample
best
inspire
mouse

Now I'm going to say the z sound, then four words that include the z sound:

z sound
zone
easy
reason
quiz

Here is the sh sound, and four words that include this sound:

sh sound
shoe
fashion
machine
fish

And finally, the zh sound:

zh sound
usual
vision
measure
massage

All four of these lessons have a recently updated spelling and pronunciation lesson that I'll link to from this show's transcripts. You can find the transcripts by visiting www.pronuncian.com/podcast.

I also recently created a quiz to help you compare these sounds and their similar spelling patterns. The lessons for these sounds also include a link to the listening quiz to check that you are actually hearing what you think you're hearing. Become a subscriber for full access to Pronuncian's listening quizzes and additional listening exercises. Go to www.pronuncian.com/join to details.

Okay, now let me tell you about the book The Giver, by Lois Lowry, and give you the details on how you can get a free copy of this audiobook.

The Giver is a compelling novel because it is both the recipient of the Newbery Medal, a very distinguished literary honor, and is also on many banned books lists because it contains somewhat controversial themes.

The story is set in the future, in a society that is highly controlled for the purpose of achieving utopia, and ultimate harmony and tranquility among its residents. For the good of everyone, every person's future is planned out for them. The main character, Jonas, has been selected for a special position among the community, a position which causes him to question the society he was born into. The story borders on science fiction, though it does not include the high-tech inventions of most science fiction books. It's also darker in theme than last week's book, Holes, by Louis Sacher.

In case you're wondering, both Holes and The Giver are read in an American accent, and you can sample the reading of any book before you pick it for download, so you always know what you're getting.

You can get a free copy of the audio version of this book by going to www.audiblepodcast.com/pronuncian and signing up for the free 14-day trial. Now, you don't have to choose a book I recommend! You can choose from any of their huge selection of titles. If you cancel your account before the 14 days is up, you still get to keep whichever audiobook you picked, and you pay nothing. It's a safe and free way to check Audible out, and we appreciate you going to our sponsors. Everyone wins.

That's all for today, everyone. This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. SLA is where the world comes to learn.

I'll be back in two weeks.

Bye-bye.

108: In the US, it is 'learned' and 'spelled,' while the British kept 'learnt' and 'spelt'

The English past tense became regular; the British kept the irregular spelling.

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 108th episode.

Listen to the end of today's show to hear about another audio book I recommend for non-native speakers, Holes, by Louis Sacker. I'll also tell you how you can get a copy of this book for free!

Today I'm going to talk about a couple of differences between American English and British English. I come across learners with very different levels of awareness when it comes to ways the dialects of English are different. Certainly, it would be easier for all of us, teachers and learners alike, if American English and British English were same, but I kind of like the differences. After all, we are in different countries, and even different continents. Certainly our cultures are different, so it seems our speech should give us clues about our individual backgrounds.

Of course, I fully understand that within these English speaking countries, there are many, many differences in smaller regional dialects. I'm speaking only about a few specific words within the most standard accents.

When I'm teaching, there are two words that tell me a student has had some British English learning experience, the words learnt and spelt. That was learnt l-e-a-r-n-t, and spelt s-p-e-l-t. In American English, the verbs to learn and to spell are regular in the past tense. We simply add -ed, and we get learned and spelled. In British English, a t is used instead.

Now, I don't know how much the British realize that the Americans have made these words regular, but I will say that probably only a minority Americans know that the British kept the older, irregular, spelling and pronunciation. That, unfortunately, can make your American colleagues and friends think you are actually wrong, and not realize that you're using a different country's standard.

When you're speaking, the spoken difference can be masked by your overall accent, and go unnoticed by your listeners. It's usually the spelling that is first noticed.

As an ESL or ELL student, you have some choices, and I think choices are good. If you are living and working or studying in the US, you might choose to adopt the US patterns, but that also depends on if you plan to stay in the US long-term.

If you are studying English outside of an English speaking country in an EFL program, it depends on how and where you'll be using your English. For people in that situation, being able to recognize the differences between countries' standards is the best circumstance.

And this might surprise some of you, but if you are using English as a common language among non-native English speakers (for instance, in a multi-cultural situation where English is the shared second language among you), I think the British patterns are more widely known across the world, and you might want to stay with them. I think the British have done a better job of creating material for English as a Foreign Language classrooms, and that is why so many of you have had more British English exposure than American English.

Let's talk a bit about Canadian speech because sometimes Canadian English can be a hybrid between American and British English. Canadian pronunciation is more American, but their spelling tends to follow closer to British. For instance, they usually keep the extra u in the words colour and favour. Their past tenses, however, have taken on the American qualities. I asked a Canadian friend of mine who teaches ESL in Canada what the more common pattern is in his country. He told me that the ed endings of these words is generally used in spelling, although saying learnt is acceptable. I would say, if you live in Canada, you can choose how Canadian you want to sound by using the learned pronunciation, or the learnt pronunciation.

The words learn and spell aren't the only words with these differences in past tense spelling and pronunciation, they are just the most frequently used. According to the Ask the Experts section of the Oxford English Dictionary, the British also have an irregular past tense for the following:

burn
kneel
lean
leap
spill
spoil

Since languages always change, It will be interesting to see what happens to these words in the future. Will they become more regular over time? Who knows.

Now I'm going to tell you about a great book, Holes, by Louis Sacker, which you can get for free by signing up for a free 14-day trial of Audible.com. To get this deal, go to www.audiblepodcast.com/pronuncian. Oh, and don't think that just because you aren't in the US you can't get in on this; Audible is available in a huge number of countries of the world.

Holes is a young adult reading level, so if you're worried you don't have a high enough listening comprehension for an audiobook, this would be a good start. And the story is very entertaining, which is why Disney also made it into a movie. A 14-year-old boy named Stanley gets found guilty of stealing a pair of famous shoes, although he is actually innocent. His punishment is to go to a place called Camp Green Lake and, every day, dig a hole in the ground. The Warden says that this kind of labor will make him, and the other inmates into good boys. However, there is much more to the story than digging a hole to improve one's set of values.

The story is amusing and funny at the same time. If you enjoy books with themes of friendship, family history, luck, destiny, and hope, this book is for you. And later you can watch the movie, too, and get even more entertainment out of it. Trust me, I've used this audio book with students in the past, and they all enjoyed it. I enjoy it every time I hear the story again.

So, you can get this book, or any other of Audible's 75,000 titles, by going to www.audiblepodcast.com/pronuncian. Sign up for the free trial. You can cancel before the 14 days is up, and you get to keep your free book.

That's all for today everyone. This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. SLA is where the world comes to learn.

Bye-bye.

107: 'ck' after short vowels (as in back), 'k' after all the others (as in 'bake)

Learning intricate English phonetic patterns can give you confidence in vowel pronunciation.

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 107th episode.

I have an update from last week's show; I did not properly fact check the URL for the free Audible audio book. The correct URL is: www.audiblepodcast.com/pronuncian. Last week's podcast has been updated and fixed, so only the people who downloaded that episode in the first day or two heard the wrong URL. Sorry for the confusion. If you tried it last week and it didn't work, try it again, using www.audiblepodcast.com/pronuncian. If you don't know what I'm talking about, I'm talking about getting a free audio book from our new sponsor, Audible. You just need to sign up for a free 14-day trial and you get an audio book to keep, even if you cancel your account before the free trial ends.

I'd also like to remind you to check out how inexpensive it can for you to sponsor an episode of this podcast. This is a great way for schools and private tutors to get their name out there. Go to www.pronuncian.com/advertising for details.

On to today's show.

Here is a bit of phonetic trivia: the vowel sound before the letters ck is almost always a short vowel sound. This convenient detail can give you an extra level of confidence in your pronunciation of those letters that can have multiple pronunciations, namely the letters u and o.

The letter u is commonly pronounced as either a short u, as in the word sun, or the other u, as in the word put. It can be hard to know which pronunciation is correct. Here's one trick: if the letter u occurs before the letters ck you can bet that it is going to be pronounced as the short u. Examples include the following:

duck
lucky
knuckle
truck
bucket

If you've been listening for a while, you also know that the letter o can be particularly troublesome because of its three different possible pronunciations! The letter o can be pronounced as a short o (short o), as in the word top), a long o (long o), as in the word most or the aw sound (aw sound), as in the word dog.

However, when a single letter o occurs before the letters ck, you are safe to pronounce it as a short o sound. Examples include:

clock
rock
shock
locker
pocket

We can look at this from another direction as well, and we can assume that if a word is pronounced with a vowel sound other than a short vowel sound, and it is followed by a k sound, the k sound is not going to be spelled ck, and only the letter k is needed. (Except, of course, when the k sound is spelled ch, but I'm not getting into that today. Go back and listen to Episode 85 to learn more about the ch/k sound connection.)

Here are examples of five vowel sounds that commonly occur before a k sound, spelled k:

long a: cake, c-a-k-e
long e: geek, g-e-e-k or speak, s-p-e-a-k
long i: bike, b-i-k-e
long o: broke, b-r-o-k-e, or soak, s-o-a-k
other u: book, b-o-o-k

More odd trivia is that the remaining five vowel sounds either don't occur before the k sound, or only rarely occur.

The oi sound and ow sound don't occur before the k sound, except in very infrequent or unusual words like zoiks (which came from the cartoon Scooby-Doo). I think we're safe in saying you don't need to worry much about those sound combinations.

The oo sound, aw sound, and long u sound rarely occur before the k sound, although at least one example of each can be found.

oo sound, spook, s-p-o-o-k
aw sound, hawk, h-a-w-k
long u: (and sorry for the vulgarity here) puke, p-u-k-e

Understanding which sound combinations and which spelling combinations are likely in English can really be useful to those of you ready for an intricate English phonetics lesson like this one. I hope you enjoyed it.

That's all for today everyone. This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. SLA is where the world comes to learn.

Bye-bye.

106: 'long u' stressed and reduced; /yu/ or /yə/?

The long u can be difficult to recognize in multi-syllable words, especially when it's reduced.

Transcript

Hi everyone, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 106th episode.

Before I get to the long u sound, I would like to announce something new we are doing at Pronuncian: sponsorships! As our podcast and website have grown, so have our bandwidth costs. Instead of making fewer podcasts or putting less sounds online for you, we are now accepting sponsors to help cover those costs. If you or anyone you know might be interested in helping to sponsor our podcast, go to pronuncian.com/advertising to see more details.

We're particularly interested in helping other English teachers or tutors reach out to students. It's an affordable way to get your name and services out in front of people who need you! So again, check pronuncian.com/advertising if you are interested.

I am really excited to introduce you to our first sponsor, Audible.com! Lucky for you, Audible has asked us to offer you a free audio book. All you need to do is sign up at audiblepodcast.com/pronuncian, and choose your free book. I've used audiobooks in the classroom with my students a number of different times. They are a really great way to work on listening skills and learn new vocabulary. Plus, they offer huge opportunities for you to practice mimicking the speech patterns of the book reader. During the next few weeks I'm going to tell you some books you might enjoy.

I actually just finished listening to an audio book from Audible that some of you might find interesting. It's called, The Adventure of English. If you really want to know why English is the way that it is, check out this book. It's written by Melvyn Bragg, and is narrated by British actor Robert Powell. Obviously, since the narrator is British, it is not read with an American accent. However, Powell does a brilliant job of speaking in a variety of English accents, both current and past, as he talks about the history of English. Because of the dialects you get to hear during the expert narration of The Adventure of English, it's one book that you can actually get much more out of by listening to than from reading yourself. If learning more about English is not for you, Audible has a huge selection of 75,000 titles, so there is certainly something there you'd enjoy. Plus, it's free, and you get to keep the book you choose, even if you immediately cancel your account, so you have nothing to lose! Just go to Audible.com/pronuncian. Your sign-ups directly support this show.

For today's show, I'm going to talk about a sound that really gets overlooked, the long u. The long u sounds like (long u), as in the word cute. Today, I'm going to talk about long u in multi-syllable words, and how to reduce the long u sound. When I say reduced long u sound, I'm talking about the long u when it occurs on an unstressed syllable of a multi-syllable word.

A common long u substitution is the oo sound. This is because the sounds are so similar; the long u sound is just an oo sound with a y sound before it. The oo sound is pronounced as (oo sound), and the long u sounds like (long u). Can you hear the difference: oo sound (oo sound), long u (long u)?

I often hear words like accumulate pronounced as *accoomoolate, or document pronounced *docooment. Don't get me wrong, these accidental substitutions will probably not cause miscommunication, they just enhance your accent, and you may want to be aware of them.

The spellings for the long u sound in multi-syllable words can be difficult sound to grasp because, as words gain syllables, their phonetics often become considerably harder to see. In big, long words, the long u sound is often spelled with just the letter u somewhere in the middle of a word, and often the word has a suffix.

Before we look at longer words, let's find the patterns of short, single syllable words. The general pattern for the long u sound is that it can be spelled:

u-consonant-e, as in the word cute
u-e, as in the word fuel
e-w, as in the word few

The confusing part is that those spellings can all also be pronounced as the oo sound. There is a way to know if the pronunciation will be long u or oo sound, however. The long u sound is more likely when the consonant sound before the spelling is any of the following six consonant sounds:

m sound, as in the word amuse
k sound, as in the word cute
n sound, as in the word continue
f sound, as in the word few
b sound, as in the word distribute
v sound, as in the word view

As I already mentioned, spelling patterns become less important in multi-syllable words because suffixes and other circumstances can affect and change spellings.

Here are some examples of words that have the long u sound spelled with just the letter u. In single-syllable words, the long u pronunciation is unlikely with just a single letter u; in multi-syllable words, however, it comes up more frequently.

fusion
circulate
contribution
document
stimulate
communicate
formula
mutual
accumulate

I want to focus on the word accumulate for a bit because it gives us an interesting comparison of a stressed long u sound and an unstressed long u sound in a single word. Because the word accumulate ends in the -ate suffix, we know that the word is stressed on the third from the last syllable. In the word accumulate, the stressed syllable falls on the c-u syllable, acCUmulate. The c-u syllable of the word accumulate sounds like (k sound+long u), accumulate.

Immediately after the c-u syllable in the word accumulate is the m-u syllable, which also has a long u sound. However, since the m-u syllable is next to a stressed syllable, the m-u syllable gets reduced. This is a common function of schwa, or reduced vowel sounds. Your dictionary shows schwa as an unside-down letter e. The m-u syllable of the word accumulate sounds like (m sound+y sound+schwa), accumulate.

The important thing here is that the long u sound, which is pronounced as (long u) when it is stressed, is pronounced as (y+schwa) when it is unstressed. So, if I break the word accumulate into its individual syllables, it is pronounced a(c)-cu-mu-late.

Your American English dictionaries will probably show the c-u syllable in the word accumulate transcribed as a k sound, then a y sound, then an oo sound. That gives you (k sound, y sound, oo sound) It will then show the m-u syllable as an m sound, a y sound, and then a schwa, which gives you (m sound, y sound, schwa), a(c)-cu-mu-late.

Let's compare some stressed long u sounds to some unstressed long u sounds. In the following words, the long u is stressed:

fusion
communicate
contribution
mutual

And in the following words, the long u is reduced:

circulate
document
stimulate
formula

I'm going to say all eight of those words again for you to repeat after me. Here is the stressed long u:

fusion
communicate
contribution
mutual

And here is the reduced long u:

circulate
document
stimulate
formula

That's all for today, everyone. If you have a pronunciation topic you'd like me to discuss in a podcast, let me know in our forums. I get a lot of ideas from the forums, and I like the opportunity to interact with all of you! So go check them out at www.pronuncian.com/forums. Forum accounts are always free.

This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. SLA is where the world comes to learn.

Bye-bye.

105: Pronouncing 'though,' 'thought,' 'through,' and 'thorough'

These four o-u-g-h words can be so similar, yet different in very important ways.

Transcript

Hi everyone, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 105th episode.

Today's topic came from a request on the forums. A user from Barcelona, Spain, asked about the words though, thought, through, and thorough. The fact that all of these words share the o-u-hg-h spelling pattern is at the heart of the confusion. However, confusing or not, it's necessary to be able to confidently use these words.

Only one of these words, thought, follows any kind of predictable spelling pattern. When the letters o-u-g-h are followed by the letter t, the o-u-g-h is usually pronounced as the aw sound (aw sound), (that's the sound in the word dog). So the words thought, brought and fought all rhyme, and the aw sound (aw sound) is the vowel sound for all of them.

Let's move on to the word through. Through t-h-r-o-u-g-h is pronounced the same as threw t-h-r-e-w. Threw t-h-r-e-w, is phonetic. We expect that the letters e-w can be pronounced as the oo sound. Other words spelled e-w and pronounced as the oo sound are the words chew, drew, and flew. So, if you can remember that through, t-h-r-o-u-g-h, and threw, t-h-r-e-w, are pronounced the same, you should have less trouble with that word. Just remember the sentence, "He threw the ball through the window."

The vowel sound in the words though, t-h-o-u-g-h, and thorough, t-h-o-r-o-u-g-h, is the long o sound (long o). I'm going to set thorough aside for a bit, then come back it later. The word though rhymes with throw, t-h-r-o-w. If you can remember that through, t-h-r-o-u-g-h, and threw, t-h-r-e-w are pronounced the same, then hopefully you can also remember that though, t-h-o-u-g-h, and throw rhyme.

I'll say that again; through and threw are pronounced the same, though and throw rhyme.

Now, let's get back to thorough. That o-r spelling in the word thorough adds a little extra complexity to the word. The letters o-r are usually pronounced (or sound), which I call the or sound. However, in this word, they are pronounced as schwa+r, even though they are on a stressed syllable. Remember, schwa+r is an r sound that creates a syllable, though no vowel sound is actually used. To say that schwa+r, go directly from the consonant sound into the r sound. Notice how I go directly from the unvoiced th to the r sound in the word thorough, thorough. The first syllable of that word has no distinguishable vowel sound, thorough. I say the r sound is a schwa+r because it creates a syllable. If the word thorough were pronounced as a regular r sound and not schwa+r, we'd have a different word completely. What word would we have? We'd have the single-syllable word throw, t-h-r-o-w.

Listen to the important difference between the words thorough and throw, thorough, throw. One more time: thorough, throw.

My point here is not to be another teacher telling you how difficult these words are, and how non-phonetic English can be. We all know that already. The truth is, these words are important, and we use them a lot. They are, therefore, worthy of some special attention from ESL/ELL teachers and students.

Because of all the mentions of spellings in this episode, it would be a good idea to read the transcripts while listening to this episode again. We post all of our transcripts on Pronuncian.com. You can find them by going to www.pronuncian.com/podcast.

If you find this kind of content helpful to you, consider helping to support the podcast, and the other Pronuncian material by subscribing to Pronuncian or making a purchase from our products page. You get some great additional learning material, we are able to continue creating more great stuff for you. Thank for you support.

And thanks for listening. This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. SLA is where the world comes to learn.

Bye-bye.

104: Pronouncing 'pronounce' and 'pronunciation'

Many patterns of pronunciation can be found through a quick study of these two words.

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English Pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 104th episode.

Today's topic may surprise some of you. It may seem too elementary of a topic. Many of you may think that anyone who has listened to any number of the 102 episodes that have come before this one would be very much aware of how to say the words pronunciation and pronounce. Trust me, I wouldn't be doing this topic if it weren't still a common error among non-native speakers, even ones who have listened to many, many of my previous shows.

As a bonus, even if you already are already correctly saying pronounce and pronunciation, this show is full of little pronunciation patterns and tips that are always good to review.

First, let's examine the word pronounce. Pronounce is a two-syllable verb. Like most two-syllable verbs, it is stressed on the second syllable, pronounce. The vowel sound of the stressed syllable is spelled ou and is pronounced as the ow sound (ow sound). The letters ou are usually pronounced as ow sound, so there are no surprises here. Since the second syllable is stressed, the vowel sound of the first syllable is reduced to schwa. It is pronounced as a quick (schwa sound), pronounce. The word pronounce is a lovely example of English being phonetic, and following the rules of pronunciation.

There is a weird thing that I've heard a lot of non-native speakers do to the verb pronounce. They add the suffix -ate to it, creating *pronunciate. Pronunciate is not a word. Sorry. The -ate suffix can create adjectives, as in the words fortunate and delicate, or it can create verbs, such as the words celebrate and imitate. I hear people incorrectly trying to create a verb pronunciate of the word pronounce. It is used in sentences like, "How do I pronunciate the word algorithm?"

However, the word pronounce is already a verb. The sentence should be, "How so I pronounce the word algorithm?" If you are a user of the word pronunciate, it is time to toss it aside. The word pronounce is the only verb you need.

Now, let's examine the word pronunciation. Between the forums and emails sent directly to me, I can't even count the number of times I see people adopt the ou spelling of the word pronounce and apply it to the word pronunciation. It just isn't spelled that way. There is no ou in the noun form, pronunciation, p-r-o-n-u-n-c-i-a-t-i-o-n.

The word pronunciation is rather long. It has five syllables, pro-nun-ci-a-tion. Luckily, the -tion suffix tells us which syllable receives the stress. Word that include -tion (as well as -sion) are stressed on the syllable before the -tion. That means, that in the word pronunciation, it is the tiny syllable that only contains the letter a that is stressed: pronunciation.

Because the word pronunciation has so many syllables, it isn't surprising that the word has a secondary stress in addition to the stressed a. The vowel sound of the main stress is said the loudest and for the most time, of any vowel sound in the word. Secondary stresses usually occur two syllable away from the main stress. In the word pronunciation that means that the nun syllable receives a secondary stress. Listen to all the syllables of the word: pro-nun-ci-a-tion. If you hadn't correctly spelled the word pronunciation, and added the ou where there should only be a u, it is likely that you were also say ing the word incorrectly as *pronounciation. Yes, I have heard many non-native speakers pronounce the word pronunciation as *pronounciation. I'll say them both again, first correctly, then incorrectly:

pronunciation
*pronunciation

Oops.

As always I'll link to the Pronuncian.com lessons that correspond to these patterns from this show's transcripts. You can find all of our transcripts by going to www.pronuncian.com/podcast.

We couldn't keep producing these shows every week without your support. If you find them helpful, consider subscribing to Pronuncian. Subscribers have full access to Pronuncian, including exercises, quizzes and full video lessons.

That's all for today everyone. Thanks for listening.

This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. SLA is where the world comes to learn.

Bye-bye.

102: Russian/Ukrainian Special Episode

Learn the most common difficulties Russian and Ukrainian speakers face when speaking English with an American English accent.

Transcript

Learn the most common difficulties Russian and Ukrainian speakers face when speaking English with an American English accent.

Hi everyone, and welcome to this special episode of the American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and today's language-specific podcast is for Russian and Ukrainian speakers as well as teachers of those students.

I have a special guest with me today. Oksana is a former student of mine, and she is a native Russian speaker. Throughout this podcast, Oksana is going to demonstrate what very clear English pronunciation sounds like when coming from a Russian speaker.

Thanks for being here today Oksana.

Oksana: Thank you for having me, Mandy. I really wanted to take part in your podcast.

Before we begin, I want to be clear that while there are variations between how Russian and Ukrainian speakers pronounce English, they do sound quite similar to one another.

I also want to say that since the area covered by Russian and Ukrainian speakers is so geographically huge, speakers from different areas will have variations of English pronunciation. This episode is only about the seven broadest, most common issues.

Today we're going to focus on the following:

1. The th sounds

2. The h sound

3. The l sound

4. The r-controlled vowels

5. The short a

6. Comparing the short i/long e sounds

7. Comparing the short o/aw sounds

I almost feel like it is a cliche to say that any language has issues with the English th sounds. Every language has issues with our th sounds. There is nothing to be done but to practice, practice, practice both the voiced and unvoiced th sounds. Make sure the air is traveling smoothly between your tongue and your top front teeth. Your tip of your tongue should be forward and close to the tooth ridge, that bony area behind your top front teeth.

Oksana, what was your error when you pronounced the th sounds?

Oksana: I always said, instead of voiced th, z sound. And instead of unvoiced th, something close to the f sound.

So you were probably pronouncing the word them as:

Oksana: *zem

And you were probably pronouncing the word think as

Oskana: *fink

Let's listen to how you pronounce those words now. I'm going to say the word, and Oksana is going to repeat it after me. Of course, all of the listeners should also repeat these words with Oksana.

Some of the most common voiced th sound words are the following:

the
them
then
these
those

And the most common unvoiced th sound words include:

think
thing
three
through

Next, I want to talk about the sound that, to me, most quickly exposes a Russian or Ukrainian speaker - the h sound. To my knowledge, the h sound does not exist in those languages. The American English h sound is a very, very soft fricative. The air is constricted, though only a little, deep in the throat. Students need to be aware of just how soft this sound is in English.

Let's practice some words that begin with the h sound. Oksana is going to repeat these words after me:

hi
he
help
horse

The following sets of words are only different in the h sound. The first word begins with an h sound, and the next word begins with a vowel sound. Oksana is going to repeat both words of the pair.

heat, eat
hear, ear
hand, and

One issue speakers of Ukrainian and Russian face is the fact that our English l sound, especially at the beginning of a word, is the same, no matter which vowel sound follows it. This is not so in Russian and Ukrainian.

Listen carefully. In English, the l sound is the same in the words leak, lack, and lick as it is in the words lock, look, and luck.

Listen again:

leak, lack, lick, lock, look, luck.

I'll say those words again, and Oksana will repeat them after me:

leak
lack
lick
lock
look
luck

Okay, issue number four for Russian and Ukrainian speakers is r-controlled vowels.

The four r-controlled vowels sound are:

schwa+r, as in the word stir
ar sound, as in the word star
air sound, as in the word stair
or sound, as in the word store

I hear two different inaccurate ways of producing these sounds from my Russian and Ukrainian speaking students. If the person learned English with a British accent, the r sound may just go away, and not be pronounced at all. This is due to the huge difference in pronunciation of the r-controlled vowels in American English and the Received Pronunciation of the United Kingdom.

For my students that have learned to include the r sounds in r-controlled vowels, I often hear my students create the r sound too far back in the mouth, creating too much friction.

The American English r sound occurs toward the back of the mouth, with the tongue bunched up, and the sides of the back of the tongue touching the top, back teeth.

The minimal set for the r-controlled vowels is the words stir, stair, star, and store.

I'll say those words again, and Oksana will repeat them after me:

stir
star
stair
store

Remember, the schwa+r sound, as in the word stir, has almost no vowel sound at all. To pronounce schwa+r, go straight from the consonant sound, in this case a t sound, into the r sound stir.

Issue number 5 is the short a sound. The American English short a sound is created with the mouth quite open, and the tongue forward. The center of the tongue is somewhat raised. Issues with this sound can again be influenced by past British English training, since they often do not place the tongue as far forward or the center of the tongue as high as Americans do. If the tongue is not far enough forward, or is too low, a sound similar to a short u or short o may be heard by native speakers of American English.

Oksana. can you say the sentence, "I bought a bus pass," in your original Russian accent? I want our listeners to notice your pronunciation of the word pass.

Oksana: *I bought a bus pass.

Thanks. Now say the sentence in your clearest American accent.

Oksana: I bought a bus pass.

Beautiful. Let's hear the difference again.

Oksana: *I bought a bus pass.

Oksana: I bought a bus pass.

Can you tell us what you did differently with your short a sound?

Oksana: I opened my mouth more and pushed my tongue forward.

Exactly. Now let's practice.

I'm going to say some minimal sets and Oksana is going to repeat them. These words are in the order of short a, short o, short u:

lack, lock, luck
stack, stock, stuck
cap, cop, cup

Issue number six for Russian and Ukrainian speakers is one of the most common among all non-native speakers, no matter what the first language is: substituting the long e for the short i sound. The long e sound (long e) occurs with the tongue high toward the front of the mouth. The short i sound (short i) occurs with the tongue slightly lower.

Oksana, how did you break the habit of saying the short i sound as a long e sound?

Oksana: I've started to differentiate the short i sound in everyday American speech and after that to practice saying the short i sound in minimal pairs with long e sound. For example, cheap c-h-e-a-p, and chip c-h-i-p.

Let's practice these sounds. The following words should be pronounced differently. First is a word with the short i sound, then the long e. Just as before, I'll say the word and Oksana will repeat it:

lick, leak
list, least
still, steal

And the final issue for Russian and Ukrainian speakers is difficulty differentiating between the short o sound (short o) and the aw sound (aw sound). The issue I hear most often is not opening the mouth enough for the short o sound. At the same time as the mouth is open, the tongue lies down inside the bottom teeth. To create the aw sound, the tongue is pulled back and while the back of the tongue is raised slightly. Most Russian and Ukrainian speakers use the aw sound too often, and rarely pronounce the short o sound, even when it's appropriate. This, again, may be due to previous British influence.

Listen to the following pairs. First is the short o sound, then the aw sound. Again, Oksana will repeat after me.

stock, stalk
cot, caught
tock, talk

Wow. That is really a lot of information for one podcast! I'll add links in the transcripts for this episode so you can get more information. You can find the transcripts at www.pronuncian.com/podcast. All of these topics can be a whole show by themselves, so it would be a good idea to dive deeper to get a more in-depth understanding.

Many of these issues have quizzes, which are available to subscribers, created to test your listening comprehension of these sounds. You can subscribe for as little as $15 per month with a 6 month subscription, and your subscriptions help support the creation of more content like this. In fact, without Pronuncian subscribers, Pronuncian could not exist. So, thank you for all of your support!

Oksana, thank you so much for helping us out with this podcast. You are a very brave non-native speaker, and you truly have my admiration.

Oksana: Thank you, Mandy. It was my pleasure.

This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. SLA is where the world comes to learn.

Thanks for listening everybody.

101: Subtle oddities of the word 'subtle'

A silent /b/, an altered /t/, and a strange history make the word 'subtle' interesting to learn about!

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English Pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 101st episode.

Today I'm going to talk about the word subtle, s-u-b-t-l-e. We can use the word subtle to learn a couple of different things about pronunciation, and a bit about the history of English. If you're not familiar with the word subtle, it's a useful vocabulary word to know. It's an adjective that means a very tiny change or small difference. An example sentence is:

There is a subtle difference between the short o and aw sound (short o, aw sound).

The first interesting thing about the pronunciation of the word subtle is that silent b in the middle of the word, s-u-b-t-l-e. Why is that b there? And do any other words follow a similar pattern of a silent b?

Let's start with why it's there. It's there because, hundreds of years ago, some people who thought they were very smart decided it should be there. According to the Etymology Online Dictionary, the word subtle entered English around the year 1300, from the Old French word sutil. At that time, the letter b was absent from the spelling and everything made sense.

Then, the Etymology Online Dictionary says something that I don't completely agree with. They report that the letter b was added to the word subtle because of confusion with another word, subtile, which we got from the Old French word, subtil.

I can see the relationship between those words, and that is a reasonable explanation. But I think another common theory is also plausible. The word subtle entered the English language during the time of Middle English. By the time early Modern English was born in the late 1400's, Latin had emerged as the language of the educated class and some English words began look more like their Latin origins, even though the words did not travel straight from Latin to English. Many of these words came to English from French; the French speakers, not the English speakers, borrowed the words from Latin. This really messed some words up, because the pronunciation was based on the French pronunciation, and only the spelling became like Latin.

I believe this theory of the Latinizing of the word subtle because that word is not the only word that gained a silent b. Two other words that were messed up by the scholars were the words debt d-e-b-t, and doubt, d-o-u-b-t. Neither of those words have a b sound either.

Encyclopedia.com states that the letter b was not only added back into English, but that French originally also adopted the spelling change. By the 18th century, however, they smartly dropped the silent b in dette, and doute, and decided to begin pronouncing it in subtil. This, I think is where the Etymology Online Dictionary found the confusion with the word subtile. Again, French confused things for English!

Your first lesson of this podcast, then, is that you can be confident in dropping the b sound from the words subtle, debt, and doubt. In fact, pronouncing the b sound is wholly incorrect.

Let's put aside the background of the word subtle and quickly talk about the other interesting aspect of its pronunciation. The letter t of the word subtle is not pronounced as a true t sound. It's pronounced as a quick d sound. Remember, this change happens to the t sound when it occurs after a vowel or r sound and before a vowel, r sound, or l sound. Since the letter b is silent in the word subtle, the t sound now finds itself between the short u vowel sound, and an l sound. This means, that in the North America, that t sound becomes a quick d sound.

Cambridge American Dictionary Online is now my favorite dictionary for checking transcription because they show this altered t sound. For words whose t sound is pronounced as a quick d sound, they provide a symbol of the letter t with a little curved line below it. The Merriam-Webster dictionary does not show the altered transcription, but they do pronounce it that way in the audio file. If only I could find a dictionary that had it all!

That's all for today, everyone. The transcripts for this show are available, for free, at www.pronuncian.com/podcast. Also, I haven't mentioned the free forums lately. If you have any pronunciation questions, you can post them to our forums. Just go to www.pronuncian.com/forums and sign up for a free forums account.

Of course, we couldn't bring you all of this free content if some of you didn't contribute financially to the site by signing up for a subscription or making a purchase from Pronuncian.com. Subscribers get full access to all of our exercises, quizzes, and video lessons. We fully rely on you to be able to continue bringing this content to you every week.

Thanks for listening everyone. This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. SLA is where the world comes to learn.

Bye-bye.

f this free content if some of you didn't contribute financially to the site by signing up for a subscription or making a purchase from Pronuncian.com. Subscribers get full access to all of our exercises, quizzes, and video lessons. We fully rely on you to be able to continue bringing this content to you every week.

Thanks for listening everyone. This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. SLA is where the world comes to learn.

Bye-bye.

100: A Hundred/One Hundred

Why is saying 'a hundred' more common than saying 'one hundred' in American English?

Transcript

Hi everyone, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English Pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy and this is our one-hundredth podcast. Yes, a milestone has been reached. I feel pretty good about making it to a hundred shows, and I have no intention of stopping.

You, my listeners, are who keep allow me to keep publishing these shows every week, and today, on this special occasion I want to give an extra-special thank you to all of you. Truly, thank you.

For today's show, I thought I'd compare the phrase "one hundred" to the phrase "a hundred." I've noticed that non-native speakers usually choose one hundred instead of a hundred, even when to my ears, a hundred would sound better. This is one of those episodes where a pronunciation lessons merges with a grammar lesson.

So, what is the difference? Well, there is little difference in meaning between one hundred and a hundred. Even the Cambridge Dictionary of American English gives one definition of the word a simply as one. When I looked up the word a I was looking for a little more detail in the definition than that! The dictionary on my MacBook gives a definition of a that I thought best expresses why we can say either one hundred or a hundred.

That dictionary says the following:

used with units of measurement to mean one such unit

It gives the examples a hundred, a quarter of an hour

Basically, that means that a and one to have the same meaning before a unit of measure. The unit of measure with we are talking about today is the unit of hundred. Yes, it is a generic unit of measure, not like a mile or a kilogram or a cup, but it is still one unit.

To make it more obvious, lets switch to something easier to picture than a hundred. Let's talk about food. Let's pretend someone is giving you a list of things to buy at the market. The person could say the following:

I need a dozen eggs, a gallon of milk, seven pounds of cherries, and an apple.

Or the person could say the following:

I need one dozen eggs, one gallon of milk, seven pounds of cherries, and one apple.

The items you are expected to buy is exactly the same, and the grammar is equally correct. However, the person probably wouldn't say it the second way, the way that uses the word one instead of a. Why not?

Because it messes up the rhythm of the sentence. Remember function words and content words? Content words are the important words of a sentence, usually our nouns, main verbs, and some adjective and adverbs. Function words are there to give us the correct grammar and make sure our words all agree with one another; they are words like prepositions, auxiliary verbs, and articles.

In the example sentences

need a dozen eggs, a gallon of milk, seven pounds of cherries, and an apple.

it's easy to pick out the content words:

need

dozen eggs

gallon milk

seven pounds cherries

apple

The function words:

I, a, a, of, of, and an

fall into the background. We need those words, but we don't need to be as clear with them as with the content words. Since we want those words to become small, it should not be a surprise that we would choose the single-sound word a over the three-sound word one, (w sound, short u, n sound)

I'll say both sentences again for you to compare the rhythm:

I need a dozen eggs, a gallon of milk, seven pounds of cherries, and an apple.

I need one dozen eggs, one gallon of milk, seven pounds of cherries, and one apple.

Function words are very flexible, however, and can become content words quite easily. First, they need to become important for some reason. Then, that importance needs to be expressed by saying the word louder and for more time. The pitch of the word will usually become higher as well.

If I wanted to stress that I only needed a single gallon of milk, I would probably switch from the tiny a to the more substantial one. I would do this if my listener, for some reason, was expecting me to want more than one gallon of milk and I want to make sure that only one gallon is purchased. Listen to the sentence with this added emphasis:

I need a dozen eggs, one gallon of milk, seven pounds of cherries, and an apple.

If I switched all the a's and the an to one, the contrast, and my emphasis would be lost.

So, let's get back to a hundred versus one hundred. Think of the word hundred as a unit, just like the word dozen is a unit meaning twelve. Let's compare podcasts to eggs, just this once.

In the first case, I am not trying to emphasize the number, but rather the product.

I can say:

I cooked an egg.

I cooked a dozen eggs.

I cooked a hundred eggs.

If I am talking about podcasts, I can say:

I recorded a podcast.

I recorded a dozen podcasts.

I recorded a hundred podcasts.

Today, however, if someone asked me how many podcasts I've recorded, I would probably be so excited that I have reached a hundred, that I am going to emphasize the unit of a hundred by using one instead of a:

I've recorded one hundred podcasts.

A similar idea is how many podcasts you have listened to. If you have listened to all one hundred of them, and it has been exhausting for you, you can give similar emphasis to the number:

I've listened to one hundred podcasts.

Let's practice, just a bit, to give you a feel for the different rhythm of a couple of sentence. First I'll say a sentence with the word a, then the same sentence with the word one. I'll allow time for you to repeat after me:

I'd like a cup of coffee.

I'd like one cup of coffee.

I read a chapter of the novel.

I read one chapter of the novel.

I read a hundred pages of the book.

I read one hundred pages of the book.

All of those sentences are correct in certain contexts. It is up to you to decide how important each single unit is, whether it is a cup, a chapter, or a hundred of something.

If you would be able to learn this in more depth by reading along as you listen, all of our podcasts are available from our website, www.pronuncian.com/podcast. I'll also link to the free content word and function word lessons from this weeks transcripts.

That's all for today, everyone. Thanks for listening to our one-hundredth episode.

This has been a Seattle Learning Academy Digital publication. SLA is where the world comes to learn.

Bye-bye.

99: Three-word informal contractions

'How did you' can be reduced to 'howdja;' 'where did you' to 'wheredja;' and 'what did you' to 'whadja,' but those reductions can cost listener comprehension.

Transcript

Hi everyone, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English Pronunciation Podcast. My name is Mandy and this is our 99th episode.

I want to warn you, today's lesson is rather complex. I recommend listening to episodes 94 and 97 before listening to this one.

Today I'm going to talk some more about informal contractions. Episode 97 was about how the words used to became useta, and episode 94 was about how could you became couldja and would you became wouldja. I explained that those reduced forms are called informal contractions and that there is nothing wrong with using them in your own speech.

It is your own choice for how perfectly you want to articulate your speech, and it should depend somewhat on your own current level of pronunciation. If native English speakers already understand you pretty well, you can use more informal speech patterns. If native speakers are still asking you to repeat yourself frequently, then you might choose to keep your speech closer to how the dictionary shows you to pronounce words. If your audience includes other non-native speakers, then you would also probably choose to speak more formally.

The benefit of speaking informally is that you will sound more fluent to native speakers and your listeners will assume that you have a better command of English. Remember, you never want your informality to cost comprehension by your listeners. Therefore, I teach the following three-word informal contractions with caution.

Listen to the following three-word contractions, first uncontracted, then as a contraction.

how did you: howdja

where did you: wheredja

what did you: whadja

Let's begin by looking at the first two words of those contractions:

how did

where did

what did

Those words could easily contract even if they weren't followed by the word you. Listen to them as contractions:

how did: how'd

where did: where'd

what did: wha'd

In those contractions, the word did is shortened to just the d sound. I'll say them again:

how'd

where'd

wha'd

Here they are in sentences:

How'd she do that?

Where'd she put my keys?

Wha'd she do to my car?

All of those sentences had the pronoun she following the contraction (how'd she, where'd she, wha'd she). If I use the pronoun you instead of she, then another level of assimilation occurs. Yes, this is the same assimilation I talked about back in episode 94. When the d sound is followed by the y sound, the two sounds combine into a single j sound. In addition to the assimilation, the word you is reduced to yu because it is a function word.

Listen to our new, three word contractions:

how did you: howdja

where did you: wheredja

what did you: whadja

I'll put those contractions into sentence:

Howdja do that?

Wheredja put my keys?

Whadja do to my car?

I'll say those sentences again, and I want you to repeat after me:

Howdja do that?

Wheredja put my keys?

Whadja do to my car?

If you want to see these contractions written, I created a new Pronuncian lesson for informal contractions. That lesson includes the more frequently used informal contractions, and these and other three-word contractions. I'll link to that lesson from the transcripts for this lesson. You can find the transcripts for this episode at www.pronuncian.com/podcast.

If you find these podcasts helpful, please consider subscribing to Pronuncian. Your subscription dollars are what allow us to continue publishing these shows every week. Subscribers get full Pronuncian.com access, including all the exercises, quizzes, and full video lessons.

Also, don't forget that you can follow us on Twitter at www.twitter.com/pronuncian.

That's all for today, everyone. This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. SLA is where the world comes to learn.

Bye-bye.

97: The transition from 'used to' to 'useta'

Informal contractions are born when speakers find easier ways to pronounce words.

Transcript

Hi everyone, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English Pronunciation Podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 97th episode.

Today's topic is the little phrase "used to." Used to describes a past habit or regular activity. Examples include:

I used to drive to work, but now I take the bus.

She used to drink coffee, but now she drinks tea.

Before I go further, let's talk about the two different words spelled u-s-e. There is the verb, to use, and the noun, a use. Do you hear the difference? To use, a use. To use is pronounced with a z sound, a use is pronounced with an s sound.

To use, as in

"I use my computer for many things."

A use, as in,

"I no longer have a use for my typewriter."

The phrase used to, to describe a past habit or activity, is used very frequently by native speakers. Like many words and phrases that occur frequently, the pronunciation has changed over time. This particular phrase seems to have gone through more transformation than most.

Even for native English speakers, three consecutive consonants is difficult to pronounce. In the phrase used to, we have the z sound of the word used, then the d sound of the -ed ending of the word used, then the link into the t sound of the word to. Fully pronounced, it is used to.

Few native speakers attempt to say all of those sounds in casual speech. For this phrase, first the d sound in the middle gets dropped. Used to becomes used to. Then, to simplify further, the z sound becomes unvoiced. Used to becomes u*se to.

At this point, the phrase used to has become useto.

In connected speech, the word to, t-o, is a function word. It is usually reduced to ta. Here is the word to in some sentences. In these sentences it's not connected to the word used:

I'm going to the park

I like to ski.

I'll repeat both of those. Listen for the ta:

I'm going to the park

I like to ski.

Now let's get back to the phrase used to. After dropping the d sound and changing the z sound to an s sound, we were at useto. In connected speech, however, the word to is reduced to ta, and we have the complete modification of the phrase used to, to the common current, yet informal, pronunciation of useta, useta.

Here it is in a few sentences:

I useta live in Wisconsin.

I useta have a dog.

I useta sleep until noon on Saturdays.

I consider the word useta to be an informal contraction. This is the same category as the word couldja a few weeks ago. Informal contractions are not normally written (though they are in the transcripts for this episode, so I can show you what I'm saying.) Informal contractions are very commonly spoken, unless, of course, you are giving a formal presentation.

Here is a side grammar note that I find interesting. When Betty Azar explains the use of the phrase used to in her third edition of Fundamentals of English Grammar (page 52), she points out that in negative or question sentences, it is possible to drop -ed ending of the phrase. She then notes, "Both forms (spelled used to or use to in questions and negatives) are possible. There is no consensus among English language authorities on which is preferable."

Ms. Azar's example sentences are:

Did you use to live in Paris? (both with and without the ed ending)

and

I didn't use to drink coffee. (again, both with and without the ed ending)

Ms. Azar didn't mention if pronunciation may be leading this spelling change or not, but I wouldn't be surprised if it is. Words can change based on pronunciation, and I think this one may be doing exactly that.

Thanks all for today, everyone. Transcripts for this episode can be found at www.pronuncian.com/podcast, you can follow us on Twitter at Pronuncian, you can ask questions on our forums, and you can help support us and our free podcasts by subscribing to Pronuncian.com. Subscribers have the benefits of additional listening exercises, quizzes, and video lessons.

This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. SLA is where the world comes to learn.

Thanks for listening.

Bye-bye.

96: How 'women' could have been 'wimmen'

Noah Webster did his best to make spelling easier, but his ideas weren't always accepted.

Transcript

Hi everyone, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English Pronunciation Podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 96th episode.

Noah Webster, of the famed Merriam Webster's Dictionary published his American Dictionary of the English Language way back in 1828. It was the first dictionary of word usage specifically for the United States. Webster's second claim to fame was his bold desire to simplify spelling and make it more phonetic. In other words, he wanted spelling and pronunciation to match more closely. For those of us born in the United States, Webster did simplify things somewhat. For non-native English speakers, however, it really only made learning English spelling more complex. Yes, you can blame Noah Webster for the fact that Americans have different spellings from the rest of the world.

Many of Webster's more audacious spellings never made it into the mainstream. One word that kept its Old English roots is the word women, the plural of woman. Webster adamantly suggested changing the w-o-m-e-n spelling to a more phonetic w-i-m-m-e-n.

As a teacher of English to non-native speakers, I find myself sometimes wishing the w-i-m-m-e-n spelling had stuck. Wimmen, so clearly pronounced with a short i sound as the first vowel. Women.

I don't know of any spelling Webster wished for the singular of women though. The other u sound (other u) of the word woman has no simple phonetic pattern in English. That (other u) sound is the same vowel sound as the words put, p-u-t, and good, g-o-o-d. I'm not sure people would really guess that sound, however, even if the word woman were spelled w-u-m-a-n or w-o-o-m-a-n. Both of those spellings could have just as much confusion as the w-o-m-a-n spelling. It would be helpful, however, to get rid of the letter a in the word woman. If you understand schwa, though, you should be expecting that a to get reduced.

Maybe, if woman weren't such an odd word phonetically, the w-i-m-m-e-n spelling of women could have become the norm. However, I imagine it would still have been quite difficult to convince the rest of the English-speaking world that it is a good idea. For the most part, they didn't like even the most sensible of Webster's ideas.

For a little quick practice, repeat woman and women after me:

woman women

Once the vowel sounds are understood for these words, then the only other trick is making sure your w sound isn't replaced with a v sound. Listen and repeat again, making sure your w sound is not vibrating against you top front teeth.

woman women

You can find the transcripts for this, and all of our podcast episodes, at www.pronuncian.com/podcast. I'll also add a link with this week's episode for other examples of Noah Webster's spelling reform. Also, don't forget, for all Pronuncian.com updates, you can follow us on Twitter at Pronuncian, p-r-o-n-u-n-c-i-a-n.

That's all for today everyone. Thanks for listening.

This has been a Seattle Learning Academy digital publication. Seattle Learning Academy is where the world comes to learn.

Bye-bye.