What's up everyone!
How are you doing?
That right there is actually today's lesson.
I'm going to show you how to say different
greetings just like a native English speaker.
Before we begin, I'd like to remind you to
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on how you can practice and improve your English.
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I'm sure just about all of you are familiar with some
greetings in English like "Hello" and "Hi".
I don't want to talk to you about those today.
Instead, I want to talk to you about other greetings
and focus on their pronunciation.
Because this is going to help you improve your overall English fluency.
Now, when people start learning English
a common phrase that they learn for greetings is
Hello! How are you?
I'm fine, thank you. And you?
This is perfectly acceptable. It's grammatically correct.
But the pronunciation sounds robotic.
And you don't really hear native English speakers talking this way.
So let's look at a few different greetings
that people often say, and we'll practice saying them together.
The first greeting I want to talk to you about is simple.
This is a very common greeting that
people use to say hello.
Culturally speaking, however, it's important to note
that when people say, "How are you?"
They're not really looking to start a conversation.
And this is especially true in the U.S.
It's just a way of acknowledging somebody and
recognizing them, and just saying hello
even in passing.
When pronouncing this greeting, native speakers will
kind of link the first two words together.
So the final sound in "How"
and the initial sound in "are"
will get blended to sound like /hou-ahr/.
Then, the word "you" may have
but not always, the reduced schwa sound.
And it'll sound like /yuh/.
As I mentioned before, this is not always the case.
It's perfectly find to say "you"
but sometimes native English speakers will reduce it
with the schwa, and it'll sound like /yuh/.
Now we have a whole video about the schwa sound
and I strongly recommend that you check it out.
So then, when we put all of this together
We have /hou-ahr yuh/.
In case you're wondering, I'm using phonetic spelling
which means that I'm spelling the words just like they sound.
Some of you may be familiar with the International Phonetic Alphabet.
Others of you may not be familiar with it.
But I think everybody can follow
and understand the phonetic spelling.
Let's listen to this greeting a few times before we practice.
Let's practice saying this together a few times.
So I'll say it, and then you repeat.
Good job!
Now, here's a slight nuance to this greeting.
If two people say it to each other,
the second person is NOT going to reduce
the word "you" with the schwa sound. /yuh/
Instead, they will actually say "you."
Let's look at this example.
The next greeting I want to talk to you about
is very similar to the last one.
We're just going to add one more word..."doing."
Again, when greeting somebody, you won't really
hear native English speakers say...
To me, when somebody says this,
it's more in a consoling manner.
And they will say, "How are you doing?"
when somebody is sad, and they really
want to know how that person is doing.
But when it's used as a greeting,
just to kind of say hi.
Then it'll get reduced.
Now, there are different ways to reduce this greeting.
Almost always the "g" in "doing" will get dropped.
And then it'll sound like, "How are you /doo-in/?"
Then, it can get reduced even further with
"How are you?"
"How are you doing?"
You give it a try!
Nice!
Finally, the most reduced form of this greeting
would be to eliminate the word "are" altogether.
You try!
The last greeting that I want to talk to you about
is a very informal one, and one that I use all the time.
I used it at the very beginning of this video
and that greeting is...
Again, this is a very informal greeting.
So, it's probably not something you would say
to your grandparents, or professor, or even your boss.
It's mostly used among friends.
Sometimes I hear learners respond with "Good."
Or they ask if it's okay to say "Good."
NO!
"What's up?" --> "Good."
This is because even though "What's up?" is a greeting
like saying "Hi."
It's more similar to someone asking
"What's happening?" or "What's going on?"
And you wouldn't really respond with "Good" to either of those questions.
The appropriate response to "What's up?" is either
"Not much."
Or "Nothing."
Or you really don't need to respond at all.
Just say "Hey" back.
You should also know that "What's up?" has
different meanings as well.
So, for example, when you approach somebody and
they look upset, you could say "What's up?"
As in - you want to know what the problem is or what's wrong.
Also, when somebody comes up to you and
you know that they want to ask you a question,
you could just say "What's up?" as in "What do you need?"
So let's look at the pronunciation.
"What's" is always going to be contracted.
You don't really hear people say "What is up?"
So after we contract "What's," the final -s sound
gets blended with the vowel sound in "up."
You give it a try!
If you want to be super informal and reduce it even
more, you can drop the "What" and just say "Sup?"
Okay, so now you know how to pronounce
three different greetings just like a native English speaker.
So what we'd like you to do now
is to say "Hello!" to us and everyone else
in our global classroom in the comments below.
You can use a greeting from this lesson or
any other greeting in English.
You can even use a greeting in your native language.
Just write it in the comments below!
Please "Like" this video if you enjoy learning about
and practicing English pronunciation.
We'll see you next time. Bye!