How do you make an accent sound authentic? Yes, there’s pronunciation work: for the Standard American accent, it’s about getting the TH’s and getting the r-coloring on the vowels in er, or, air. And then there’s the “music”, or prosody: the timing, the ups and downs of the speech melody (intonation), and the interplay of stress and non-stress […]
After almost 20 years in the accent business, my favorite challenge is meeting a new client who wants accent reduction training but does not sound like a non-native speaker. In these cases, I have to listen for a couple minutes to get past what seems like a bona fide “American” accent. I think the prize […]
Greetings from NYC in this wild and challenging time! I feel fortunate to have myself and AccentsOff featured as a “Best E-Learning Company” in DataBird Business Journal. My team of instructors and I are keeping busy both on (and off) the webcam: accent coaching sessions, wedding plans, babies being born! We’re enjoying seeing our students […]
If you are a foreign-born English speaker with grammar challenges, read on. This particular issue comes up with some of our accent reduction students. In this picture, who is “boring” and who is “bored”? During a conversation with an American accent client, if I hear “I was so exciting…”, I immediately get suspicious, realizing they […]
An accent, whether foreign or regional, can be described as a package of substitutions. Non-native speakers who have an accent substitute features of their original language’s accent for features of their secondary language. An accent can be described by variations in pronunciation, intonation and rhythm patterns, resonance, “vibe”, and general vocal tract physicality. Add to […]
Summer is never easy – as the non-stop parties and sunny picnics and fun outdoor events keep us from getting any decent work done. So… in honor of AccentsOff’s 8th year anniversary (yet another reason to throw a party 🙃 ), we are NOT writing an August blog post. Instead – I want to share […]
For all you devotees of speech, accent, and voice out there, please enjoy this guest blog post written by the brilliant Tim Urban of the website Wait But Why. It’s all about SOUND and I learned a lot from reading it. Enjoy and share! Everything You Should Know About Sound
Why do so many letter S’s in the American English accent sound like Z’s? Take: “poison” (POY-zin), “is” (izz), “bugs” (bugz). It’s frustrating for non-English speakers. I had a Columbian client once who said “My sister has a great American accent and she’s always going Z-Z-Z-Z. Now I know why!” Fortunately, there are a few […]
I recently was on a phone call with a prospective new client. I spent a solid 10 to 15 minutes of that call trying to get his email address. He had an unusually heavy accent and his email address was long and complicated. In the end, I gave him mine, and we were finally able […]
Working with students from every corner of the world, I have come to recognize the various linguistic challenges my students face depending on their language backgrounds. For each accent, there are dozens of things to talk about, from pronunciation of individual sounds, to oral posture, to intonation and rhythm, etc; but a few salient features for […]