Learn English: How To Speak Better English (Words):

© Harish Jharia

Usually, we become a bit conscious while speaking English. The main reason is that it is not our mother tongue and we had learnt it rather than just picking it up stage-by-stage right from our infancy like our mother tongue. Our mother tongue merges with our nature and becomes a natural instinct for thinking, writing and speaking.

First Step to Speaking English (Words)

For speaking English we should think also in English, rather than, thinking in our mother tongue and then speaking in English. Thus, we divert our mind from our speech that would result in many mistakes.

Let us know the basic catchwords of English speaking. Most of us do not know the difference between pronunciation and accent. Let us have clear concept of these basic requirements for English speaking. They are as follows:

1. Pronunciation
2. Accent

Pronunciation :

Speaking words with specific sounds may be called ‘Pronunciation’. Utterance is also a synonym for pronunciation. Your pronunciation should be right for a right speech.

Examples: Look how pronunciation changes:

1. ‘hop’ & ‘hope’
2. ‘save’ & ‘shave’
3. ‘dose’ & ‘does’
4. ‘advice’ & ‘advise’

Accent :

Style of pronunciation may be called ‘Accent’. Speaking any word by breaking it and stressing at any latter is called accent. Pronouncing with an accent is in fact speaking by giving prominence, stress or pitch to a part of word spoken in a single flow.

Examples:

1. Excreta = ek-‘skree’-ta
2. Expedient = eks-‘pee’-dee-ent
3. Environment = en-‘vire’-on-ment

(-) stands for break
(‘aaa’) stands for stress / pitch

It is just like percussion beats and pitch that are used with musical notes to make it a complete musical piece.

There are slightly different pronunciations and accents used in different countries for a single word because, they depend on the dialects spoken in those particular parts.

The number ‘8’ is pronounced differently in different countries like in Australia they pronounce it like ’…aight’ and not ‘…eight’ as pronounced in other countries.

We must remember that we In India have adapted ‘UK English’ for studying in our academics and working in offices. Nevertheless, we come across ‘US English’ while watching Hollywood films and working on computers and internet. In spite of all this fuss, we should not try copying the English speaking styles from different parts of the world.

We should follow the pronunciations and accents of English that we have learnt from our primary schools and kept improving as we elevated ourselves until our university levels

27 Mar 2009

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Read more articles on similar subject: Click on the following links
Discover Life: Speaking English- 1  
Discover Life: Speaking English- 2  
Discover Life: First Step to Speaking English (Words)  
Discover Life: Second Step to Speaking English (Sentences)  
Discover Life: Speaking English (Speech)  
Discover Life: Speaking English (Practice)
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