If you want to visit Britain then you need to know how to pronounce the places that you
are going to go. So today we're going to look at how to pronounce twenty British cities.
Are you ready to go on a tour around Britain? Ok, here we go! Before we do, I just want
to remind you that I'm teaching you the pronunciation in my accent which is a London accent. There
are many other different accents that might say these cities differently. I can only teach
you with my accent. Alright? So just bear that in mind. Now as we go through these cities
I'd like you to practise with me, ok? So when I'm saying London. Don't just sit there going
ummm. Because you won't know how to say it. You'll think you are hearing it but when it
comes to actually saying it you won't know how. So practise with me. If you find a quiet
place to do that or if you want to do it on the tube or the bus or the train, wherever
you are. Just say it with me 'London'. Even stop the video and say it and then start the
video again. So 'London, London' stop it, say it a few times. You could even say it
in different ways. You could say it very quickly 'London, London, London'. You could say it
loudly 'London'. You could say it quietly 'London, London'. Have fun with your pronunciation
otherwise it's going to be really boring, ok? Have fun! Alright, here we go.
The capital city of England, London, London. The stress is on the first syllable, London.
Not London, London.
The beautiful capital of Scotland, Edinburgh. Stress is on first syllable, Edinburgh. One
more time, Edinburgh.
Two famous university cities, Oxford, Oxford. Cambridge, Cambridge. Again the stress in
on the first syllable of both cities. Oxford. Cambridge.
One of the most famous seaside towns in Britain, Brighton. I'll say it one more time, Brighton.
Now personally with my pronunciation sometimes I will not say the /t/ sound, I will miss
out the /t/. So it sounds like Brighton. This is a glottalization. So sometimes I'll say
Brighton, sometimes I'll say Brighton. I guess I'll do that in more informal situations,
conversational situations where I am quite relaxed and I'm speaking more informally I'll
probably say Brighton without the /t/ sound. But if I am trying to be a little bit more
formal, maybe I am in class or something like that I'll say Brighton. That's just a personal
thing, that doesn't apply to everyone. But it's just good to be aware of different pronunciations
of a similar word. So Brighton or Brighton, you might hear both.
A huge city up in the north of England, famous for football and music, Manchester. Again
the stress is on the first syllable, Manchester. The second biggest city in England, Birmingham.
Now I know that the ham there looks like it should be Birmingham but actually when we
have the ham at the end of a place it's just 'um. So Birmingham. So three syllables there,
Birmingham. The stress is on the first syllable. Birmingham. Another big famous northern city
famous for music like the Beatles, the football team Liverpool. The pronunciation is Liverpool.
The stress is on the first syllable, Liverpool. A big city in the north east of England, Newcastle.
My stress is on the first syllable. Now this is pronounced very differently locally in
Newcastle where they stress the 'castle' so it's Newcastle. But I'm a southerner, I'm
from London so I stress the first syllable, Newcastle. You can do whatever you want.
A really popular city for English language students to visit is Bournemouth. Not Bournemouth.
Like the mouth. It's Bournemouth. Stress on the first syllable again Bournemouth.
A really popular place to visit for the Roman baths is Bath. You have the /th/ sound at
the end there. Bath. Now I think locally they might say Bath with a softer a, again my pronunciation
is Bath.
Very close to Bath in the west of England is Bristol. Stress on the first syllable,
Bristol.
Back up in Scotland, we have Glasgow. Stress on again the first syllable. I'm seeing a
pattern here. Glasgow. Again that pronunciation is different from how they would locally say
it. My a there Glasgow is a very southern a instead of Gla. I think further north they'd
say Glasgow but I'm saying Glasgow because that's the pronunciation that I have. Glasgow.
One of my favourite cities and where I went to university, Leeds. Nice long /i/ sound
there, Leeds. So you really open up the mouth, Leeds.
The capital of Wales, Cardiff. It's like Car diff. Cardiff. Stress on the first syllable.
Cardiff.
A really popular city for tourists to visit in the north of England is York. Say it one
more time, York. Where Robin Hood was originally from, Nottingham. Again here we have the ham
at the end just like we did with Birmingham. So it's not Nottingham, it's Nottingham. So
let's say that one more time 'Nottingham' stress on the first syllable. Nottingham.
The capital of Northern Ireland, Belfast. Stress again on the first syllable. I think
that's different from how the locals would say it where they would put the stress on
the second syllable but my pronunciation it goes on the first. So Belfast.
Alright I'm including this one because it causes so many problems and also their football
team won the Premier League a few years ago and there's a place in London with a similar
name. Leicester. Not Leicester. Leicester. Stress on the first syllable. Leicester. And
the last one, Sheffield. Stress on the first syllable again. Sheffield.
Why did I choose these cities. Well, they are the biggest cities in Britain so that's
the first reason. Secondly these are the ones that I've found tourists and English students
visiting the most. So a lot of these cities have big student populations and universities.
Or they are popular with English language students who want to learn English or they
are just famous for being big tourist cities as well. So those are the kind of main reasons
why I chose these twenty cities. There are of course lots of other cities in Britain
that I could have chosen but these are the ones I think that you are most likely to visit
or you are most likely to need to pronounce.