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Use YouTube to improve your English pronunciation

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Re: Use YouTube to improve your English pronunciation

#221

Post by blackoil »

shadowgovt wrote: post #33
teach wrote: post #3

This is really interesting! Instead of "here's how you are SUPPOSED to pronounce" any given word or phrase, you show how a bunch of native English speakers actually pronounce it. Maybe everyone is wrong, but if your goal is to be understood then you'd be better mimicking what they do than just being technically correct. :) For example, there's a street in the city I live in spelled "Guadalupe". Natives pretty much un…

Language (especially spoken language, most especially English ) doesn't really have a "right" or "wrong." It has "likely to be understood by receiver" and "unlikely to be understood by receiver." The real correct answer to anyone's "what's the right way to say...?" question is a probability distribution.

Language do have right and wrong pronunciation and, in many cases, it is also tied to the script. e.g. in Hindi position of tongue, lips and sound from vocal cord is defined for every phoneme.

That's why games like spelling bee make no sense because if you can hear the word, you can write it there is no ambiguity. Some may pronounce words it differently, but they are mostly different dialects. Or in some cases it is accepted as wrong but common pronunciation.

Re: Use YouTube to improve your English pronunciation

#222

Post by SamFold »

lynguist wrote: post #110
tarkin2 wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In fact, I find it strange when Germans, for example, have a 'perfect British accent'. Even I would say it's perfect. Problem is, no one speaks like that... except the Germans. It also goes with grammatical accuracy as well. If any German, or Nordic etc, says "With whom were you speaking" it marks them as a foreigner instantly.

It’s not grammatical accuracy on their part, it’s the opposite, it’s a calque, a word by word translation from their native tongue. If it was actually perfect grammatical accuracy on their part they’d be saying “Who were you talking to” or “Who were you speaking to”. Correct is what the people say, not the opinion of literal singular English language teachers.

“With whom were you speaking” IS grammatically correct though. “Whom” is the object of the preposition “with”.

Re: Use YouTube to improve your English pronunciation

#223

Post by hughdbrown »

dragonwriter wrote: post #196
hughdbrown wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a Canadian living in the US, this is the bane of my existence. The disappearance of Ts from so many words and phrases irks me: - bouny hunner - innerview - alannic ciddy - Rocky Mounins - haunid house - udderly - budder (the bagel topping) - winner (the season) - bidder (the taste) - invennive - annie-American - bedder - odder (the cute wadder mammal) The inventive ways that Ts are dropped in favor of: - Ns - Ds -…

> I've mused about publishing a compilation of these words with dropped Ts, but it's hit-or-miss whether the other person in America who cares would buy the book. There are probably more people than that that care, but most of them would probably prefer something more like the broad description of https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phonological_history_of_Engl... rather than a catalog of words exhibiting one (or, rather…

I wasn't thinking of a big long list. I envisage a project more like The Quintessential Dictionary: https://www.amazon.com/quintessential-dictionary-I-Moyer-Hun...

It's an amusing work of high-vocabulary words with an excerpt from actual usage with the definition and etymology. Catamite, for example, is memorably demonstrated with, I believe, the opening sentence of Anthony Burgess's "Earthly Powers":

"It was the afternoon of my eighty-first birthday, and I was in bed with my catamite when Ali announced that the archbishop had come to see me."

Re: Use YouTube to improve your English pronunciation

#224

Post by hughdbrown »

drdaeman wrote: post #212
hughdbrown wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a Canadian living in the US, this is the bane of my existence. The disappearance of Ts from so many words and phrases irks me: - bouny hunner - innerview - alannic ciddy - Rocky Mounins - haunid house - udderly - budder (the bagel topping) - winner (the season) - bidder (the taste) - invennive - annie-American - bedder - odder (the cute wadder mammal) The inventive ways that Ts are dropped in favor of: - Ns - Ds -…

At least there is a pattern, so it’s not exactly like “salmon”

Goodness. I forgot about exackly.

Re: Use YouTube to improve your English pronunciation

#225

Post by mathieuh »

filereaper wrote: post #36

This is a very interesting site. I took the name "Regina" as an example as its pronounced very differently between Canada/UK and US. If you toggle through the site's region selectors it does indeed produce videos with the regionally correct pronouciation. (Admittedly I had a sample size of N=1 video each) So yeah, its a great start!

I assume in Canada/UK it rhymes with vagina? That's probably because the royal cipher of Elizabeth II was ER, with the 'R' being for Regina (Latin for 'queen'). So I would imagine that people have heard it in that context before.

Just looking at it it looks like it should be pronounced "redgEEnuh".

Re: Use YouTube to improve your English pronunciation

#226

Post by lottin »

deadbeeves wrote: post #217
lottin wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Without proper knowledge of English phonetics and dialects, this method isn't going to take you very far. For example, in English, vowel length carries phonetic information, whereas in other languages it does not. If you mother tongue happens to fall in the latter category, it's extremely unlikely that you'll figure out how vowel length works, or even that you have to pay attention to it.

That's not true. I use stress timing without even realizing that I'm using it nor understanding what it means, but I can realize when someone doesn't use it. I learned it purely by ear, by mimicking the sounds other people make. More specifically, by copying their cadence.

Yeah, like I said, it's most unlikely that you're using vowel length correctly. You can't copy something you're not aware of. For example, without looking it up, would you say 'quit' and 'quid' are pronounced with the same vowel length or not?

Re: Use YouTube to improve your English pronunciation

#227

Post by GeneralMaximus »

hughdbrown wrote: post #184
Gabriel54 wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or, if you are from New York / New Jersey, the correct pronunciation is 'budder'. :)

As a Canadian living in the US, this is the bane of my existence. The disappearance of Ts from so many words and phrases irks me: - bouny hunner - innerview - alannic ciddy - Rocky Mounins - haunid house - udderly - budder (the bagel topping) - winner (the season) - bidder (the taste) - invennive - annie-American - bedder - odder (the cute wadder mammal) The inventive ways that Ts are dropped in favor of: - Ns - Ds -…

The one I have most problems with is "Toronto". Every time I've heard it said out loud by somebody from North America, it has sounded like "Turrawnno", with the T's barely audible.

On the other hand, my (very Punjabi) family members who actually live there pronounce it "Turronto", with hard T's, rolling R's, and a heavy emphasis on the final T. If you've heard the most common form of the Indian English accent, you know what I mean.

So now I just call it "that city in Canada". I just know I'll mangle it if I say it out loud.

Re: Use YouTube to improve your English pronunciation

#228

Post by russdill »

anadalakra wrote: post #119

As a non-native English speaker, the "randomness" of English pronunciation has been a source of frustration for me for many years. I realized there are two types of issues: 1. Some sounds in English don't exist in other languages and you have to learn them "from scratch". For example the "flap T" in butter. Or the particular American "r" (constrast it to the Spanish rolled r for instance). 2. Certain sounds I DID kno…

As a native English speaker, I love videos that point out all the details I never think about but must be maddening for non-native speakers https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4BYmA5V5Cyg

Re: Use YouTube to improve your English pronunciation

#229

Post by gniv »

Nice that it works in other languages too. It seems useful for finding how words/expressions are used in real conversations. I don't care much about pronunciation, but I want to find context for the (French) words I run into. I am learning French and I use a website with a similar idea: https://www.linguee.fr. It lets you search for usage of words and shows them in professionally translated context.

PS. Just realized the '...' icon on the transcript frame opens another frame with a scrolling transcript. Very neat!

Re: Use YouTube to improve your English pronunciation

#230

Post by MongoTheMad »

gizajob wrote: post #181
anadalakra wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm based in the US, where it's spelled without the "u". Quite a few examples of this spelling difference - humo(u)r, behavio(u)r etc. Oh and "spelt" is "spelled". Isn't English fun! :)

It cold be a real labour if yo’re not used to it.

Your missed u from you're and could merged into labor.

:thumbs_up:

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