Welcome back! Have you checked out my Accent Reduction classes yet? The Roman alphabet has five letters that represent vowels; a, e, i, o, & u, but in spoken American English there are approximately 15 vowel sounds. Linguists and many pronunciation teachers use phonetic symbols to represent these 15 sounds.
Please keep in mind that all dictionaries and pronunciation [...]
Posts Tagged ‘american english vowels’
American English Vowel Sounds
Pronunciation Problems for Koreans- American English Vowel Sounds
There are some American English vowel sounds that are particularly difficult for Koreans to pronounce.These include the /ɪ/ sound and the /ae/ sound.
Koreans often pronounce the /ɪ/ vowel sound in the words sit, slip, & grin more like an /iy/ vowel sound. That makes sit, slip, & grin sound like seat, sleep & green to American listeners.
Keep [...]
Best Accent Training American English Audio Course
This week I found an excellent American English Pronunciation Audio Course on the web. In this audio course instructor Charles Becker teaches you American English vowel & consonant sounds, syllable stress & intonation as well as linking and connected speech.
This is a very complete course and I advise you to check it out! You can [...]
American English Pronunciation Software
Many of you already know about the great free pronunciation software from the University of Iowa. However, for those readers who are new to my blog, I’m going to post it again.
This online software shows you how to pronounce all of the American English vowel and consonant sounds using audio and video. If you want [...]
Pronunciation Problems for Brazilian Portuguese Speakers
I know that many readers of my blog are Brazilians who want to improve their American English pronunciation. I am pleased that so many of you visit here!
Here are two common problems encountered by Brazilian Portuguese speakers who are trying to improve their pronunciation of American English.
1. The schwa sound /ə/
Brazilian Portuguese does not have [...]
American English & Phonetic Pronunciation
I receive lots of requests from students for IPA charts and information about the pronunciation of American English vowel and consonant sounds. Here is some basic information.
The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is a system that was developed to represent the sounds of spoken languages. The system uses characters from the Latin and Greek alphabets.
The symbols [...]
English Pronunciation Videos
I finally took a closer look at the American English pronunciation videos created by the people at Fun Easy English. I had come across these on the web many times but I never took the time to check out the site.
I was really quite impressed with the number of video lessons they provide for American [...]
Pronunciation of American English Vowels
Every language has vowel sounds. Some languages have as few as three vowel sounds and some languages have more than 20 vowel sounds.
The English alphabet has five vowels, a, e, i, o, and u, but these vowels make 14 (or more) spoken sounds in American English. The variety of sounds is very complex and this [...]
American English Audio for Vowel & Consonant Sounds
I just discovered a great free resource called Spoken Skills. This website has audio examples of most of the American English vowel and consonant sounds.
There are also short audio lessons for learning idioms speaking at business meetings.
This is an excellent site so be sure to check it out!
American English Pronunciation-Vowels /iy/ & /I/
In my pronunciation and accent reduction classes I work with many people who speak Spanish and Filipino as their first language. One American English vowel sound that both these groups have trouble pronouncing is the /iy/ sound as in the word “sheep”. They often confuse this sound with the /I/ vowel sound as in the [...]
