PRONUNCIATION BASICS

If you would like some theory first, start here... if you would like some advice, start at "rule #1". IF you just want to get to the practical things, start below rule #4 (a pity, because I think my advice is quite good hehehe).

A long time ago, when students asked me about pronunciation I would go automatically on a rant about many things, that boggled their minds and probably discouraged them from trying to do anything about it. I hope I have changed. In today's post I will try to offer a foothold for those who feel lost and don't know where to start.

Think of languages as flats in a building: they all have the same function: languages are self-contained communication ecosystems. This is one flat, this is another. The owners of the flats can modify and adapt the internal distribution in the way they think is best. That is why languages are sometimes similar and sometimes they are different. 

To follow the same metaphor, imagine your flat, the layout, the rooms, the furniture... and now think that as you visit your neighbour's flat, you find out that he's got a different number of rooms, or he built an extra bathroom, has a shower instead of a bathtub. Still, it is a flat and the family live there. 

Languages are diverse and their pronunciation too. Therefore, it is very important to learn to manage that difference. 

Rule #1 Different is good. It is refreshing, it can be funny. All right, it can also be frustrating and confusing. Be a good tourist, enjoy the view.

Rule #2 Awareness of its importance. Pronunciation is not only needed for speaking better but it will improve your listening skills. The bigger the difference between what you expect to hear and what you actually hear, the worse your listening skills will be. If you know what you can expect to hear, then you will recognize the word.

Rule #3 Make an investment. Investing your time and effort (and perhaps some of your money) in learning pronunciation for a language (English here) will get you good returns. All languages have things in common and you can recycle what you learn. Once you learn to go from your native system to a new one, you can reproduce that movement to other languages. Once you learnt to adjust the movements in your mouth for new sounds, you are not just learning those sounds, but how to try new experiences, like an exotic ice-cream flavour.

Rule #4 Know your strengths and weaknesses. Identify your challenges. With the help of a good teacher, a good book and/or good online resources you can find out what your standing point is by learning the basics about pronouncing your native tongue. 

You will be very surprised to realize the complex adjustments you make constantly in your mouth. The bonus of learning to pronounce new sounds is that they are very likely to appear in other languages that you may want to learn. The more vowels you can pronounce, your ability to assimilate new ones will improve. It's cumulative learning.

OK, you feel you are past the motivational speech stage and you want to get down to work. You should start by gathering your tools. My recommendation is to start here:

This is an excellent app by the British Council that consists of an interactive chart of the phonemic symbols that represent the sounds pronounced in English. You can click as many times as you want on each symbol to hear the sound it represents.

Why do you want to do this? Because if you go to your dictionary (paper or online) you can find these symbols after the word you are looking up. That means you can figure out how a word is pronounced, without actually hearing it. At least its standard pronunciation.

But there is more. If you click your mouse on the little blue tabs on the top right corner of each symbol, you will find examples of each sound in context. 

This is a good tool to get you started. My advice here: build on those examples and make your own list of words that include each of the sounds that you find problematic.

This is very similar to what Macmillan, the book publishers, have on their website:

http://www.macmillaneducationapps.com/

However the Macmillan app is more complete, as you will be able to see. First of all, there are two version: a limited version for free (the one I am using for this demonstration) and the full version.

Once you start the app you will find a menu with several options. We wil go through the first three of them. The "more option" is only interesting because it includes the instructions!

The chart os the part which reminds us of the British council app. You have the buttons, you can hear the sounds if you tap on the symbols. If you tap and hold you can hear one example.

Let's go now to the practice section. This section is limited in the free version of the app. You can judge for yourself once you download it. The full version is worth the money though. Here you have three options: read, write and listen. In the read section you will be given a phonetic transcription (oh those funny symbols!) and you have to figure out which word it is. In the write section, you are given a word and you have to write it with phonetic symbols. Finally in the listen section, you will hear a word and you will have to write it! Here you have some screenshots for you to get an idea.

Good I did it!

Will I get this one right? Let's check!

Oh this one was pretty easy!

The listening part is probably the most difficult... and sometimes you get surprised. Listen well! There is actually no "b" in "lamb"!

Well, I hope you can all benefit from these tools. I believe they will empower you, whatever your level, to improve your listening and speaking skills. And provided you have a tablet or smartphone, you can use in anywhere (yes, even there). Enjoy!

Google pays for the ride

Here's another post for my students. Today, about how authorities and corporations can collaborate to benefit the community.

And, this is the link to the original article, from a great newspaper, the New York Times (NYT for short!)

http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/02/27/google-pays-for-the-ride/?_php=true&_type=blogs&_r=0

Google, which has been at the center of a controversy in San Francisco over tech company shuttles using public infrastructure, is giving $6.8 million to fund a city transit program.

Shuttle :a transport service between two points. Usually a bus (although spaceships that go to the orbital station are also called shuttles!)

To fund: to provide (give) money for some activity or project.

The program, whose city funding runs out in June, provides monthly bus and streetcar passes to 31,000 low-income San Francisco youths ages 5 to 17. It began last year after the San Francisco school system reduced the use of buses transporting students to and from school. The program gets youths to school, after-school programs and jobs.

To run out: to use completely some resource or supply. "We will run out of petrol, we need to go to a petrol station soon.
Streetcar: a vehicle , between train and bus, that runs on electricity from a cable, usually on rails, on the streets. They are an iconic image of San Francisco.
Low-income: it applies to people whose salaries are low.
Youths: young people.

Mayor Ed Lee’s office called the gift “one of the largest private contributions towards direct City services in San Francisco history.” Google will fund the program for two years.

Towards: in a specific direction. 

Protests against Google began with anti-eviction activists, angered by the increasing gentrification of San Francisco, blocking its commuter shuttles that run down to the valley. The private shuttles use city bus stops to load and unload their passengers, which prompted lots of ire among less privileged residents. A resolution worked out with the city means Google and other tech companies will pay $1 per stop.

Eviction: to make someone leave their house or office because they can't pay it.

To anger: to make someone angry

Gentrification: a process by which an area's population changes and only richer people live in it. (From gentry=aristocracy and/or rich people)

To load: to put something in a place, usually a vehicle or something that moves like an elevator or machine. You can load a truck (BrE: Lorry), a car, a computer. Other connected words are unload (the opposite) and download/upload used to talk about files and the internet.

To prompt : to motivate, to make something happen, to cause something to start. A teleprompter is a machine used on TV by presenters which will show them the text they need to say. 

Ire: extreme anger. 

On Feb. 15, members of Heart of the City interrupted the Wisdom 2.0 conference. As three Google speakers introduced a presentation on “Three Steps to Build Corporate Mindfulness the Google Way,” demonstrators rushed the stage with an “Eviction-Free San Francisco” banner.

Demonstrators: people who walk on the streets to protest against something. This action is called a demonstration.

To rush the stage: to occupy the stage quickly.

Banner: A (usually big) piece of cloth or plastic with a message written on it. Also a very common form of advertising on websites.

“San Francisco residents are rightly frustrated that we don’t pay more to use city bus stops,” said Meghan Casserly, a Google spokeswoman. “So we’ll continue to work with the city on these fees, and in the meantime will fund Muni passes for low-income students for the next two years.”

Rightly (frustrated): you have a solid reason to feel frustrated (or any other feeling).

Fees: amount of money paid for a service.

In the meantime: the period that happens between to points in time, two events. Synonym for "while".

Passes: A card or similar document that allows you to use a service by paying only once a month or once a year. Common for means of transport. 

San Francisco Muni (Municipal) passes. (Photo credits: About.com)

Lyric video: "Happy" by Pharrel Williams

Hello everyone,

This year's Oscar Awards have been, ehrrm... awarded and one of the candidates for best song was Pharrell Wiliams' "Happy" for the film "Despicable me 2". I found it interesting as an excuse to talk about several things:

1) The love of double meanings by English speakers, in this case songwriters.
2) The importance of stopping (or rather, slowing down) at the right places and how it changes meaning.
3) Using "like", that slippery dangerous word.
4) And other stuff, but that will be after you watch the video.

Honestly, I did not look at the song credits, so I don't know if Mr. Williams himself or other people wrote this song, but it is very clever. It is constantly playing with the word like, or more specifically with the expression "feel like" in contrast with feel... like "x".

The first expression as in:

"I feel like going to the cinema today."

Here "feel like" means "I would enjoy/love doing that."

The second expression as in:

"I feel like a rat in a trap."

Here "feel like something" is a comparison. You are not that something but you feel in a similar or equivalent way.

So sentences in the song can be understood as either about what someone wishes for, or the description of their feelings.

"... if you feel like a room without a a roof." (so either you are wishing you had one or your feelings can be compared to a room without a roof).

Going to my second point, we can look at this:

"... if you feel like happiness is the truth." which can be read as:

[if you feel like happiness][is the truth] (meaning: the truth is you feel like happiness, you would like to feel happy, that's what you want.)

Or:

[if you feel] [like happiness is the truth] (meaning: your feeling is equivalent or similar to thinking that happiness is the (only, most important) truth.

The most important thing about these lyrics is how all meanings are perfectly combined in a way that the message is absolutely positive and optimistic, every and any way you look at it.

Ok, so here's the video, finally. An after that, there's more to comment!

What I'm 'bout to say. Recently I was explaining my students how in words like about, the initial sound is the neutral vowel known as "schwa". Thanks Pharrell for helping me by showing how weak that vowel can be, to the point of disappearing in some varieties of colloquial English.

Sunshine she's here. He's playing with us again. Sunshine is a word used in the same way as dear, honey or other endearing terms. So it could be Sunshine! she's here! or a double-subject, nonstandard way of saying "She's here and she is like sunshine for me." 

Like I don't care. colloquial way of saying "as if I don't care".

Clap along. A phrasal verb. What does it mean? If you are familiar with go along, that means to go in parallell with something, as opposed to following someone. So the meaning here is to go along someone or something, and at the same time, clapping your hands. So walk and clap! (Which I think he does at some point in the original music video). Also, when you are doing a music performance, like a concert, if the public claps following the music, they are clapping along!

Give me all you got, don't hold it back. Make an effort, use all your strength. Show me all those bad news, I am not afraid! (Because I am happy...). Don't hold it back, don't keep any bad news for yourself.

Can't nothing bring me down: he is a rap singer! Using inversion for emphasis! (=Nothing can't bring me down).

And finally I leave you with two more versions of the song. Enjoy!