Here are two big reasons why it’s so difficult for Americans to understand Koreans’ spoken English: 1. Koreans tend to stress every word in a sentence with the same emphasis. However, North American English speakers listen for stress or emphasis on the important words. When we don’t hear stress on the important words (focus words)
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To the American listener Korean spoken English sounds rather flat or monotone. It doesn’t have a good melody. ♬ This happens because the Korean language does not use syllable stress or word stress like we do when we speak North American English. The lack of syllable stress and word stress makes it very difficult for
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If you are a Korean speaker who is trying to reduce your accent, here are 2 TIPS for you. These tips have to do with American vowel sounds. American English has 15 different vowel sounds. Some of these vowel sounds are particularly difficult for Koreans to pronounce. Difficult sounds for Koreans include: the /ı/ sound
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Those of you who read my blog frequently know that using syllable stress correctly is one of the very best ways to improve your comprehensibility when you speak English. That said, here are a few syllable stress patterns for compound words that you may find useful. Compound nouns are stressed on the first word in
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When I do accent reduction coaching with my clients from Japan, Korea, China, Latin America (and sometimes India, France & Haiti) we work on the sounds of the American R. As you can see….he American English r is a very difficult sound for many non-native speakers to articulate correctly! ✔ The American English r sounds
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Many non-native English speakers, including Koreans, often mispronounce the words woman and women. Both words are stressed on the first syllable as indicated in bold. However, the vowel sounds do not sound how you think they should! The word woman is pronounced wʊ→mən. The word women is pronounced wɪ→mɪn. (The → means lengthen the vowel.)
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In spoken American English the letter combination TH makes two different sounds. One of these sounds is voiced and the other is voiceless. The IPA symbol for the voiced th sound looks like this /ð/. The IPA symbol for the voiceless th sound looks like this /θ/. While both of these sounds cause problems for
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There are some American English vowel sounds that are particularly difficult for Koreans to pronounce.These include the /ɪ/ as in SILVER and the /ae/ as in BLACK. Koreans often pronounce the /ɪ/ vowel sound in the words sit, slip, & grin more like the /iy/ as in GREEN. That makes sit, slip, & grin sound like seat,
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I work with Japanese professionals and post grads in my American accent coaching program. These highly motivated people UNDERSTAND what they need to do in order to speak American English more clearly. After about 6-8 lessons with me they understand the RULES and PATTERNS of spoken English. What they need is more opportunities to PRACTICE
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Sung Yu Ri is a young Korean singer and actress famous for her roles in the productions One Fine Day and the Snow Queen. In this hilarious video she shows her sense of humor by acknowledging the difficulties Korean speakers have with the English sounds /r/ and /l/. ×
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