These are five things that you can easily change about your English pronunciation and accent to
help you sound more British when you speak in English. Now, besides subscribing to my channel
and watching this video, one of the best ways to improve your English pronunciation and speaking
skills is by receiving feedback from a qualified and experienced English teacher in one-to-one
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lesson, I have also included a mini worksheet that you can download completely for free,
no email address or anything needed, and then use it with your teacher on Preply to practise
what we have covered in this lesson. So you'll be able to practise today's lesson with a teacher on
Preply and get live feedback and corrections from them. The link to Preply is down below in the
description. Remember to use the code EMMA for 50% off your first lesson and also download that free
mini worksheet, and send it to your teacher before your lesson, so they know what you're gonna do,
basically. I also want to add a quick disclaimer here that I do not push the narrative with this
video that you should sound a certain way. Y ou do not need to sound British. Y ou do not need to
change your accent or anything if you don't want to. This video is simply here just to educate as
well as, possibly, entertain those people who are interested in learning more about this
topic. This video will be focusing predominantly on the Received Pronunciation accent, however,
I will be drawing comparisons between the Received Pronunciation accent and the Modern Received
Pronunciation accent because you're more likely to hear Modern Received over Received, despite
this being considered more of the "standard". So the first thing you can change is by dropping your
r's. If we compare this to, say General American Pronunciation, you will hear that they pronounce
the /r/ sound more, particularly at the end of words. Let's take this word: car, car. Notice
that I'm not saying the 'r' there. I don't say car, car. The same with this one:
here, here. While in American English, it would be more here, here. Girl
girl. Ensure that this sound is very very relaxed. I have a full video all about how
to do this sound as I know it can be tricky, but for now, just know it is very relaxed.
Girl. And the 'r' is not pronounced. Here's another: court, court.
Now let's take a look at this one. This is our first sound where we have two
different ways to pronounce it. So in RP you will hear hair, air, air, hair.
So it becomes more relaxed: air, hair. While in Modern RP,
it just becomes more of one sound, more of a monophthong: /e:/, hair, hair.
So notice it's a little bit flatter. We're not changing from air it's just one sound:
/e:/, hair. I like your hair. I like your hair. But the key thing here is there's still no
'r'. Here's another one with some differences: tour, our, our. Then relax it again: our, our,
tour. Now what you'll hear many Modern Received Pronunciation speakers say is: tour, tour. So this
'ua' actually changes to the vowel that we looked at in 'court'. So, you might hear, for example,
'cure' becoming 'cure'. 'tour', 'tour'. Now our final sound: uh. This is what's called the schwa,
you've probably heard of it. It's the most common sound used, particularly in British English.
Make sure it's super relaxed: teacher, teacher. So we're not going to try and pronounce that 'r':
teacheR. TeacheR sounds more American: teacher, teacher. As soon as you cut that
'r' it sounds way more English. Now as a side note, I don't even have this in my own notes,
but words that tend to end with er, ar, or re, for example, we pronounce them with a
schwa if they are in a syllable by themselves and they are a weak syllable. So as we looked
at 'teacher' we also have 'centre'. Now in the US, they would say 'center' 'center'. Centre, centre.
Or doctor, doctor. While in the US they would say: doctor, doctor. So let's do
some shadowing. Listen closely and repeat: She works here as a teacher in Portsmouth.
She works here as a teacher in Portsmouth. Where does the tour car take us?
Where does the tour car take us? Now let's look at the second change you can make. You
might have noticed this when I was saying the word 'doctor', or 'doctor'. Notice that first
vowel is slightly different. So this O is very round and very short: O, O. Shop, shop. Got, got.
Keep it short and keep it round: dog, dog. And our last word: wan. So even though this has
an 'a' we're not going to say 'wAnt', okay? Keep it round. Want, want. Time to practice
your shadowing: I want a dog. I want a dog. And notice 'I don't say I want A dog', but 'a dog',
'a dog'. If you'd like to learn more about sentence stress, then I have a full video all
about it I will leave it in the card above and in the description for you. I got it at a shop.
I got it, join them together, I got it at a, at a, shop. Shop.
Keep it round. I got it at a shop. Now for change number three. In Received Pronunciation,
you will hear this 'ou'. So start really relaxed
'uh' and then move to a very round position with your mouth, ou ou ou.
So our first one is slow, slow. Go, go. So keep it very relaxed, ou. Go go. Alone,
uh, so a very weak vowel, a-lone, alone. and our final one road, road.
Keep it very relaxed, row, then round, road, road. Now in Modern RP you will hear this ou
being pronounced slightly differently. You will hear it slightly more open. For example 'slow'
becomes 'slow', 'slow'. So notice it's more open with that first vowel: slow, slow. The
sound really doesn't change all that much, but I just wanted to make you aware of it 'cause I
know some of you have very very good ears. So let's practise: drive slowly down the road.
Join those together: Drive slowly down road. Drive slowly down the road.
I put on my coat because it was snowing. I put on my coat because it was snowing. Point number four
that you can change. Now I'm going to compare this to General American Pronunciation here.
What you will hear with this word here is not only will they pronounce the r at the end and say /r/,
but they will also pronounce that 'r' slightly differently. Now it's not exactly like a /d/,
but they will tap very quickly at the top of their mouth to make this sound, so it sounds like:
water, water. This is called the Flap or Tap T, in case you're interested in researching
more about it. However, we don't really use this in words in the UK. You might hear people using
it at the end of words, particularly if they're speaking quite quickly, but never in the middle
of a word. So you won't ever really hear a Brit saying 'water', cause that sound a little bit more
Australian. So in Received Pronunciation: water, waa, so along oo, like 'court', water, water.
City, city. So make sure you're pronouncing that T, city. Ss opposed to in American English, city,
city. This one's quite similar to 'water' in a way because we have that 't' sound in the middle
'bet' and then the ending, we don't pronounce the r: better, better, bet. While in American
English it would be more like: better better. And this one as well a similar thing would happen:
later, later. In the U.S: later later. Now a little side note here, again I don't even
have this in my own notes, but in the UK you may hear speakers changing these T's from a /t/ to a
sound that's pronounced more here. This is called the glottal stop and this is something that you
won't hear American speakers do. So water may be pronounced as water, city, better, later.
While you won't find many speakers of RP using this in their accent,
you will hear it if you ever come to the UK. So it is something definitely to be aware of. So even if
you don't do it in your own speech, you will still hear it. So let's practice: I'll see you later.
I'll see you late, get that T, later. Notice that I'm not touching the back
of my teeth when I do this T, so I'm not saying later, later.
But do it a little bit further back: later, later. And make sure there's a good amount of air as
well. There's a lot of what's called 'aspiration' with this sound, so make sure there's lots of air.
Later. And cut that 'r' as well! I want to move to a better city.
I want to move to a better, better, city, city. So in American English that would be 'better city'.
I wanna move to a better city. It feels really weird saying that with my pronunciation.
Now let's talk about some words that are pronounced differently in the UK compared
to in the US. So these are some British and American pronunciation differences
in specific words. Let's start with a very common one, advertisement, advertisement,
advertisement,
advertisement. Now something interesting that's happened with, particularly younger people,
in the UK, is that they may use the American pronunciation more. So, for example, I would
say advertisement, I don't say advertisement. Even though, according to the dictionary,
and many people that you may ask, they will say advertisement is more British than advertisement.
However, I think this is more to do with the amount of American cartoons and TV shows that we
were exposed to as children, so we just picked up the accent and many of us say advertisement, even
though we are from the UK. So if you hear a Brit using advertisement. instead of advertisement.
then don't be shocked, cause there are many of us who do that! Tere's another interesting one:
schedule, schedule, schedule,
schedule. Now again, many Brits may also say schedule, so don't be surprised if you hear
Brits like me I also say it say it the American way. This is a really good one: zebra, zebra,
zebra, zebra. This also goes for our next one, which is the letter of the alphabet,
X, Y, Z we say in the UK. Z. While in the U.S,
they would pronounce this as Z. X Y Z. In the UK: vase,. So it's a long 'aa'.
In the U.S: vase vase. So the vowel changes from 'aa' to 'ei', but also the endings change:
vase. There's vibration. Vase. There's no vibration. Now this one is very very different:
aluminum, aluminum, aluminum, aluminum. So you know that kind of metal foil that you use to wrap
hot food or sandwiches or something? In the UK we call it aluminum foil, while in the U.S, aluminum
foil. Aluminum, aluminum. They're quite different. Now if you're familiar with army vocabulary, you
will already know that this has two very different ways and the British one is very strange. The
British one is: Lieutenant Lieutenant. Don't ask me why there's a /f/ in there. Lieutenant.
While the American: Lieutenant Lieutenant. This one makes a bit more sense. So we have:
Lieutenant, Lieutenant. This is a very common one: tomato. So mine that second vowel to-ma-to.
Tomato. While in the U.S: tomato. So remember that Flap T that we looked at. Not tomato. Tomato,
tomato. So the vowel changes to-ma but also that T changes to that 'd':
Tomato, tomato. This one has quite different vowels: vitamin, vitamin. While in the U.S:
vitamin, vitamin. So again, we have that Flap T, vita, vitamin, and also the vowel changes.
Vitamin, vitamin. And our final word: herb, hurb. So we pronounce the 'h'
like you're fogging up a mirror, herb. But the 'r' is silent. Herb. It's the same vowel
that we looked at in 'girl' if you remember? We cut that 'r', herb. While in American English:
herb, herb. So now this time we remove the 'h' but we add the 'r'. Herb, herb, herb. Thank you very
much for watching today's lesson. I hope you've enjoyed it and you have learned something new.
I've linked the mini worksheet down Below in the description, please feel free to download
that! And book your lesson on Preply and use that little mini lesson with your teacher to
practise what we've done today. Use the code EMMA to get 50% off your first lesson. The link is down
below in the description. Enjoy the rest of your week and I will see you next lesson. Bye, bye!