161: Schwa in 2-syllable words

The importance of tiny syllables!

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 161st episode.

In words with more than one syllable, not every syllable is given equal emphasis; one syllable is "stressed." The stressed syllable is said louder, for more time, and often at a higher pitch than the other syllables of a word. When learning a new vocabulary word, it's always a good idea to identify the stressed syllable of that word, because, as you will see, we can't understand the phonics of a word until we know where the stressed syllable is. This is because a stressed syllable controls all the other syllables of a word. Today we're going to focus on the syllable next to the stressed syllable. Why? Because of a concept called "schwa." Schwa is a quick reduced vowel sound that is often pronounced similar to a quick short u sound. Schwa occurs most often on an unstressed syllable that is next to a stressed syllable. If I don't know where the stressed syllable of a word is, I won't know how to find schwa.

In addition to stressed syllables and syllables reduced to schwa, there are also secondarily stressed syllables, but I'm going to save that topic for another episode.

Before I continue, let me remind you that you can find the transcript for this episode by going to www.pronuncian.com/podcast. Also, we'll link to the Pronuncian.com lesson regarding schwa from this episode's transcript page. So if you want to learn more, that's the place to go!

When a syllable is stressed, it's really only the vowel portion of the syllable that is stressed. So, when we talk about syllable stress, we're going to focus on the vowel sound. In a multi-syllable word, the vowel sound of the stressed syllable is the most likely syllable to be phonetic. In other words, that syllable is the most likely to be pronounced how we expect based on its spelling. This makes the pronunciation more predictable. What happens to the other syllables? Well, this is where schwa comes into the picture.

The reduced vowel sound, schwa, usually sounds like a very quick short u sound (short u), and, as I said, it usually occurs on syllables adjacent to the stressed syllable of a word. The thing to understand is that it can have any spelling, though the letters a, o, and u are the most likely to sound closest to a short u.

To begin with, let's listen to a few 2-syllable nouns, then a few 2-syllable verbs. There is a general pattern that 2-syllable nouns are stressed on the first syllable, and 2-syllable verbs are stressed on the second syllable. This general pattern works for between 80% and 90% of the 2-syllable nouns and verbs in English. To keep it simple today, we'll only look at words that follow this pattern.

Let's begin with nouns. Each of these nouns are stressed on the first syllable. The vowel sound of the second syllable of these words is reduced to a very quick (schwa), no matter how that vowel is spelled. Listen closely. I'll say the word as a whole unit first, then I'll break it in to syllables, then I'll say the whole word again:

problem, prob-lem, problem
wisdom, wis-dom, wisdom
salad, sal-ad, salad
custom, cus-tom, custom
system, sys-tem, system
method, meth-od, method
balance, bal-ance, balance
circus, cir-cus, circus

And here are some 2-syllable verbs. We've chosen words that all follow the pattern of being stressed on the second syllable. I'll say these words in the same pattern of the whole word, then by syllable, and then as the whole word again:

provide, pro-vide, provide
complete, com-plete, complete
observe, ob-serve, observe
assume, a-ssume, assume
succeed, suc-ceed, succeed
agree, a-gree, agree
compare, com-pare, compare
contain, con-tain, contain

Schwa is a part of pronunciation that my students have a hard time trusting. It seems unnatural to allow the vowel sound to be so small in these words. Practice pronouncing these words using that very tiny (schwa) in the unstressed syllables. Learn what it sounds like and what it feels like. That way, when we have a word that breaks the rules, a word like tattoo that has no reduced syllables, you can trust what you're hearing, and then you can trust what you're saying.

To help you, I'm going to say the 2-syllable nouns and verbs that we used as examples one more time. I'll leave time for you to repeat after me.

Here are the nouns:

problem
wisdom
salad
custom
system
method
balance
circus

And here are the verbs:

provide
complete
observe
assume
succeed
agree
compare
contain

To learn more about schwa, and for more practice using it, consider purchasing a copy of Pronunciation Pages 2. In addition to the schwa lesson, this book also includes exercises to help you practice schwa in 2-syllable and 3-syllable words. Pronuncian subscribers have access to these same exercises from the schwa lesson wen logged into their account. Find out how to purchase your copy of Pronunciation Pages 2 or how to join Pronuncian by going to www.pronuncian.com/products or click "Join Pronuncian" on Pronuncian.com.

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

Thanks for listening.

Bye-bye.

160: w+a (want), w+a-r (warm), w+o-r (work)

Less-known patterns for the aw sound, schwa+r, and or sound.

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 160th episode.

In our last episode, I explained non-phonetic words. Non-phonetic are the words whose pronunciation we cannot predict based on their spelling. These words should be memorized. However, you can't just memorize the non-phonetic words, you also need to memorize the common spelling patterns for each sound!

Since this episode deals a lot with English spelling patterns, it will probably be easier to understand if you're reading the transcript while listening. You can find the transcript by going to www.pronuncian.com/podcast.

Some basic phonetic patterns can go a long way. A very good pattern to know, for instance, is the vowel-consonant-e pattern for long vowels. We can guess that the words cake, bike, and home are pronounced with the long a, long i, and long o, respectively, because of their vowel-consonant-e spelling.

Sometimes, though, the patterns don't apply to a huge number of words. Then, as learners, you need to decide if the pattern is worth memorizing or not.

Today we're going to talk about a small set of phonetic patterns. If we study them in a set, then at least you can be aware that they exist. You'll know that this is a set of patterns that you need to pronounce with care.

Today's set of patterns is the letter w plus a, w plus o-r, and w plus a-r. You see, the letter w before the letter a or the letters o-r or a-r causes weird things to happen to the pronunciation of the letter a or the letters o-r or a-r. Some examples will help.

Listen to the words want, wash, and watch. We could guess that, since the letter a is between two consonants, those words would be pronounced with a short a sound (short a). After all, they're pronounced with a short a in the words chant, cash and batch. But, want, wash, and watch aren't pronounced with the short a sound. Instead they're pronounced with the aw sound (aw sound). Listen closely: want, wash, watch. Why are they pronounced with the aw sound? Because the letter w comes before the letter a. This is one of the less-frequent patterns for the aw sound.

Here are some words spelled w plus o-r: work, word, and worth. It would make sense for those words to be pronounced with the or sound (or sound), like they are in the words cork, cord, and north. But they aren't. Instead they're pronounced with a schwa+r sound (schwa+r): work, word, and worth. Why are they pronounced with schwa+r? Because the letter w comes before the letters o-r and w+o-r is one of the patterns for schwa+r.

Now listen to the words warm, warn, and war. It would make sense that those words would be pronounced with the ar sound, like they are in the words harm, barn, and car. But they're not. Instead they're pronounced with the or sound. Why? You guessed it: because the letter w comes before the letters a-r and w+a-r is one of the patterns for the or sound.

To help you hear and compare these sounds, I'm going to say the words that have the common pronunciation when the letter w is not involved, and then examples of words spelled with the letter w involved. I'll leave time for you to repeat after me.

First, a regular short a (short a) pronunciation when the letter a is between two consonants:

chant
cash
batch

And now the w+a spelling for the aw sound (aw sound):

want
wash
watch

Here is theor spelling pronounced as the or sound (or sound):

cork
cord
north

And here is w+o-r being pronounced as schwa+r (schwa+r):

word
word
worth

Finally, here are some words spelled ar and pronounced, as we would expect, with the ar sound (ar sound):

harm
barn
car

And here is the w+ar spelling which causes the letters ar to be pronounced with the or sound (or sound):

warm
warn
war

The question really is: how can you learn these patterns? Well, you are in luck because all of these patterns are included in Pronunciation Pages 2! Yes, that's the same book I mentioned in the last episode that includes all of the non-phonetic words patterns. Both the digital and physical version of this great reference guide come with MP3 audio files so you can listen to and repeat native English speaker pronunciation during your practice. It's a great way to learn, and every purchase you make of any of our products directly supports our ability to keep providing these podcasts to you for free. So go to www.pronuncian.com and click "products" to find all of our products.

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

Thanks for listening.

Bye-bye.

158: Vowels plus voiced and unvoiced consonants

Vowel sound duration depends on many things.

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 158th episode.

This podcast is going to cover some advanced pronunciation topics, so I would advise you to go to www.pronuncian.com/podcast and click episode 158 to read the transcript for this show along with listening to it. Reading along will help you to comprehend the lessons in today's show.

I've spoken quite a few times about voiced and unvoiced consonant sounds before, but I haven't spoken very much about the changes in the vowel sounds that come before voiced and unvoiced consonant sounds.

Before I begin, let me say again that the terms "long" vowel and "short" vowel are common names for vowel sounds in American English. As tempting as it is to think that a long a and a short a are the same sound except for how long we say the sound, that's not how it works. The term long a represents the sound (long a) as in the word cake. The term short a represents the sound (short a) as in the word cat. The sounds (long a) and (short a) are actually about the same duration if everything else is equal. What do I mean, though, when I say "if everything else is equal"?

Well, there are a few different things that change the duration of a vowel sound in a word. First, of course, there is syllable stress. Vowel sounds in a primarily stressed syllable are going to have a longer duration than vowel sounds in secondarily stressed or unstressed syllables. For example, take the word timid, t-i-m-i-d. (The word timid means to be shy.) Timid is a two-syllable word with the first syllable stressed. Both syllables have a short i sound, but the short i of the first syllable has a longer duration that the short i sound of the second syllable. Listen again: timid, timid.

Also, a vowel sound in a word that is stressed in a sentence has a longer duration than the same vowel sound in an unstressed word. If I use the word timid in two different sentences, once as a stressed word and once with the word not stressed, you should be able to hear the difference.

First, here it is stressed: Chloe is so timid.
And here it is in a less stressed position: Chloe is such a timid kitten.

In the first sentence, the first short i of the word timid takes more time than in the second sentence because the whole word is stressed more in the first sentence. In the second sentence, the word kitten has a longer duration short i sound. Listen to both sentences again:

Chloe is so timid.
Chloe is such a timid kitten.

So, remember for the rest of this podcast that vowel duration is relative to a number of different circumstances: first, syllable stress; second, word stress in a sentence; and third, what sound follows the vowel sound in a word. Yes, a vowel sound will change duration based on the sound following it being voiced or not.

Let's do another little review of concepts. In English, we have sixteen consonant sounds that occur in voiced/unvoiced pairs. A voiced consonant sound includes vocal cord vibration during its production, and an unvoiced sound does not. To feel the difference between a voiced and unvoiced sound, let's do a little experiment.

Place two fingers on the front of your throat. Yes, you have to actually do this in order to understand what I'm talking about. So, put two fingers on front of your throat. Now say the b sound (b sound, b sound). Now say the p sound (p sound, p sound). Can you feel the difference on your fingers? You should feel a vibration during the voiced b sound, but not feel it during the unvoiced p sound. If you feel it for both, you may be adding a vowel sound to the p sound. You should be saying (p sound), and not (p sound+vowel sound). If you're saying (p sound plus vowel sound), you'll feel the vibration of the (vowel sound), which is not actually part of the p sound.

Let's do the experiment again. With your fingers against the front of your throat, say the b sound (b sound) and the p sound (p sound). At it's very simplest, that is the difference between a voiced and unvoiced sound. A voiced sound vibrates in your throat.

When I say "voiced/unvoiced pair," I'm talking about two sounds that use the same shape of the vocal tract. Since the b sound and p sound are created using the lips in the same way, they are a voiced/unvoiced pair. Another example is the z sound and s sound. The z sound is voiced, the s sound is not; the shape of the tongue for both sounds is essentially the same.

I also use the term "minimal pair" a lot in these podcasts. A minimal pair is a pair of words that are the same except for one sound. For instance, the words robe and rope are a minimal pair. The words are the same except that the word robe ends in a b sound and the word rope ends in a p sound: robe, rope. Similarly, the words buzz and bus are a z sound/s sound minimal pair.

If you listen carefully to the pairs (robe/rope and buzz/bus), you'll notice that the vowel sound in the words changes slightly in duration. The vowel sounds in the words robe and buzz take more time than the vowel sounds in the words rope and bus. This tiny and odd little vowel feature is actually an important clue as to which consonant sound was said in a word.

Listen to the pairs again:

robe, rope
buzz, bus

As I said in the beginning, we have 8 voiced/unvoiced pairs of sounds in English. Two pairs of these sounds, the voiced and unvoiced th sounds and the zh sound and sh sound do not have any minimal pairs to use for comparison. The other 6 pairs, however, do have nice words that we can use for hearing and practicing this difference in pronunciation.

First, let's practice the three pairs of stop sounds: the b sound/p sound, d sound/t sound, and g sound/k sound. I'll say a pair of words for each pair of sounds. I'll leave time for you to repeat after me:

b sound/p sound: robe, rope
d sound/t sound: bad, bat
g sound/k sound: pig, pick

And here's a pair for our affricate sounds, the j sound and ch sound:

badge, batch

And finally here are the two pairs of fricative sounds that have words that we can use:

v sound/f sound: save, safe
z sound/s sound: eyes, ice

I'll say all of those pairs again for you to repeat after me:

robe, rope
bad, bat
pig, pick
badge, batch
save, safe
eyes, ice

Since we're talking about so many minimal pairs today, I should mention our minimal pairs collection on Pronuncian.com. We've gotten through creating lists for almost all of the combinations of vowel sounds and consonant sounds, and they're free for you to access. Just go to www.pronuncian.com and click the "Minimal Pairs" icon on the homepage, then click whatever pair you want to practice. That's just one little bit of the free material we have on Pronuncian. We also have helpful books you can buy to help you study even more. The information I covered today about the differences in vowel duration before voiced and unvoiced sounds is covered in our most popular book, "Pronunciation Pages 2: Sounds of American English." You can purchase a downloadable version and download it directly to your computer, along with MP3 audio files, or you can purchase the physical version of the book and have it shipped to you along with a CD version of the MP3 files. Of course, your purchases help support all the free content, like the minimal pairs tables, that we offer on the website.

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, and good luck!

Bye-bye.

157: Native French speakers special!

The top 10 errors made by native French speakers.

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 157th episode.

We've had a lot of people asking us to do a special podcast for French speakers lately, so here it is. The transcript page for this lesson is especially important because I'll add links there for all the lessons on Pronuncian that can help you with these issues. You can find all of our episodes' transcripts by going to www.pronuncian.com/podcast. For this episode, just click "episode 157." Also, lessons with exercises, quizzes and audio for everything that I talk about here regarding vowels and consonants is in our book, "Pronunciation Pages 2." You can find information about both the physical and ebook format by visiting our products page at Pronuncian.com. If you want all of your practice to be online, exercises, quizzes and videos for everything I'll talk about in this episode is available to our Pronuncian.com subscribers.

English really is a quite difficult language for native French speakers to pronounce. When speaking a language that is not your first language, a concept called "interference" occurs. Interference is when characteristics of your first language are used when producing a non-native language even if those first-language characteristics don't exist in the the non-native language. French speakers tend to have a lot of interference when they are speaking English, so it can take a lot of practice to acquire new language characteristics.

Here are the top ten most troublesome pronunciation issues for native French speakers when speaking English.

#1: One of the most troublesome aspects of French pronunciation interfering with English pronunciation is in rhythm. English rhythm is based on syllable stress. Although English does have a lot of patterns to help learners understand syllable stress, it still is much more irregular than the patterns of French. French speakers need to pay special attention to the suffix-derived stress patterns of English. This includes the pattern that words that include the -tion, -sion, or -ic suffix are stressed one syllable before the suffix. Once you understand that, don't forget that many -tion, -sion, and -ic suffix words can also have -al and -ally added to them and the stressed syllable does not move. So classic can become classical or classically. The stress always falls one syllable before the -ic. The -ate and -ity suffix-derived stress patterns are usually a little more difficult to grasp because these words are stressed three syllable from the end. All of these patterns are very worthwhile for native French speakers to understand.

#2: While the first part of understanding English rhythm is getting syllable stress correct, the second part of rhythm is learning to reduce unstressed syllables. Sorry French speakers, but this is also something that you tend to have a lot of trouble with. This means that you need to pay extra-special attention to schwa as well as the syllabic consonants. Syllabic consonants include the syllabic n, syllabic l, and schwa+r. There is no vowel sound in a syllable that has a syllabic consonant.

Again, I'll link to all the lessons on Pronuncian.com to help you learn more about syllabic consonants, schwa, and the -tion/-sion, -ic, -ity, and the -ate suffix-derived stress patterns from this episode's transcript page.

Enough about rhythm, let's talk about vowels sounds.

#3: Native French speakers substitute the short i sound with the long e sound. The short i sounds like (short i) and and the long e sounds like (long e). This is the difference between the words still and steel and lick and leak.

#4: The short a is usually troublesome for native French speakers, especially if you've had a lot of British influence during your English language learning. The short a sounds like (short a), and is in the words cat, fast, and class.

#5: Native French speakers also have trouble differentiating between the other u ( (other u) as in put) and oo sound ( (oo sound) as in soon). Some minimal pairs that can help with this issue are:

pull, pool
hood, who'd (Who'd is the contraction of who had or who would.)
look, Luke (Luke is the name L-u-k-e.)

#6: Finally, the aw sound (aw sound) can also cause problems for native French speakers. Be careful with words like the following:

boss
dog
lost

It is also good if you can differentiate between the aw sound (aw sound) and the short o sound (short o). Notice the difference between the words caught/cot and stalk/stock.

Now, switching to consonants.

#7: Native French speakers have trouble with both the voiced and unvoiced th sounds. Most other languages that have problems with these sounds substitute the d sound for the voiced th (so then is pronounced den) and the t sound for the unvoiced th (so think is pronounced tink). French speakers, however, often use a z sound in place of the voiced th and an s sound in place of the unvoiced th. This means that then is pronounced zen and think is pronounced sink. This less common substitution makes the French accent distinctive among the non-native accents of English. Also, since it is not a common substitution, it can fatigue your listeners a bit more since they need to use more effort to translate the sound into the appropriate word.

#8: Native French speakers tend to drop the h sound off of words, replacing it with a glottal stop. For instance, the sentence, "I had some," will become "I 'ad some." Learning to produce just enough h sound take a lot of practice, but it is do-able and can soften your accent quite a lot.

#9: English has two sounds that are affricates: the ch sound and the j sound. To properly create an affricate, the tongue must be used to completely stop the air for a tiny amount of time. The air is then released with friction. The release of the ch sound is like an sh sound, and the release of a j sound is like a zh sound. French speakers tend to create just the released sound and not the entire affricate. This means that the word chip is pronounced as ship.

#10: French speakers also need to be careful with making clear, accurate r sounds in English. Again, if your English background has been British English, you may have been taught to not include the r sound after vowel sounds. In American English, the r sound is pronounced. So not only do French speakers learning American English pronunciation need to remember to include the r sound, they also need to learn to pronounce it using the English r sound (r sound). We have included r-controlled vowel lessons and lists with our Pronuncian material to help those of you who have learned British English and now want to be able to also use a more American accent.

I know that sounds like a lot of issues, but with practice you can make dramatic improvements in how much your listeners understand without needing to ask you to repeat yourself. A French accent is one of those accents that native English speakers often like to hear, so keeping some accent does a favor to those of us who find listening to it to be very beautiful. You can play with your speech and learn what level of English pronunciation perfection provides the balance between still sounding like a native French speaker, and being easier to comprehend when you're speaking English.

As I said before, I'll link to all the Pronuncian.com lessons that can help you with these issues from this episode's transcript page. Just go to 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, and good luck!

Bye-bye.

156: Silent letters in high-frequency words

Which high-frequency words have a silent consonant?

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 156th episode.

I've just created a new lesson on Pronuncian that lists all of the words in the top 5000 most frequent words that have a silent consonant. I didn't include silent vowels because their spelling rules are so complicated that they are very difficult to classify as being "silent" or not.

The top 5,000 most frequent words is not just an arbitrary number. That is the number of words listed in Mark Davies and Dee Gardner's Frequency Dictionary of Contemporary English. I've talked about the frequency dictionary before, but in case you don't know what it is, it's basically just a list of words that includes information about the part of speech that the word is being used as and also how frequently the word is used in English. This frequency dictionary also lists other words that are usually used alongside each word.

To get an idea of how important the 5,000 most frequent words are in English, it states in the preface of the Frequency Dictionary of Contemporary English that "the 4,000-5,000 most frequent words account for up to 95 percent of a written text and the top 1,000 most frequent words account for 85 percent of speech." So, if you can handle the top 5,000 words in English, you'll do quite well in most any situation.

I never would have guessed that the letters l, b, and g are the most common silent consonants in the top 2,000 words in English. Those are the words I'm going to talk about today. In fact, there are 13 words in the 2,000 most frequent words in English that have a silent consonant. Seven of those words have a silent l, four have a silent b, and two have a silent g.

Let's take a quick look at these 13 words.

Here are the top words with a silent l listed from the more frequent words to the less frequent words:

would
could
should
talk
walk
half
talk

Yes, the word talk is included twice. First it;s included for the verb form, as in "I talked to him," then again for the noun form, as in "She gave a very long talk." The pronunciation of both forms is identical.

Now here are the four words with a silent b:

climb
doubt
debt
bomb

And here are the two words with a silent g:

campaign
design

There are 10 more words in the top 5,000 words with silent letters. I've included those words in our new Silent Letters lesson on Pronuncian. In the lesson I also include the word's frequency as well as its part of speech. I'll link to that free lesson from this episode's transcript page. As always you can find the transcript by going to www.pronuncian.com/podcast. From there, click Episode 156.

I'm going to say all of those top 13 words again, and I want you to note the silent letter. Repeat each word after me:

would
could
should
talk
walk
half
talk
climb
doubt
debt
bomb
campaign
design

Again, you can find the link to the free lesson that lists all of the words with silent consonants by going to this show's transcript page.

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.

Davies, Mark, and Dee Gardner. A Frequency Dictionary of Contemporary American English. London: Routledge, 2010. Print.

155: The f sound and semi-irregular plurals

3 things to keep in mind when making 'wife' into 'wives' and 'leaf' into 'leaves.'

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 155th episode.

We've had a number of podcasts about the -s ending, but we've never talked about that small set of irregular plurals where a final f sound is changed to a v sound before adding the -s ending. These are words like the singular wife and its plural wives and the singular leaf and its plural leaves.

This seemingly simple episode explains a number of topics, starting with ideas good for beginners, and ending with some concepts that are a bit complicated. If you'd like to read the transcript along with listening to this show, go to www.pronuncian.com/podcast.

If you're a Spanish speaker, you may want to listen to our podcasts in Spanish to be able to have the greatest understanding of the topics. Go to the link I just mentioned, www.pronuncian.com/podcast, and click "en espanol" to see all the episodes we've published so far.

To begin with today, let's review how to create the f sound and v sound. The f sound and v sound are an unvoiced/voiced pair. An unvoiced sound is produced without using the vocal cords, while a voiced sound allows them to vibrate. Both of these sounds are created when air is pushed between the top of the bottom lip and the bottom of the top front teeth. You don't need to curl you bottom lip into your mouth to create these sounds, it takes only a very little amount of friction. Also, these sounds are both fricatives, so their pronunciation can be held for a long time.

Create the f sound with me: (f sound).
Now create the v sound with me: (v sound)

Remember, if you can't hold these sounds for a few seconds, you're not creating them correctly. We're going to say them again, and this time I want you to put a couple of fingers against the front of your throat and feel the difference in vibration between the unvoiced f sound and the voiced v sound.

f sound, (f sound)
v sound, (v sound)

Could you feel the difference?

Next, let's review adding the -s ending to words. If an -s ending is added to an unvoiced sound (such as the f sound), the -s ending is pronounced as an s sound. So if I add an -s ending to the verb laugh, I get laughs. If I add an -s ending to the verb cough, I get coughs.

However, simply adding an -s ending does not work very often with nouns that end in the f sound because a large number of those nouns have semi-irregular plurals. You probably already know what I'm talking about: the f sound changes to a v sound, and then the -s ending is added. Because the f sound changes to a v sound, the -s ending becomes voiced and is pronounced as a z sound. Yes, a lot of things just happened, so let's listen to some examples of nouns that originally end in an f sound, but change to a v sound for plurals. I'll say the singular first, then the plural.

shelf, shelves
wolf, wolves
life, lives
leaf, leaves
thief, thieves
knife, knives

See, that wasn't so bad! Now I'm going to go one step further and make this a truly advanced lesson by talking about something that happens to the vowel sound in four of these six nouns. Can you think of anything that is different about the sound before the f sound in the words shelf and wolf as compared to life, leaf, thief, and knife? That was comparing shelf and wolf to life, leaf, thief, and knife.

The first two example words have a consonant sound before the f sound, and the rest all have a vowel sound before the f sound. But why does this matter?

It matters because the change from an f sound to a v sound will also change the duration of a vowel sound that immediately precedes it. The same vowel sound will have a slightly shorter duration when it occurs before an unvoiced sound than it has before a voice>d sound. That means that the long i sound in the words life and knife is pronounced for less time than it is in the words lives and knives. Similarly, the long e sound in the words leaf and thief is pronounced for less time than the long e sound in the words leaves and thieves.

There is no change in the vowel sound duration in the words shelf and shelves or the words wolf and wolves because the vowel sound is followed by an l sound in all those words. Since the l sound didn't change, the vowel sounds won't change. Our Introduction to Fricatives lesson on Pronuncian.com also explains this concept, and I'll be sure to link to that lesson from this lesson's transcript page.

So getting back to our example words, the words life, leaf, thief, and knife have three changes to their pronunciation when they are made plural. First, the f sound changes to a v sound. Then, this causes the -s ending to become voiced and pronounced as a z sound. Finally, if the original f sound is preceded by a vowel sound, the length of the vowel sound will increase in the plural due to the voiced v sound.

Yes, this is all rather complicated, but is is a good example of the trickle-down effect on pronunciation when one change is made to a word.

In addition to linking to the Introduction to Fricatives lesson from this episode's transcript page, I'll also link to other lessons that deal with these topics. Again, you can find all of our episodes' transcripts by going to www.pronuncian.com/podcast. At the bottom of each lesson are additional listening exercises and quizzes to help you practice your English pronunciation. Those exercises and quizzes are available to our Pronuncian subscribers. To find out more information about that, go to www.pronuncian.com/join. Pronuncian is spelled p-r-o-n-u-n-c-i-a-n.

Finally, I know I haven't mentioned it in a while, but you can still practice hearing the details of English by listening to an audio book. You can get a free audio book by signing up for a free 14-day trial of Audible.com. Use our special web address: www.audiblepodcast.com/pronuncian as a way to help us support this show and to get your free audio book to keep. If you cancel your subscription with Audible before 14 days, you are charged nothing, but 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.

Thanks for listening.

Bye-bye.

154: 'She sells seashells'

A tongue twister to compare the sh sound and s sound.

Transcrpit

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 154th episode.

"She sells seashells by the seashore" was one of my favorite tongue twisters when I was growing up. If you want to practice alternating the s sound and sh sound, there is nothing better.

I was surprised to recently learn that the tongue twister was written for a real-life woman named Mary Anning. Mary was born back in 1799. Throughout her life she became well-known in the scientific realm for having made some important scientific fossil discoveries. She made these discoveries when she was out collecting seashells on the beach. She was collecting the the shells to sell in order to help support her family. In the process of collecting and selling, she discovered new species of sea life. In 1908, Terry Sullivan wrote the children's tongue twister, "She Sells Seashells" based on Ms. Anning.

Even though Mary Anning had a very interesting life, my goal here today is not to teach you about her interesting finds; I just to help you pronounce the sh sound and s sound more clearly.

Hopefully you remember from past episodes that the s sound and sh sound are in the category of fricatives. A fricative is a sound that is created when air is pushed out through a small opening in the vocal tract.

When practicing the s sound and sh sound, you should also know that these sounds are both unvoiced. This means that the vocal cords do not vibrate during the production of these sounds.

And finally to be able to talk about the s sound and sh sound, you have to be able to identify your tooth ridge. The tooth ridge is the bony bump behind your top front teeth. You can easily feel your tooth ridge with the tip of your tongue.

The s sound is produced when the tip of the tongue is placed close to the front of tooth ridge. The tongue is shaped so that there is a groove in the tip, from front to back. The tongue is kept tense as air is pushed between the groove in the tip of the tongue and front of the tooth ridge.

Listen to the s sound: (s sound).

In contrast, the sh sound is produced with the front of the tongue more flat and farther back in the mouth. The friction occurs between the back of the tooth ridge and the front of the tongue. The air is pushed through wider area instead of through a small groove.

Listen to the sh sound: (sh sound).

I will say the s sound and then the sh sound. I'll leave time for you to repeat after me:

(s sound, sh sound)

Again:

(s sound, sh sound)

Before practicing our tongue twister, let's practice a few easier minimal pairs. I'll leave time for you to repeat after me:

see, she
sign, shine
mess, mesh

Now let's try the tongue twister. After I read it from beginning to end, I'll read it again in short parts for you to try to repeat. I will say that this tongue twister is hard even for native English speakers, so if your tongue has a hard time with it, don't worry, so does mine!

Here is the whole thing:

She sells seashells on the seashore
The shells she sells are seashells, I'm sure
So if she sells seashells on the seashore
Then I'm sure she sells seashore shells.

Okay, are you ready? I'll read it in parts and I'll leave time for you to repeat:

She sells seashells
on the seashore

The shells she sells
are seashells, I'm sure

So if she sells seashells
on the seashore

Then I'm sure
she sells seashore shells.

Was that fun? Let's do it again:

She sells seashells
on the seashore

The shells she sells
are seashells, I'm sure

So if she sells seashells
on the seashore

Then I'm sure
she sells seashore shells.

Very good! It's not uncommon for non-native speakers to have difficulty with these two sounds. We do have a nice lesson up on Pronuncian that compares these two sounds, as well as their voiced counterparts, the z sound and zh sound.

I'll link to that lesson, as well as the spelling and pronunciation lessons for the s sound and sh sound from this episode's transcript page. You can find all of our transcripts by going to www.pronuncian.com/podcast.

You will also find the link to the Spanish podcasts by going to that same webpage: www.pronuncian.com/podcast. And as it turns out, we will be publishing the s sound/z sound podcast in Spanish the same day we publish this episode. To make it clear, these podcasts are about American English pronunciation, but they are taught in Spanish so people who do not have a high enough level of English to fully understand the podcast in English can still learn about English pronunciation.

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.

153: 'Look at Luke!'

Compare the oo sound and other u sound.

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 153rd episode.

We have a very special announcement today! We have just begun publishing this podcast in Spanish! I'm going to give our narrator, José, a moment to introduce himself and our new show, in Spanish. Then we'll come right back to our regular English.

José: Si usted es hablante nativo del español y todavia tiene dificultades para entender el inglés hablado, suscríbase a nuestro nuevo podcast en español y hablemos de la pronunciación del inglés en español. Mi nombre es José y estaré narrando los episodios en español de la Seattle Learning Academy.

Thanks, José. You can find this new podcast by searching for "Seattle Learning Academy" on iTunes. It's also available by going to www.pronuncian.com/podcast.

Let's move on to today's show.

I haven't compared vowel sounds in a while, so I thought that today I'd return to two vowels that easily get mixed up with each other: the other u (other u) and the oo sound (oo sound). We'll use the simple sentence, "Look at Luke." for practicing these two sounds.

As always, if you want to read the transcripts while listening to this show to increase your comprehension, go to www.pronuncian.com/podcast.

The word look, l-o-o-k, is pronounced with what is called the other u sound: (other u), look. The other u is also the vowel sound in the word put. Can you hear that the vowel sounds are the same: look, put? As nice as it would be to assume that a word spelled o-o is going to be pronounced with the oo sound, we cannot make that assumption. Other words that are spelled o-o that are pronounced with the other u sound include: foot, book, cook, good and stood.

The name Luke, L-u-k-e, is pronounced with the oo sound: (oo sound, Luke). The oo sound is also the vowel sound in the word soon. Can you hear that those vowel sounds are the same: Luke, soon? We call this sound the oo sound because it's the most common pronunciation for the o-o spelling. Some examples of the oo sound being spelled o-o include the words: food, school, room, fool, and moon.

So these are the sounds (other u) and (oo sound). Both of these sounds are created by lifting the back of our tongue and moving it toward the back of the soft palate. The soft palate is the soft, mushy area at the top, back of the mouth. The tongue is lifted just a little more for the oo sound than it is for the other u. The real difference between the sounds is in the shape of the lips. The oo sound is easier to recognize and produce, so I'm going to explain it first. In addition to the tongue being lifted in the back, the oo sound is created when the lips are brought into a small circle, almost as small as a w sound. You can feel the lips vibrate during the oo sound. Create the oo sound with me: (oo sound).

Repeat these oo sound words:

food
school
room
fool
moon

To transition into the other u, simply relax the lips. The back of the tongue does drop a little, but the major difference is in the lips. Create the other u sound with me: (other u).

Repeat these other u sounds after me:

foot
book
cook
good
stood

Now let's play with our little sentence: Look at Luke. Remember, the first word, look is the other u, and the name Luke is the oo sound.

Repeat the sentence after me:

Look at Luke.

Again:

Look at Luke.

You can use this sentence to help you remember that the oo spelling is sometimes pronounced with the other u sound. To help you with this, I will also link to three lessons related to this show from this episode's transcripts. I will link to the spelling and pronunciation lessons for both the other u sound and the oo sound and also the lesson that specifically compares these sounds. All three of those lessons are also available in the new version of Pronunciation Pages, which you can find on the products page on Pronuncian.com. The ebook version comes with MP3 files to download, and the physical copy of the book comes with an MP3 CD, so you can practice your pronunciation all day long!

And don't forget, if you are a Spanish speaker, you can subscribe to our Spanish version of the American English pronunciation podcast by searching for "Seattle Learning Academy" in iTunes.

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.

152: 's-c-h' and the word 'schedule'

An American/British difference and a Greek history.

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 152nd episode.

This podcast uses some upper-level English, so reading along with the transcripts may help your comprehension of the topic. You can find the transcripts by going to www.pronuncian.com/podcast.

I've been receiving a lot of requests lately for more podcasts highlighting differences between British English and American English. So today I thought I'd talk about the word schedule which is pronounced as sh-schedule in British English. Also I'll discuss the more general s-c-h pronunciation pattern.

The word schedule has an interesting history. According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, this word points all the way back to Greek about 2500 years ago, give or take a few hundred years. Then the word traveled through a couple of versions of Latin, then into Old French, and finally, in the late fourteenth century, into English.

That tour through Old French is probably what created the sh-schedule pronunciation that the British still use. I've done podcasts before about words in English that have retained their French influence in their English pronunciation. This includes words like cafe and ballet. However, it's unusual that the word sh-schedule, using the British pronunciation, held on to the French influence. This is because words that are older than the seventeenth century usually fit into modern spelling and pronunciation patterns. The modern pattern is that words that are spelled s-c-h are pronounced (s sound+k sound), especially if they came from Greek. This includes words like school, scholar, scheme, and schematic.

The Online Etymology Dictionary credits Noah Webster, of dictionary fame, for updating, or at least solidifying, the pronunciation of schedule in the United States. Apparently he thought the pronunciation of the word should reflect its Greek roots, and not the pass through French that the British still hold today. This gave us two different pronunciations for the same word. Now, let me say that both pronunciations are correct. It just depends on which continent you're on.

I don't think that our friend Mr. Webster was trying to confuse future English learners of the world by putting the word schedule into the dictionary with the (s sound+k sound) pronunciation. I think that he was simply trying to help English become more regular by matching it with its cousins who also migrated linguistically from Greek. Undoubtedly, some parts of English would be easier to learn if we didn't have Webster's influence causing a greater schism between Englishes. Hmm, schism, now there's an interesting s-c-h word. I'll let you do the research on that one if you want to.

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.

151: j/ch sounds plus -ed ending

Practice adding the -ed ending to the j or 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 151st episode.

Free transcripts for this episode, as well as links to the lessons related to this episode can be found at www.pronuncian.com/podcast. Just click Episode 151.

Some sound combinations are more difficult to master than others. Two difficult combinations are the j sound plus d sound and the ch sound plus t sound. We use these combinations when adding the -ed ending to words whose final sound is the j sound or ch sound. For instance, the past tense of to change is changed, and the past tense of to watch is watched.

Before talking about combining sounds, let's talk about how to pronounce just the j sound and ch sound. The j sound and ch sound are both affricates. Affricates are created by stopping the air, and then releasing the air with friction. In English, the j sound and ch sound are the only affricates we have. Both of these specific sounds are created by briefly pressing the front of the tongue, near the tip, against the bony ridge behind the top front teeth; that is where the air is stopped. When the air is released, the tongue only moves a little, forcing air out through a small opening; that is the "friction" part of the sound. Both the stop and the friction are needed to fully create an affricate.

The difference between the sounds is that j sound is voiced, meaning that the vocal cords vibrate during the sound, and the ch sound is unvoiced, meaning that the vocal cords do not vibrate during the sound.

Listen to the j sound, then the ch sound (j sound, ch sound).

Now let's do a quick review of the -ed ending, just so everyone can understand why the -ed ending is pronounced as a d sound after the j sound and as a t sound after a ch sound. It all relates to voicing. The -ed ending will be pronounced as a d sound when it follows a voiced sound (such as a j sound) and as a t sound when it follows an unvoiced sound (such as a ch sound).

Of course, there is still one more pattern to add to the -ed ending pronunciation. When the -ed ending follows a d sound or a t sound, the -ed ending is pronounced as id, or the short i plus the d sound. When the -ed ending is pronounced as id, a syllable is added to the word. Paint becomes painted and add becomes added. I'll link to the Pronuncian.com lesson about the -ed ending pronunciation from this episode's transcripts so you can review it further if you need. This third pattern is not relevant for this episode, except to say that we do not add id to words that end in the j sound or ch sound. So we will not say watch-ed or change-ed.

Since the j sound is voiced, and an -ed ending added to it will be pronounced as a d sound, it will sound like (j sound+d sound), as in changed. Since the ch sound is unvoiced, an -ed ending added to it will be pronounced as a t sound; it will sound like (ch sound+t sound), as in watched.

Try saying just the j sound+d sound with me:

j sound+d sound
j sound+d sound
j sound+d sound

Now let's practice some words. I'll leave time for you to repeat after me. Be very careful to not add a syllable with the -ed ending.

charged
arranged
damaged

Now let's practice the ch sound plus -ed ending:

watched
itched
switched

Because I like practicing sounds in sentences so much, let's put a few of these words into sentences. I'll leave time for you to repeat after me:

They changed their phone number.
Kelly challenged the judges decision.
We switched daycare providers.

If you want an easy way to keep practicing these words, we've created an exercise with more example words and more sentences to practice. I'll link to that exercise from the -ed ending lesson, the j sound lesson, and the ch sound lesson. Of course, exercises are only available to Pronuncian subscribers. As I have said before, Pronuncian subscriptions and memberships, as well as textbook sales are what allow us to keep publishing these podcasts and the many lessons on Pronuncian for free. So if you've made a recent purchase from Pronuncian, we thank you very much.

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.

150: Common spellings and non-phonetic words

How do we choose which spellings are common and which words are non-phonetic?

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 150th episode.

This episode is a little complex in topic, so I'd recommend following along with the transcripts if you are not an advanced English learner or a native speaker. You can find the transcripts at www.pronuncian.com/podcast. Just click the link to Episode 150.

I was recently asked why the lesson on Pronuncian.com and the new Pronunciation Pages book say that the long a sound is commonly spelled eigh (as in the word eight), but not ey (as in the word they). This is a good question, and one worth explaining. I included the eigh spelling, but not the ey spelling because of the predictability of the phonetics involved. Phonetics is the term used when spellings and pronunciations match, or correspond, in a language. English is considered a phonetic language overall, though there are many exceptions to the phonetic patterns. Deciding what is a pattern and what is an exception can seem arbitrary at times, and in some ways, it is. I have seen texts that do include the ey spelling for the long a sound, but don't include the eigh spelling. As I said a bit ago, I base the patterns on predictability.

First, I look at how many total words use a specific spelling. For the eigh spelling, there are approximately 200 different words. That is a surprisingly high number, but it includes all closed compound nouns and derivations of a word. For instance, for just the main word neighbor, there are ten variations of that word, including the words: neighbored, neighborhood, neighborhoods, neighboring, neighborless, neighborliness, neighborlinesses, neighborly, and neighbors.

Then, to choose which spellings are most predictable, I see how many variations of pronunciation exist for a specific spelling. Of the original list of over 200 words that include the eigh spelling, relatively few are not pronounced with a long a sound, and most of those are variations of the word height, including, more commonly, heights and heighten. Those words are pronounced with a long i sound. The rest of the words that are spelled eigh are pronounced with a long a. Because the percentage of words pronounced with a long a is so high, that spelling is added to the common spellings section of the lesson.

The ey spelling is far more complex and common than the eigh spelling. When I checked for that spelling anywhere in a word, I found more than 1,300 words. However, all the words that I know that have the long a pronunciation spelled ey use that spelling at the end of the word. So I searched for the ey spelling at the end of a word, and I found just over 350 words. When scanning the list, I could see that the majority of the words that end in ey are pronounced with the long e sound. Many of these are related to words that originally end in the letter e and then have the -y ending added to it, making a noun into an adjective, such as the words smile and smiley. The -y spelling alone is already included in the long e common spellings list.

Only six of the more than 350 words that end in the letters ey end in the long a sound. Those words are: grey, hey, prey, survey, they, and obey. Only the words grey and they are common words. That is too low of a percentage of corresponding spellings and pronunciations for me to consider it common.

So, to decide whether to include a spelling in the common spelling list or to just list the higher frequency words in the non-phonetic portion of each lesson, I check the predictability of the pronunciation. If the pronunciation is highly predictable, such as it is for the eigh spelling and the long a pronunciation, I will include the spelling in the common spelling list. If the percentage of words with a specific spelling that is pronounced with a certain sound is quite low, I will pick the most common words and include them in the non-phonetic words section of the lesson. My goal is to provide learners with some idea of how likely a pronunciation will be.

To practice the long a/eigh spelling, here are some of the more common words with that spelling. I'll leave time for you to repeat after me:

eight
eighty
sleigh
weigh
weight
neighbor

And here are a few words that are spelled ey that are also pronounced with with long a sound:

they
grey
hey
survey
obey

I'll link to the free long a lesson from the transcripts for this show. The lesson is also included in our book, Pronunciation Pages 2, Sounds of American English and our Vowels eBooklet. You can find information about both of those on our products page.

Let me know what you think of our approach of classifying spellings. Does it work for you? Is there some other way that the material could be presented to make it more clear to you as a learner or teacher? Perhaps I could change the heading of Common Spellings to Predictable Spellings to make it a little more accurate. Do you think the ey spelling should be added to the long a common spellings list? I've started a forum post on this topic in the EnglishAssembly.com forums so you can give me your opinion.

Thanks to Akrum in Saudi Arabia for originally asking me the question, giving me the opportunity to explain some of the processes behind the lessons on Pronuncian.com and in Pronunciation Pages.

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.

149: Practicing the /w/ and /v/

/w/ and /v/ in paragraph practice.

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 149th episode.

Since we had such a good response from the paragraph practice for the th sounds in our last episode, I decided to do it again this week to practice the v sound and w sound. The most difficult thing about these sounds is that most non-native speakers don't realize how subtle they are. This subtlety is why it's really easy for native English speakers to think you said the opposite sound.

Before I explain, let me remind you that you can find the transcripts for this show by going to www.pronuncian.com/podcast and clicking "Episode 149." I will also link to the free pronunciation lessons that are associated with this show from this show's transcripts page. For additional pronunciation practice, join Pronuncian.com. Members receive full access to all of our exercises, quizzes, and videos.

Now, let's talk about the v sound and w sound.

Both of these sounds are articulated using the lips, and both sounds are voiced, meaning that the vocal cords vibrate during the sound.

When I create the w sound (w sound), my lips are brought together enough to cause a vibration when the air passes through between them. My lips don't need to be in a really tight circle, just enough to make them tickle a little bit equally on the top and bottom lip. The key is that the lips are both vibrating the same amount.

The v sound, on the other hand, only requires my bottom lip to vibrate. This vibration happens when I tip the bottom lip inward toward the bottom of my top front teeth. Yes, I know, that is a lot of prepositions to describe the position of my bottom lip, so I'll say it again: my bottom lip vibrates when I tip it in toward the bottom of my top front teeth. I don't need to place my lip under my top teeth to create the sound, it is actually the backside my bottom lip that is vibrating. My upper lip needs to stay relaxed during this sound, or the v sound won't be clear.

Say the v sound with me a few times (v sound, v sound, v sound). Practice moving your bottom lip in and out while creating the sound to really feel how slight the movement has to be to cause the vibration. If your top lip is tense and made into a semi-circle, native speakers will have a hard time telling if the sound is a v sound or a w sound, so keep your upper lip relaxed.

Let's practice a few words that contain both a w sound and a v sound. I'll leave time for you to repeat after me:

wives
twelve
wave
everywhere
overwhelm
otherwise

Now let's practice a paragraph again. I'll read the entire paragraph, and then I'll read it sentence by sentence and give you time to repeat after me.

We were very excited when we received the invitation to the wedding. We hadn't even heard that Victor and Whitney were engaged. The wedding will be in Vermont, in a very small town called Walden on Wednesday, July 27th. It is a bit unusual to have a wedding on a Wednesday, but we'll just plan a vacation around it. Vermont has very nice weather in the summer.

Now I'll say it sentence by sentence, leaving time for you to repeat each sentence after me.

We were very excited when we received the invitation to the wedding.
We hadn't even heard that Victor and Whitney were engaged.
The wedding will be in Vermont, in a very small town called Walden on Wednesday, July 27th.
It is a bit unusual to have a wedding on a Wednesday, but we'll just plan a vacation around it.
Vermont has very nice weather in the summer.

If you like this kind of paragraph practice, there is more of it on the w sound/v sound Paragraph Practice exercise linked from the w sound and the v sound lessons. I'll link to those lessons from this episode's transcript page.

You can also listen to authentic speech in whole sentences and paragraphs by listening to an audiobook read by a native English speaker. You can get a free audio book by signing up for a free 14-day trial of Audible.com. Use our special web address: www.audiblepodcast.com/pronuncian as a way to help support this show and to get your free audio book to keep. If you cancel your subscription with Audible before 14 days, you are charged nothing, but 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.

Thanks for listening.

Bye-bye.

148: More 'th' sounds practice

Practice quickly saying the th sounds in paragraphs.

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 148th episode.

Today we are going to practice the th sounds, but instead of practicing the sounds in single words, we are going to practice them within a paragraph. This is good, especially for the th sounds, because they usually occur in function words, such as in the article the and the pronouns them and they. Since function words are spoken so quickly, those words pass by very quickly. Even though they are said quickly, accuracy with these sounds will make you sound more fluent.

Since we'll be practicing whole sentences, you may want to read along with the transcripts for this episode. You can find the transcripts by going to www.pronuncian.com/podcast, and clicking "Episode 148". Pronuncian is spelled p-r-o-n-u-n-c-i-a-n.

Before we get to the paragraph, let's quickly review what the th sounds are.

The letters th are used to represent both the voiced th and the unvoiced th. The voiced th sounds like voiced th. To create that sound, the tip of my tongue is very lightly touching the backside of my top front teeth. When I create the sound, air must be forced between the tip of my tongue and my top front teeth. At the same time, my vocal cords are vibrating. You may have been taught to put your tongue between your front teeth to create this sound. You will get an accurate sound, but most people find it very difficult to create the sound that way when speaking quickly. Therefore, I recommend learning to keep your tongue behind your top front teeth.

Another important fact about the voiced th is that it's a continuous sound. You should be able to hold the sound for a few seconds. Try it with me voiced th. If you cannot hold the sound, you might be accidentally completely stopping the air. If you stop the air during the voiced th, a native speaker will most likely hear a d sound instead of the voiced th.

The position of the tongue is exactly the same for the unvoiced th sound. The difference between the sounds is that the vocal cords are not vibrating during the unvoiced th. Listen to the unvoiced th unvoiced th. Now I'll say both of them, first the voiced th, then the unvoiced th (voiced th, unvoiced th).

Now you try saying them with me, first the voiced th, then the unvoiced th (voiced th, unvoiced th).

Okay, so let's move on to the paragraph practice. I took this paragraph from a new exercise for the th sounds lesson. The exercise has this paragraph, read in individual sentences, plus two more practice paragraphs. The only way to get access to the exercise is to sign up for a Pronuncian subscription or membership. You can find details about that by clicking "Join Pronuncian" on the right hand side of the Pronuncian.com webpage.

I'm going to read the paragraph all the way through, then we'll take it sentence by sentence.

The other day, I forgot my phone on the bus. The next morning I went to the lost and found office to see if it had been turned in. I saw the phone on the desk at the office. Since the battery had died during the night, it was difficult to convince the man that it was mine. Then I remembered a v-shaped scratch on the back of the phone. I described the scratch to the man, and he happily returned the phone to me.

Now, let's practice sentence by sentence. I'll leave time for you to repeat after me. Be extra careful with the th sounds:

The other day, I forgot my phone on the bus.
The next morning I went to the lost and found office to see if it had been turned in.
I saw the phone on the desk at the office.
Since the battery had died during the night, I had to convince the man that it was mine.
Then I remembered a v-shaped scratch on the back of the phone.
I described the scratch to the man, and he happily returned the phone to me.

How was that? Like I said, if you like this kind of practice, there is more of it on the th sound paragraph practice exercise linked from the th sound lesson. I'll link to the lesson from this episode's transcript page.

You can also listen to authentic speech in whole sentences and paragraphs by listening to an audiobook read by a native English speaker. I haven't mentioned it in a while, but you can still get a free audio book by signing up for a free 14-day trial of Audible.com. Use our special web address: www.audiblepodcast.com/pronuncian as a way to help support this show and to get your free audio book to keep. If you cancel your subscription with Audible before 14 days, you are charged nothing, but 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.

Thanks for listening.

Bye-bye.

147: The -ious suffix

All of those vowels and two different pronunciations make this a tricky suffix.

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 147th episode.

To read the transcripts and to find links to free lessons associated with this episode, go to www.pronuncian.com/podcast and click Episode 147. Pronuncian is spelled p-r-o-n-u-n-c-i-a-n.

I notice that a lot of my students have trouble with words that end in the -ious suffix, as in the words cautious and previous. If you've never had the -ious suffix explained to you, seeing the vowels i, o, and u all together can cause a little confusion. I mean really, how many vowel sounds are in that suffix?

Remember we can count the number of vowel sounds by counting syllables. The word cautious c-a-u-t-i-o-u-s, has only two syllables total: one on the word's stem, and one on the suffix cau-tious. The word previous p-r-e-v-i-o-u-s, has three syllables: one on the stem, and two on the suffix pre-vi-ous. Lucky for us, there is a pattern to help us understand what's happening here.

The -ious suffix is a little extra difficult because it's the letter before the suffix that dictates how the suffix itself is pronounced.

Let's start with t+ious and c+ious. Both of these combinations are pronounced as shus. The initial consonant sound, whether it's a t or a c is pronounced as an sh sound. Then, the vowel sound can be thought of as either schwa or the short u. Dictionaries mostly transcribe the sound as schwa, which essentially is a very quick short u (short u). Finally, the last consonant of the suffix is an s sound, just as we'd expect. So we get shus.

Examples of t+ious and c+ious are the words cautious, nutritious, precious, and delicious. The error I hear students make is trying to add a small y sound into the suffix. I know, it just doesn't seem possible that the i-o-u combination of vowel letters can be pronounced as just schwa, but it is. The word cautious is pronounced as cautious not as caut-y-ious. Yes, the difference is small, but it is noticeable by native English speakers. I'm going to say those example words again, and give you time to repeat after me:

cautious
nutritious
precious
delicious

Not to confuse you, but I'd like to quickly add that there are also two common x+ious words with the same pronunciation of shus. Those are the words anxious and obnoxious.

Unless there is a t, c or x before the -ious suffix, the suffix is pronounced as i-ous, with two vowel sounds: first the long e, then schwa. Going back to our initial example word, we have previous, pre-vi-ous.

Some other common words with the two-vowel suffix pronunciation include:

curious
envious
tedious
serious

It is important to be ready for both of these patterns because there are around the same number of English words for each pronunciation of the suffix. This is because the consonant before the -ious is the letter t or c more often than the other letters. I encourage and learners of English, and teachers of English, to focus a little more on getting the shus pronunciation of t+ious and c+ious correct because it's less intuitive, even if it is just as common as the i-ous pronunciation of the word previous.

Now let's practice. Here are eight words that are pronounced shus:

cautious
nutritious
ambitious
precious
gracious
suspicious
anxious
obnoxious

And here are eight words pronounced i-ious:

previous
curious
envious
serious
tedious
obvious
hilarious
luxurious

It was this odd shus pronunciation of the t+ious and c+ious suffixes that made me want to add suffix pronunciation information to the new Pronuncian.com lessons and the new, second edition of Pronunciation Pages. I'll link to the sh sound lesson from this episode's transcripts for you to see what I'm talking about. You can click the Products link on Pronuncian.com to find information about buying Pronunciation Pages, either as a downloadable ebook or as a physical book that we can ship to you.

Don't forget, you can let us know what you'd like to learn about by posting on our Facebook wall! Just go to www.facebook.com/EnglishAssembly. We'll also post there when new content has been added to any of our websites.

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

Thanks for listening.

Bye-bye.

145: a, e,i, o, u and sometimes y

Why is 'y' sometimes a vowel.

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 145th episode.

When we launched our new EnglishAssembly.com Facebook page, the first question we asked was if you were taught that the letter y is a vowel. When I was a child, we were taught that the vowels were a, e, i, o, u and sometimes y. Sometimes y? What does that mean?

We know that, in English, letters represent sounds. The letters a, e, i, o, and u are used alone or in combination with each other to represent vowel sounds. So, for the sake of simplicity, we call those letters vowels. Letters and sounds are not the same thing, though. So, if we're talking about y, then we really need to know if we're talking about the letter y or the y sound. This is because the letter y sometimes represents a vowel sound and sometimes represents a consonant sound. The confusion occurs because the y sound is generally considered to be a consonant sound. This is for two reasons.

First, consonant sounds are created with a more restricted vocal tract than vowel sounds. During the y sound, the the tongue is held slightly closer to the tooth ridge during the y sound than for the vowel sound most similar to it: the long e sound. This can be heard, though it is very slight, in the minimal pair yeast/east. At the beginning of the word yeast, y-e-a-s-t, my tongue is close enough to my tooth ridge for the airflow to be considered restricted. My vocal tract is not as constricted in the beginning of the word east e-a-s-t. Listen to both words again: yeast/east. The trouble with the constricted vocal tract explanation is that there is no exact amount of constriction that classifies a sound as a consonant or a vowel.

Therefore, we rely more on the second characteristic of determining whether a sound is a vowel or consonant: all vowels must create a syllable. The words yeast and east are both only one syllable in length. They both contain only one vowel sound, the long e. The means that the y sound cannot be a vowel. If it were a vowel, the word yeast, beginning with a y sound, would be two syllables in length.

Despite the fact that the y sound is a consonant sound, there are many, many more words that use the letter y to represent a vowel sound than use the letter y to represent a consonant sound. To add more confusion, let's remember that the letter y commonly used in creating at least five different vowel sounds: the long a, long e, long i, short i, and oi sound.

Of those five sounds, probably, the most common vowel sound created with the y spelling is the long e sound at the end of a word (as in the words happy and pony). It represents the long i sound, both at the end of a word (as in the words shy and dry), or in the middle of a word (as in the words cycle and dynamic). The letter y mid-word can also represent the short i sound, as in the words myth and symbol.

Digraphs are sounds represented by two letters, and the letter y can be involved here, too. Remember that the ay spelling is commonly used for the long a sound (as in the words day and play), and the oy spelling of the oi sound (as in the words boy and joy).

How can you keep track of all of this? Well, lucky for you, all of this information is on our website, Pronuncian.com. But there is a new resource available to you right now! We have officially launched our second edition of Pronunciation Pages and it includes all of the sound spelling and pronunciation lessons as well a large number of exercises and quizzes, plus all of our new and improved sounds lists, and all of the audio for each lesson, exercise, and quiz. All of the concepts I've talked about in this episode are included in the book, and so are the y spelling exercises.

You can buy the new book in its physical form and we'll happily ship it to you, or you can download it in PDF with all of the audio in MP3 form. I really cannot express how excited I am to have this available to you. I'll link to our products page from the transcripts for this show, which you can find by going to www.pronuncian.com/podcast and clicking Episode 145. In case you're wondering, I'll also link to the free lessons that correspond to this lesson from this show's transcripts page as well.

Now let's practice. First, here are some words with a y spelling representing the y sound:

yes
year
young
beyond
canyon

And here are the words I used as examples of the y spelling being used to represent the various vowel sounds:

happy
pony
shy
dry
cycle
dynamic
myth
symbol
day
play
boy
joy

Oh, one last thing, in case you're wondering: what about the letter w? Everything that is true about the letter y representing a consonant or a vowel sound is also true for the letter w. I can only think that it's because w doesn't represent vowel sounds as often as the letter y that it isn't included in the children's chant of a, e, i, o, u, and sometimes y. The chant could be a, e, i, o, u, and sometimes y and sometimes w and it would still be true, and it would still be overly simplified. The most important idea to remember is that letters and sounds are different things. Letters represent sounds, but only sounds can actually be vowels or consonants.

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.

144: -ed ending exceptions

Some -ed adjectives gain a syllable.

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 144th episode.

Ngoc, A Vietnamese user on the English Assembly forums, brought up a question about adjectives that end in -ed that do not follow the typical -ed ending patterns. Simply put, the -ed ending patterns state that the -ed will be pronounced as a d sound when it follows a voiced sound (as in the word loved, a t sound when it follows an unvoiced sound (as in the word liked), and short i plus d sound when it follows an d sound or a t sound (as in the word needed).

When the short i plus d sound pronunciation in used, the word gains a syllable. For instance, the past of to need is needed. The word need is one syllable, and needed is two syllables.

Adding only a d sound or a t sound for the -ed ending will not cause an added syllable. For example, the words love and like are one syllable, and so are loved and liked.

So, if we have this very nice pattern to follow, what is going on with the words wicked, crooked, learned, ragged, and blessed? Why are those words pronounced with two syllables instead of one? Uh-oh, is something wrong with our pattern that says that only words that end in a t sound or d sound are supposed to have an added syllable?

Well, two things are going on here. First, these words are obviously exceptions to our pattern and, sorry, but their pronunciation should be memorized. There is something exceptional about these exceptions, though. They are all adjectives. Now, this does not mean that the -ed ending patterns only work for verbs and that all adjectives that end in -ed gain a syllable. These words are still exceptions because most adjectives still follow the pattern listed at the beginning of this podcast.

Grammatically speaking, the -ed ending usually forms the past participle of a word, and the past participle can be used to conjugate verbs and create adjectives. With some of these odd adjectives that don't follow the typical -ed ending patterns, you need to be careful, because the verb-forming past participle does follow the pattern.

The two sets of past participles that you are most likely to hear in adjective form and verb form are the adjective learned and the verb learned and the adjective blessed and the verb blessed. If you work in a science field, you might also hear the verb wicked, but for most of us, the adjective form of wicked is more common. Listen to all six of these words in sentences:

1. learned (adj): The learned doctor spent 10 years in medical school.

2. learned (v): The doctor learned all the details of human anatomy.

3. blessed (adj): The blessed event filled the family with joy.

4. blessed (v): The priest blessed the child shortly after she was born.

5. wicked (adj): I didn't trust his wicked grin.

6. wicked (v): The water wicked up the piece of cloth.

Remember, besides learned and blessed and wicked, the words crooked and ragged are also two-syllable adjectives. Yes, they also have one-syllable verb forms, but they really aren't used very often.

To help you remember, I'm going to say all five adjectives and give you time to repeat after me.

learned
blessed
wicked
crooked
ragged

This was only one of the interesting topics that has come up on our EnglishAssembly.com forums. One thing I really love about the forums is that it encourages individuals to notice things about language. Noticing is a huge part of language learning. So if you're questioning the pronunciation of anything in English, you can also post a question to our forums! Just go to www.englishassembly.com/forums, or you can also click the forums link on Pronuncian.com and you will also be sent to the English Assembly forums.

Of course, you can notice things about American English pronunciation by listening to an audiobook read by a native English speaker. You can get a free audio book by signing up for a free 14-day trial of Audible.com. Use our special web address: http://www.audiblepodcast.com/pronuncian as a way to help support this show and to get your free audio book to keep. If you cancel your subscription with Audible before 14 days, you are charged nothing, but 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.

Thanks for listening.

Bye-bye.

143: Don't over-pronounce sounds

Exaggeration is not authentic speech.

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 143rd episode.

Last week, I had an opportunity to present on the topic of pronunciation at a teachers' conference. One of the issues I stressed to teachers is to not encourage students to over-pronounce, or exaggerate sounds. Since so many teachers approached me after the sessions to talk more on this topic, I thought I'd dedicate a podcast to it.

By exaggerating, I mean practicing saying a sound by moving the mouth and vocal tract more than it would move in natural speech or by stressing a syllable with more emphasis than is necessary. Learning how to exaggerate has no purpose, since that isn't the skill actually used when speaking.

I'm going to include some limited International Phonetic Alphabet symbols in the transcripts for this show. To read this show's transcripts, go to www.pronuncian.com/podcast and click "Episode 143."

Here are some examples of how students are taught to over-produce sounds.

First, spreading the lips for the long e /i/. The long e sounds like (long e) and is the vowel sound in the word keep. Because the jaw is mostly closed for this sound, the lips automatically form a smaller slit for the air to pass through. The lips go where they do because the jaw is where it is. The problem with teaching students to actively spread the lips for the long e is that then it seems like the difference between that sound and the short i /ɪ/ is the position of the lips. The short i sounds like (short i) and is the vowel sound in the word sit. In fact, the difference is a slightly lowered tongue position along with the short i having slightly less duration. I can create both the long e and and short i with essentially the same lip position, so I don't need to exaggerate the shape of the lips.

Another example is opening the mouth too much for the short a /æ/ and the short o /ɑ/. The short a is the vowel sound in the word cat and the short o is the vowel sound in the word top. Yes, the jaw is more open for these sounds, but not so far open that you can look deep into someone's mouth and see the the top of the tongue and into the inside of the throat (at least not unless that person is trying to yell across a room or is loudly sing a song).

Also, the short o has rounded lips, but this does not need to be exaggerated. Again, the rounded lips are a function of the jaw position. Since the jaw is dropped during this sound, the lips become rounder. If the tongue is in the wrong position inside the mouth, the rounding of the lips won't create the correct sound. The same thing is true of the short a sound.

I also include putting the tip of the tongue between the front teeth for the th sounds /ð, θ/ in the category of over-producing. I've said before that you can create the correct sound with the tip of your tongue between your teeth, but it isn't necessary. The same sound is created with the tip of the tongue behind the top front teeth. Then, since the tongue isn't as far forward, it's easier to link to the sounds before and after the th sounds.

Now let's talk about over-producing syllables.

Words can have up to three levels of stress, and all three of them are important. The tendency is for teachers to accept a really strong primary stress, then too strong of a secondary stress, and then let the syllable that should be unstressed not get reduced. At its worst, this will sound like yelling. Luckily, most non-native speakers won't speak like this because it intuitively sounds so wrong in conversation. Instead, those non-native speakers default back to incorrect patterns of giving stressed and secondarily stressed syllables equal stress, and never reducing a vowel sound in an unstressed position. For instance, the word economic is pronounced as /ˌɛk ə ˈnɑm ɪk/, not /ˈik oʊ ˈnɑm ɪk/.

Finally, function words should be reduced or else they are likely being over-pronounced. I'm talking about words like to, you, for, of, and can. Yes, when I say them in isolation, I say their full citation form. The citation form is what the dictionary shows. Reduced forms are sometimes shown second, and sound like /tə, jə, fɚ, ə(v), k(ə)n/. An over-pronunciation of the function words will not usually cause miscommunication, but will alter the rhythm of spoken English and can fatigue listeners.

I am very glad that more teachers are paying attention to specifically teaching English pronunciation; it needs to happen. But be careful of learning to exaggerate sounds if it means moving your vocal tract into a position that is not used by a native speaker; it's better to learn the subtleties of the sounds as they actually exist. An additional benefit is that listening comprehension improves once it is understand how words are truly pronounced in authentic speech.

Of course, you can listen to authentic speech by listening to an audiobook read by a native English speaker. You can get a free audio book by signing up for a free 14-day trial of Audible.com. Use our special web address: www.audiblepodcast.com/pronuncian as a way to help support this show and to get your free audio book to keep. If you cancel your subscription with Audible before 14 days, you are charged nothing, but 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.

Thanks for listening.

Bye-bye.

142: The syllabic l

Don't add a vowel sound!

Transcript

Hi again, and welcome back to Seattle Learning Academy's American English pronunciation podcast. My name is Mandy, and this is our 142nd episode.

Our last podcast was about the t sound allophones and part of that show was about the importance of being able to tell the difference between a syllabic l and a non-syllabic l.

A syllabic consonant is a sound that is typically considered a consonant, but can sometimes do something that only vowel sounds are supposed to be able to do--create a syllable. We have three syllabic consonants in English: the schwa+r sound, the l sound, and the n sound. Today I'm just going to talk about the syllabic l.

Understanding syllabic consonants is important because it allows non-native English speakers to not over-pronounce words by adding unnecessary sounds. If you want to sound like a highly fluent speaker of English, learning where to not put sounds is just as important as knowing where to keep them.

A syllabic l does not sound different than a regular l, it's just a classification to help us understand syllables and realize that some syllables don't include a vowel sound. I hope that makes sense.

Let's start with a few words that contain an easy to identify syllabic l: words where it's spelled le, as in the words trouble, single, and simple. I'm going to say those words again, but I'm also going to say just the final two consonant sounds so you can hear that there is no vowel added between them. Those words were trouble (bl), single (gl), and simple (pl). Try saying them with me:

trouble
single
simple

So the idea is that the syllable with the syllabic l sound does not also include a vowel sound. Compare the word simple to simply. The final syllable of the word simply is ly, an l sound and then a long e sound. Since the final syllable of simply includes a vowel sound, the l sound is not considered syllabic.

Once you learn to notice syllabic l's, you can find them in other spelling patterns as well. The word local, spelled l-o-c-a-l, has a syllabic l. So does final f-i-n-a-l, and special, s-p-e-c-i-a-l.

The syllabic l exists in more than just 2-syllable words. Listen to the final syllable of the words animal, difficult, and hospital. Those final syllables were ml, klt, and tl: animal, difficult, and hospital.

While the syllabic l does occur more often on an unstressed final syllable of a word, it can also occur in earlier syllables. Examples are the words especially and potentially, e-spec-iall-y, po-tent-iall-y.

I'm not saying you'll never hear native speakers add a vowel sound into these syllables, only that is it more common to use the syllabic consonant. In all of the words I used as examples in this podcast, and in all of the words in Pronuncian's exercise on this topic, I verified that the Longman Pronunciation Dictionary shows a small, raised schwa symbol (that's an upside-down letter e) before the l sound; that's their way of showing syllabic consonants. That style of transcription means that the Longman Pronunciation Dictionary does not recommend adding the vowel sound, but that it is optional. Regular dictionaries that we use for definitions of words seldom give this kind of detail. So, if you want to know things like this, you need a good pronunciation dictionary, and you need to read the introduction to the dictionary to see how the symbols are specifically used.

As I mentioned a bit earlier, there is an exercise on Pronuncian for more syllabic l practice. Exercises are only available to Pronuncian subscribers, which you can find information about by going to www.pronuncian.com/join. I'll link to the Pronuncian's free l sound lesson from this show's transcripts page, which can be found by clicking Episode 142 on www.pronuncian.com/podcast.

Let's practice. Repeat these words after me, using a syllabic l:

trouble
single
simple
animal
difficult
hospital
especially
potentially

Of course, you can practice hearing the details of English by listening to an audio book. You can get a free audio book by signing up for a free 14-day trial of Audible.com. Use our special web address: www.audiblepodcast.com/pronuncian as a way to help support this show and to get your free audio book to keep. If you cancel your subscription with Audible before 14 days, you are charged nothing, but 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.

Thanks for listening.

Bye-bye.