Matthew

Floodbucket strikes again!

What's your point exactly? He shouldn't be teaching Recieved Pronunciation because of the (small) chance these students are going to run into a "heavy Scottish accent" and go ape-shit?

English is an international langauge now, there are more non-native speakers than native speakers, I believe, at this point in time. It makes absolutely no sense NOT to teach the RP which really is at the heart of it..this has nothing to do with somehow being insentive to Scottsman, if that's your vague meaning.

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martyboy

What's your point exactly? He shouldn't be teaching Recieved Pronunciation because of the (small) chance these students are going to run into a "heavy Scottish accent" and go ape-shit?

English is an international langauge now, there are more non-native speakers than native speakers, I believe, at this point in time. It makes absolutely no sense NOT to teach the RP which really is at the heart of it..this has nothing to do with somehow being insentive to Scottsman, if that's your vague meaning. (Quote)

My 'vague' meaning is - doesn't this exercise become academic in view of the vast, and I mean vast, number of foreign learners who now speak with an American accent? Received Pronunciation is a thing of the past as you imply. American vowel and diphthong sounds are very different, often pronouncing the final 'R'. Isn't it at least a potential difficulty for learners. My own case is an example. I know for a fact that the teacher before me has a Scottish accent. Will those young learners look at me in confusion wondering whether I am speaking English? Small point perhaps but it is a point.

Lizara

As an American, is he teaching RP anyway?

It does seem rather academic, but I think it's good to know in case students ask questions about it.

martyboy

Absolutely Lizy. I echo your sentiments. But the huge number of dialects, regional accents etc. does make phonetics problematic.

emjay

there is nothing strictly "academic" about the differences these dipthongs can make to a student's pronunciation... many asian language speakers have difficulty producing both, usually pronouncing only the first vowel in each case...

both thai and chinese speakers often substitute an 'e' for an 'ei', so "cake" sounds like "kek" and "date" like "debt", which can be confusing... and the japanese in particular, along with spanish speakers, tend to produce very short-sounding 'o's in the place of our lovely long 'ou'...

i have found it helpful to point out the dipthong without ever naming it as such and to model them with stretched pronunciations, getting students to repeat the stretch... this is not only beneficial in helping them with these sounds in particular but also with the all-important rhythm of english, which is in great part created by the contrast between short and long and longer sounds...

as to the OP's "I teach pronunciation so I should understand it 100%! I happen to even find studying it interesting", i can only add that ideally this would be the case with every salient aspect of the language for anyone teaching it...

Eric C

I did appreciate the second part of your post where you raised the issue about a wide variety of accents speaking English, but I couldn't get past the "What is the point of all that research?" part that got my hackles up. Even if it is something I will rarely, if ever, use in class there is still value in understanding it. In fact the issue of only hearing one sound in the /əʊ/ and /eɪ/ diphthongs was raised in class and I was not happy about not being able to give the student a good explanation.
Yes, and to answer St. Franny and Cream's question this is the same problem I am having with these 2 particular diphthongs. When I pronounce them I can only hear the first of the 2 vowel sounds in each. The rest of them are pretty straight forward.

I teach the IPA first thing in my pronunciation classes and refer back to it extensively as the class progresses to focus on sounds and sound combinations that are difficult for Thais. Matthew pointed out some of the most problematic ones. It's been an invaluable tool. By about 1/4 way through the class most of the students 'get it' and for the first time begin to understand how they have been taught English pronunciation incorrectly by their Thai teachers from the beginning. It's very rewarding to see that.

Once the students can read the IPA they can use one of the few Thai --> English dictionaries with phonetic English spellings (see the Dictionaries thread in Thai Language and Culture forum) and have a chance of saying a word they have never heard before well enough to be understood the first time. For example, there's no other way for them to know that there's no /g/ sound in 'neighbor' if they've never heard the word pronounced correctly in association with seeing it spelled.

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emjay

i got this from what you said before, but, honestly, i doubt that this is really the case... you hear only 'e' as in "get" when you say "cake"? or you hear yourself saying "go" and it sounds short and sharp like "koh" in "koh chang"?

it's more likely the case that, as Matthew pointed out, your "brain[s] [is] hav[e]ing a hard time disassociating enough with these fundamental symbols to hear them for what they are in a more detailed fashion."

there is a lot of "disassociating" to do in regard to our own "english" if we want to be able to approach students effectively...

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Eric C

That's probably the nail on the head right there, I'm having a very hard time disassociating with these 2 diphthongs.

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"It is anti-pedagogical to expect campesino students to be educated [in a schoolhouse in such poor condition], while government officials drive Mercedes cars. That is what we are fighting against."
--Ernesto "El Che" Guevara (hours before his execution)

"I don't believe that drug addiction is an occupational hazard."
-- Duke Ellington (Playboy's "Narcotics and Jazz Musicians" panel discussion)

peelieorion

Although interesting to understand this, i think the problems that most Thais have with pronounciation are due almost entirely to useless Thai teachers and the stupidity of the English curriculum that doesn't teach kids to read and learn basic letter and blend sounds. Virtually no one in my school has an issue with pronounciation P1-M2 because they wre taught simple phonoics and how to read and blend words.

I think people continue in this country to get het up on pefect English rather than concentrating on getting Thais producing some English. Pronounciation is a problem fixed at source not one to be addressed after the students has spent 15 years making the same errors. How many Thais can still not stay the word like (lie) or rice (ry) These problems need fixing first.

Matthew

Alright, marty, you've got a (small) point!

I'd just say the "huge number" (don't know, really, these days, that it's a huge number that are REALLY THAT divergent...really?) of regional accents could potentially make the TEACHING of phonetics difficult, but not really phonetics itself, or the pronunciation of English as an international language (somewhere basically between the standard US and UK pronunciation plus all kinds of regional, but managable, quirks). Just my sense of it, being a fucking armchair ajarn expert and all....

Just like we were talking about at your place poring over the books...and I ended up yelling in your face trying to MAKE you hear it...hehehe...sorry!

Sounds like your classes are going very well, dude. Nice.

Get the usual stuff covered so you can delve into Ebonics Pronunciation ASAP.

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