I hear and feel you. The difference between full and reduced 'i' sounds is one of the more difficult to master for many non-native English speakers, as is the unaccentuated 't' in between vowels in American English that becomes a soft 'd.' I also

To continue..... I think the sound quality is an important difference between the two languages besides the pronunciation. The Americans tend to drone in the middle tone, wheras the English have a more lilting quality and the Welsh more so; but

Have to disagree with the vowel sound you use in B IR D is a long vowel. The long vowel "i" sound is the "i"sound in "find," "mine," "grind," "like," "tribe." The difference between the ir and er is, indeed, the accent. Probably has roots to

I'm afraid to say that I don't think that there is always a rule, Guest. You'll master the different pronounciations of "o" after spending some time on pronounciation and listening. However, you can get some hint from your dictionary which gives

Hi cball007, I found my notes which I jotted down in my ESL course. The difference between a and an is one of pronunciation, and so we also use an in front of a silent h because judging only by sound, the word begins with the vowel that

when you say the R , what condition your mouth and toung should be ? DRAW THE BASE OF YOUR TONGUE TOWARD THE BACK OF YOUR MOUTH-- THE TONGUE IS NOT INVOLVED IN THE 'R' SOUND. AT FIRST, PRACTICE BY PUSHING YOUR TONGUE BACK AND OUT OF THE WAY

Donna Richoux typed thus: That'll be me. Guilty on all ... out that I wassaying "Shore". Or the other way around. Interesting. I cannot understand how "pen" and "pin" could possiblybe confused (except perhaps by a

I notice that none of the dictionaries I have access to distinguish between the basic pronunciation of the vowel in 'dad' (/'had'/'lad'/'pad' etc.) and that in 'mad'/'sad'/'bad'. I find no

The explanation (which I find convincing, but your mileage may vary) is that the puff of air is *unvoiced*, whereas all vowels are, by definition, voiced to some extent. If you try the hand-over-mouth experiment with the word "peak", for

In a prefixed word I might say ('sEmi) or ('hEmi) ... ("semuh" or "hemuh"), as in "hemisphere" ('hEm@,sfIr) and "semicircle" ('sEm@,s@rkl-). I use the schwa in "hemisphere", but in