Here are two American English consonant sounds that are problematic for Korean speakers. The first is the /f/ sound. This sound does not occur in Korean.
Korean speakers often pronounce the /f/ sound as a /p/ sound . That means that the word stuff sounds like stop, the word coffee sounds like copy and the word laugh sounds like lap to American listeners.
To make the /f/ sound touch your upper teeth to your lower lip as the airflow leaves your mouth.
Another consonant problem is the S.
In American English the S is frequently found at the end of both verbs and nouns. Korean speakers tend to omit this sound but they must remember to say the letter S whenever they see it. Keep in mind that the consonant S at the end of words is pronounced as a /z/ sound more often than it is pronounced as an /s/ sound.
Word initial S is often pronounced as /ʃ/ by Korean speakers so that the name Sue sounds like shoe and the word city sounds like shitty or sheedy to American listeners.
To see how the /f/, /p/, /s/,/z/ & /ʃ/ sounds are articulated you can use the online pronunciation software developed by the University of Iowa.
Tags: american english consonants, American English Pronunciation, Free Pronunciation Software, Korean Speakers, learn american accent, S & Z sounds
