Search results for 'tag:British English tag:Intonations' matching tags 'British English' and 'Intonations'

Re: How to change my accent?

Kooyeen — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 18:04:20 GMT

sanycool4
Am really struggling with my accent...English people can't really understand some words what am saying...So any body advice me how to change my accent?

You might need an accent reduction course. Learn the sounds, learn how to connect words, learn to use a decent intonation, etc. It depends on the variety you want to learn though. For American English, I once read "American Accent Training" by Ann Cook. I found it vital for my English, learned a lot of things and I improved a lot. I can't say anything about British English or other dialects though. Good luck. :)

Re: Mimicking an actor's accent

Kooyeen — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 20:27:59 GMT

Hi,
yes, I remember you asked about him. I'm not an expert at all, but I can tell you my opinion, as a learner.
I agree it's a good accent for those who are interested in British English. I don't find any annoying features in his accent (=features I don't like). It doesn't sound posh to me, his intonation seems to be normal and not exaggerated like in annoying posh accents.

3:54 - That is strange, yes. <-- Tapped T in "that is". I don't know how many accents have this feature and to what extent because I don't really know enough about British English.
3:57 - Yeah, that's a little weird <-- Glottal stops in "little". But they are not everywhere... either he's changing hir accent while he speaks, or those glottal stops are only found in certain special cases in his accent.
He doesn't release final T's. - Notice the difference between his final consonants and the hosts' ones, especially the woman's (the hosts sound like they overpronounce final consonants to me, since I'm mainly used to American English).

Just my non-native opinion, though. I don't know how difficult it is for a learner to pick up such an accent, because I don't know how widespread those kinds of accents are in the UK and in the media in general. Good luck.

Re: accents

Anonymous — Thu, 06 Sep 2007 20:01:44 GMT

Cvilla wrote:
Anonymous wrote:

I believe that I haven't missed anything. I think that you don't understand the concept clearly.I agree that (nothing new here) an intonation is one of the most important part of any accent. But in your example it is related to an empasis of some particular words to add a bit different meaning to your phrase (it is NOT an accent!). Usually it is done by changing a pitch of your voice at the right place. So, it has nothing to do with a concrete accent as we don't allways need to emphasize something, do we? But an intonation is used in every phrase. Every native speaker will do this if it is needed. On the other hand accents imply certain intonation patterns which add some kind of "melody" to the speech.
For example the Irish accents are characterised by frequent fluctuation of the pitch. To emphasisize some word an Irishman (like all other people) will just inrease the pitch of his voice to draw your attention to this word (He will change his usual intonation pattern). So, to conclude all accent have their own intonation patterns if you need to emphasize something (that is your example) you need to inrease a pitch at this place despite the accent you speak with.

Like I said, examples like that very specific one, which happens a lot in English, can't be found in other languages... because of the accent. You are trying to be even more "specific" by targeting specifc accents within the accent pool of the English language, but that scenario I describe exists in English because the accent allows for it. Again, you don't find it in some other language because those "lack" that specific pattern in their accents.

Anonymous wrote:

Let's forget what I've just said. I've got a question: who needs this if nobody uses this? Accents are totally useless, since everybody uses his own pattern of speech and it is nearly impossible to learn how to speak with "right" intonation if you are quite old. Moreover nobody will be able to understand you anyway if you succeed, because not all people can hear and understand intonation. International English is just different from British and American English.
I hope you will get it.
Please feel free to correct me if I am wrong.

Nobody uses what? Things like the example I gave you or accents in general? If nobody uses accents, how come do they exist??? Accents aren't useless, my friend; you're simply trying to fight something you can't.

And maybe you're right, maybe it's almost "impossible" to speak with the "right" intonation (let's say "accent", better) if you are quite old. But if you succeed, people will understand you... There's no point in saying that nobody will understand if you succeed; I'm sorry, but that's nonsense. I succeeded at learning a "standard" american accent, and americans understand everything I say. And I have seen a few people succeeding at it too, with the best results.

Now, there is no "international" English which is differenciated from American and British English. And if it existed, that International English would have a accent of its own... You can't escape that, because the accent is defined by intonation patterns, pronunciation, inflection, and other factors that are always present when people speak. We don't speak like robot.... and even there we can talk about a "robotic accent," like "he speaks like a robot."

I just can't see why you are so obsessed in fighting accents. They have existed, they exist, and they will exist.

Ok, I see you didn't get it. I will repeat it again. Accents and intonation aren't the same things. You can emphasize something without speaking a perfect accent, let's say American one. Just rise a pitch of your voice at the right place. This doesn't depend on a concrete accent, it is more matter of communication. Perhaps, you learnt these "tricks" at a pronunciation class, therefore you associate them only with an accent. Most learners are unaware about these topics, so most likely they will not understand you.
Believe me that international English exists, but of course not in the USA. Italians, Spaniards, Russians all have their own version of English. I'M NOT OBSESSED with fighting of accents. I just want to show that their sdudying by foreign learners are totally useless. It is because: it is extremely HARD (if you succeeded it doesn't mean that everyone will be able to do that) to tune your pronunciation to the correct one, there are not so many native speakers in the international environment; you are surrounded by various foreign accents, which you need to understand somehow, these people have various levels of English skills, they simply will not understand you if you say something like "I wanna", but you desperately need to communicate with them. Of course if you live in the terrarium like the USA then it is a different story. So, I just want to remove all obstacles in communication with everyone.

Re: accents

Cvilla — Thu, 06 Sep 2007 14:49:19 GMT

Anonymous wrote:

I believe that I haven't missed anything. I think that you don't understand the concept clearly.I agree that (nothing new here) an intonation is one of the most important part of any accent. But in your example it is related to an empasis of some particular words to add a bit different meaning to your phrase (it is NOT an accent!). Usually it is done by changing a pitch of your voice at the right place. So, it has nothing to do with a concrete accent as we don't allways need to emphasize something, do we? But an intonation is used in every phrase. Every native speaker will do this if it is needed. On the other hand accents imply certain intonation patterns which add some kind of "melody" to the speech.
For example the Irish accents are characterised by frequent fluctuation of the pitch. To emphasisize some word an Irishman (like all other people) will just inrease the pitch of his voice to draw your attention to this word (He will change his usual intonation pattern). So, to conclude all accent have their own intonation patterns if you need to emphasize something (that is your example) you need to inrease a pitch at this place despite the accent you speak with.

Like I said, examples like that very specific one, which happens a lot in English, can't be found in other languages... because of the accent. You are trying to be even more "specific" by targeting specifc accents within the accent pool of the English language, but that scenario I describe exists in English because the accent allows for it. Again, you don't find it in some other language because those "lack" that specific pattern in their accents.

Anonymous wrote:

Let's forget what I've just said. I've got a question: who needs this if nobody uses this? Accents are totally useless, since everybody uses his own pattern of speech and it is nearly impossible to learn how to speak with "right" intonation if you are quite old. Moreover nobody will be able to understand you anyway if you succeed, because not all people can hear and understand intonation. International English is just different from British and American English.
I hope you will get it.
Please feel free to correct me if I am wrong.

Nobody uses what? Things like the example I gave you or accents in general? If nobody uses accents, how come do they exist??? Accents aren't useless, my friend; you're simply trying to fight something you can't.

And maybe you're right, maybe it's almost "impossible" to speak with the "right" intonation (let's say "accent", better) if you are quite old. But if you succeed, people will understand you... There's no point in saying that nobody will understand if you succeed; I'm sorry, but that's nonsense. I succeeded at learning a "standard" american accent, and americans understand everything I say. And I have seen a few people succeeding at it too, with the best results.

Now, there is no "international" English which is differenciated from American and British English. And if it existed, that International English would have a accent of its own... You can't escape that, because the accent is defined by intonation patterns, pronunciation, inflection, and other factors that are always present when people speak. We don't speak like robot.... and even there we can talk about a "robotic accent," like "he speaks like a robot."

I just can't see why you are so obsessed in fighting accents. They have existed, they exist, and they will exist.

Unreleased final consonants

Kooyeen — Fri, 20 Jul 2007 19:46:37 GMT

Hi,
I read Nona's new post earlier, but... where is it now? I can't see it anymore. It was a post with a link to a website where you could listen to IPA sounds (for British English).
Well, I heard a lot of words pronounced with a clear consonant sound at the end. I thought of posting this:

What are the consonant that are unreleased at the end of a word? (In American English, but Nona's and the other brits' opinions are welcome too of course, lol).

If you say Bob as Bo-buh, bod as bo-duh, bop as bo-puh, and bot as bo-tuh, you will be doing a stereotypical Italian accent. What I notice is that in American English all the final consonants are unreleased, apart form k, which is not aspirated though. The T is unreleased and often with a glottal stop. For M, N, P, ect., not releasing them means not opening the mouth again at the end.
Sometimes final consonants are released, but only very very little, so... Having said that, there's not much difference between:
Bot / Bop
Bod / Bob
The fist pair can be distinguished from the second by the vowel length (longer vowel and on two levels of intonation if the syllable ends with a voiced consonant). But there's not much difference between the words in each pair, is there?

Opinions? Thannk you in advance

Re: Speaking Teaching Books

Kooyeen — Sat, 10 Feb 2007 02:06:40 GMT

Hi,
yes, there are books that deal with stress, intonation, and pronunciation.

I've read "American Accent Training" by Ann Cook. There's really a lot of stuff in that book (and on the 5 CDs). I haven't tried any other books anyway, so I can only tell you about that one. It treats American English, not British English or any other variety. Generally speaking, it's a really good book and I would recommend it.
Some points (just my opinion):

She (Ann Cook) makes you notice almost all the features of English that you've never noticed (stress, intonation, liaisons, word reductions, contractions, vowels, tapped t... )
Five CDs for audio lessons (she reads most of what's in the book, so you can listen while reading). Plus, she speaks very clearly.
She said you will learn standard American English, but in my opinion her accent is not standard, I guess it could be Californian (not sure though, I could be totally wrong). Plus, the book doesn't consider the difference in pronunciation between "cot" and "caught", so the variety taught has the cot-caught merger.
There's some confusing stuff in the book, learners should be careful. She sometimes tells you to do something he doesn't always do, and sometimes phonetic transcriptions don't match what she says.
Exercises are sometimes boring, but that's normal, isn't it? Some parts and some exercises are really silly and not useful at all, in my opinion.
The book is not for basic learners, IMO (but I see you can already write good English, so don't worry).

Conclusion: even if it's not perfect (nothing is perfect in the world), I learned almost everything I wanted to know and I was amazed how many features I'd never noticed. My result: "comprehension +80%", more or less (which means that after the course I could understand almost double what I understood before, in speech).

Here's some stuff from Ann Cook's book, on a unofficial website (it's not Cook the one who speaks here)
http://www.5minuteenglish.com/pronunciation.htm

This is the official website:
http://www.americanaccent.com/

Best wishes

Re: Is American English lazy English?

Marvin A. — Fri, 29 Dec 2006 06:41:22 GMT

Wow, what a lot of nonesense.

Is American English simply lazy English with disregard for the fundamentals of the language, or is it a valid simplification of an overly complex and irregular language?

Huh? What are you talking about?

I was hoping nobody would ask, but since you did, I much prefer the attitude of the British. They have enough respect for the language to use correct spelling

How is modern British spelling more "correct"? Who determines correct spelling anyway? The differences in spelling between the US and the UK are mostly due to there being multiple forms that were considered "correct" at the time: such as "color" and "colour".

(The British have) clear enunciation

Oh they do, do they? Are you referring to RP, which is spoken by about 4% of the population, or are you referring to Glaswegian?

(And the British have the) correct use of prepositions and general grammar (and Americans don't)

Huh?

It is not my intention to offend users of American English, users of the imperial system of measurement or anyone else who cares little for international standards.

By your logic, the imperial system should be the correct one. After all, it was invented in Britain. They simply "dumbed down" their system (as you like to say), and switched to the metric system.

I know literacy levels in most western countries are declining rapidly. Could this be a contributing factor?

What does literacy have to do with it?

they use American enunciation

There are several dialects of North American English.

(The "American enunciation", grammar, etc.) all these also have been standardized

Um, no. There is no standardized pronunciation in North American English.

British is regarded as classical English?

"Classical English"? Modern British dialects, particularily RP, have diverged more from the English that both RP and General American are derived from. The non-rhoticity is one thing.

When one considers that the countries on the following list and a multitude of other nations have deep historical if not current connections with Britain and British English, I think it is quite likely that the use of Bitish English is far more widespread and popular than one might think at first glance.

Canada

Um. Canada does not speak "British English".

Oh, by the way, British English is taught in Australian schools, and I think it would be fair to say that Australians take great pride in the preservation of 'proper' (the Queen's) English

Australians speak *Australian English* not British English. They are not "taught" British English. Their spelling system is closer to the British standard though. As for Australians speaking the Queen's English, nothing could be father from the truth, in fact most non-Australians think that most forms of Australian English sound very much like Cockney.

Interesting that Australians take much pride in using British English - that actually would support the thesis that it'll hardly happen that the British English will be replaced by the American English, what do you think?

Um. They don't use British English... But they're of course not going to adopt an American accent. That would be like thinking that people from Berlin would adopt a Swiss German accent.

As nationalities continually interact around the word, shouldn't there be ONE set standard for both measurement and English? Emagine if you gave a spelling test to students from different English speaking countries. Q. What would be the correct spelling for the word "COLOR/COLOUR" ? (for example) Who would pass the test and who would fail?

Um. Both were used in the past as acceptable variants.

As nationalities continually interact around the word, shouldn't there be ONE set standard for both measurement and English?

No. English is a pluricentric language.

American English now is mostly ebonics lol

Rubbish

In a nutshell American and British English are but two dialects of ENGLISH.

They are not two "dialects". There's really no such thing as "American English" or "British English". There are many dialects of English in North America, as well as many dialects in the Britain.

I don't think I would consider British English "Classic English". British English and American English were assumable one in the same 200 years ago.

Exactly. But remeber, even at that time there was not just one form of English. There were many dialects.

I started this thread in 2003, and I have to admit I now feel a little silly about it.
Thanks to the input in this thread (and others) I realise my stupidity at having been so outspoken.

Good.

U.S. has a very diverse population. The pressure, naturally, is to simplify English so everyone, including the non-native speakers, can understand each other.

Rubbish. How has it become simpler?

They should learn to write properly, that is, English, proper English

Write properly? What is this "correct spelling" anyway?

So you're quite likely to hear a rising 'Australian' intonation in plain statements, for example â which to some BrE ears makes every statement sound like a question.

That's also found in North American English. It's associated with California English and Valley girls for the most part. It has very little to do with Australian influence.

Re: British English needed in the Philippines???

Chad — Thu, 07 Dec 2006 09:51:08 GMT

Annvan wrote:
I hope to move (back) to Manila in the future and offer English tuition to Filipino teenagers preparing either for college/university or entering the business world/ a career. The thing is that I'm English, so my 'version' of English is British rather than American. My question is: Is British English relevant in Manila? (Or would it be better to start training myself in American English?!)

People in the Philippines are used to American English. If you train yourself in American English way it willl be your key to success of becoming a good teacher. Because knowing a American English and British English at the same way could create a big impression. Specially now that Call center in the Phillipines is creating its name and English teacher is becoming indemand specially those who teach the intonation, slang and complete grammar structure.

Re: :::::: HOW TO SPEAK AND LEARN EGNLISH ::::

Exclusive — Thu, 04 May 2006 22:16:55 GMT

Part I: Want to 'neutralise' your accent?

Many deserving candidates lose out on job opportunities because of their vernacular accent.

Can I 'neutralise' my accent?

Yes, you can. All you need to do is train yourself to speak English as comfortably and perfectly as you speak your mother tongue.

How do you train yourself? By inculcating certain practices in your daily lifestyle. These will get you closer to sounding like a native English speaker and equip you with a global accent -- and you will speak not American or British English, but correct English.

This is the first step to learn any other accent, be it American or British or Australian.

Lisa Mojsin, head trainer, director and founder of the Accurate English Training Company in Los Angeles, offers these tips to help 'neutralise' your accent or rather do away with the local twang, as you speak.

i. Observe the mouth movements of those who speak English well and try to imitate them.

When you are watching television, observe the mouth movements of the speakers. Repeat what they are saying, while imitating the intonation and rhythm of their speech.

ii. Until you learn the correct intonation and rhythm of English, slow your speech down.

If you speak too quickly, and with the wrong intonation and rhythm, native speakers will have a hard time understanding you.

Don't worry about your listener getting impatient with your slow speech -- it is more important that everything you say be understood.

iii. Listen to the 'music' of English.

Do not use the 'music' of your native language when you speak English. Each language has its own way of 'singing'.

iv. Use the dictionary.

Try and familiarise yourself with the phonetic symbols of your dictionary. Look up the correct pronunciation of words that are hard for you to say.

v. Make a list of frequently used words that you find difficult to pronounce and ask someone who speaks the language well to pronounce them for you.

Record these words, listen to them and practice saying them. Listen and read at the same time.

vi. Buy books on tape.

Record yourself reading some sections of the book. Compare the sound of your English with that of the person reading the book on the tape.

vii. Pronounce the ending of each word.

Pay special attention to 'S' and 'ED' endings. This will help you strengthen the mouth muscles that you use when you speak English.

viii. Read aloud in English for 15-20 minutes every day.

Research has shown it takes about three months of daily practice to develop strong mouth muscles for speaking a new language.

ix. Record your own voice and listen for pronunciation mistakes.

Many people hate to hear the sound of their voice and avoid listening to themselves speak. However, this is a very important exercise because doing it will help you become conscious of the mistakes you are making.

x. Be patient.

You can change the way you speak but it won't happen overnight. People often expect instant results and give up too soon. You can change the way you sound if you are willing to put some effort into it.

Quick tips

Various versions of the English language exist. Begin by identifying the category you fall into and start by improving the clarity of your speech.

~ Focus on removing the mother tongue influence and the 'Indianisms' that creep into your English conversations.

~ Watch the English news on television channels like Star World, CNN, BBC and English movies on Star Movies and HBO.

~ Listen to and sing English songs. We'd recommend Westlife, Robbie Williams, Abba, Skeeter Davis and Connie Francis among others.

Books to help you improve your English

Essential English Grammar by Murphy (Cambridge)
Spoken English by R K Bansal and J B Harrison
Pronounce It Perfectly In English (book and three audio cassettes) by Jean Yates, Barrons Educational Series
English Pronunciation For International Students by Paulette Wainless Dale, Lillian Poms

more info: www.ingilizcepratik.net

Re: Quite and Pretty

Thethenothere123 — Sat, 29 Apr 2006 03:31:43 GMT

MrPedantic wrote:
I think it depends on the intonation, in British English. With a confident intonation, "That's quite good!" can mean "that's surprisingly good!". With a hesitant intonation â "That's quite good" â it can mean "fairly good".

(The same applies to "pretty".)

MrP

It's the same in NAmE (North American English).