This is my fourth and last post explaining why you have an accent when you speak American English.
Today I am going to write about sound substitution or approximation.
When speaking English, non native speakers often substitute a sound they are familiar with from their own language for an English sound.
For example, Russian speakers often substitute the /v/ for /w/ so that the word wine sounds like vine.
French speakers typically substitute a /z/ sound for the voiced th sound so that the word these sounds like zese.
Speakers of many languages including Spanish and Portuguese substitute the /iy/ sound for the /I/ sound so that the word chip sounds like cheap.
There are many accent reduction books and audio courses that focus on articulating vowel and consonant sounds correctly. I review the most popular books at my Confident Voice Bookstore.
Tags: accent reduction books, accent reduction for french speakers, accent reduction for russian speakers, accent reduction for Spanish speakers, Accent Reduction Techniques
