Understanding British Accent.

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Understanding British Accent.

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Hello Friends,

I am New in Manchester, UK and I am unable to understand the English people Speak Here. I am from India and it was OK to understand Local Indian Accent but I only get 20% here in Manchester UK. I want to know where I can find some Audio Files Recorded in British Accent So I can Practice with them. I will appreciate your Help

Thank you.

Oct 22 2006 18:38:48

Comments

Hello Harish

Try this link: British Library Archive of English Accents and Dialects

Good luck!

MrP

Oct 22 2006 22:48:55

Thanks.

This is Exelent Collection

Oct 23 2006 15:37:09

Students: We have free audio pronunciation exercises.

Hi Harish. Can I ask you - how long have you been in Manchester now?
(I lived near Manchester for many years, though I wasn't born there.)
Ann

Oct 27 2006 20:08:03

hi harish this is sharon from kerala i read your mail i understand your problem while speak with british people..if u were in kerala i could have heleped u a lot cause i ve got a teacher who was trained by british teachers..take some movie dvds and watch with the help script..u should watch part by part..again play it and try to understand without script. email addy deleted by mod

Feb 16 2007 09:20:01

I don't understand too. They are speaking very fast!

Feb 16 2007 18:57:59

Students: Are you brave enough to let our tutors analyse your pronunciation?

Ouhh man your situation really scares me.. I got an scholarship to study a master degree at the University of Manchester but Ive learned american english all my entire life!!

Feb 20 2009 06:59:36

Hi Harish,
I have same problem.i recently came to UK.i can't understand the British english accent.i want to do job here.....so plz help me

Regards,
sangeetha.

Feb 25 2015 09:22:30

Hi Sangeetha

Welcome to the UK. Where are you living? There isn't one uniform British accent. There are many regional accents. A good resource to use for learning to understand spoken English is the BBC Learning English site:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/language /

I particularly like their Express English series, where passers-by on the street are asked questions:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/general/expressenglish /

Also if you watch programmes on the BBC i-player they generally have the option to turn on subtitles.

There are two main problems causing lack of comprehension faced by newcomers to the UK:

1) Often the English taught abroad is based on each word being spoken very clearly and in my experience the use of weak forms is often not taught. You may find that the spoken English you hear sounds very fast. Certain words within a sentence will be being stressed and the other words will be sped up and possibly shortened.

So for example, you may be used to 'What do you think?' being pronounced /wɒt du: ju: θɪŋk/ but in reality in the UK you may hear it being pronounced in a number of different shortened versions including /wɒʔ dʒə θɪŋk/.

2) Most English taught abroad is based on either British RP or General American. There are many regional accents in the UK. These can often sound quite different to standard RP. You can hear examples of different regional accents here:

http://www.dialectsarchive.com/england

http://accent.gmu.edu/browse_maps/europe.php

Karen

Feb 25 2015 10:37:35

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Hello Harish

Try this link: British Library Archive of English Accents and Dialects

Good luck!

MrP
Hi Harish. Can I ask you - how long have you been in Manchester now?
(I lived near Manchester for many years, though I wasn't born there.)
Ann
hi harish this is sharon from kerala i read your mail i understand your problem while speak with british people..if u were in kerala i could have heleped u a lot cause i ve got a teacher who was trained by british teachers..take some movie dvds and watch with the help script..u should watch part by part..again play it and try to understand without script. email addy deleted by mod
Ouhh man your situation really scares me.. I got an scholarship to study a master degree at the University of Manchester but Ive learned american english all my entire life!!
Hi Harish,
I have same problem.i recently came to UK.i can't understand the British english accent.i want to do job here.....so plz help me

Regards,
sangeetha.
Hi Sangeetha

Welcome to the UK. Where are you living? There isn't one uniform British accent. There are many regional accents. A good resource to use for learning to understand spoken English is the BBC Learning English site:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/language /

I particularly like their Express English series, where passers-by on the street are asked questions:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/general/expressenglish /

Also if you watch programmes on the BBC i-player they generally have the option to turn on subtitles.

There are two main problems causing lack of comprehension faced by newcomers to the UK:

1) Often the English taught abroad is based on each word being spoken very clearly and in my experience the use of weak forms is often not taught. You may find that the spoken English you hear sounds very fast. Certain words within a sentence will be being stressed and the other words will be sped up and possibly shortened.

So for example, you may be used to 'What do you think?' being pronounced /wɒt du: ju: θɪŋk/ but in reality in the UK you may hear it being pronounced in a number of different shortened versions including /wɒʔ dʒə θɪŋk/.

2) Most English taught abroad is based on either British RP or General American. There are many regional accents in the UK. These can often sound quite different to standard RP. You can hear examples of different regional accents here:

http://www.dialectsarchive.com/england

http://accent.gmu.edu/browse_maps/europe.php

Karen

Understanding British Accent.

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