Do you understand me?

fruity   Mon Feb 16, 2009 1:03 am GMT
Since I'm a nearly deaf person and English isn't my native language. I'm just trying my best.

I'll tell more about it later. I just want to know if I would be understandable for the native English speaking people if I'd go to such a country.

Even in my own native language I may sound a bit weird because of my bad hearing.. Just saying with this, every word I hear sounds very different to me than to 'normal' people.

http://www4.zippyshare.com/v/31092672/file.html

The part I read:



"""""What about language learning?

Now let's take a look at language learning. It's obvious that learning a language is not an "unknown" area like research or marketing. No one is asking learners to invent anything (indeed, they should not invent their own grammar and vocabulary) — they just need to do things exactly the way the native speakers do it.

Language learning is not like learning to swim, either. In swimming, you can remember very well how your coach moves his arms, but still be unable to re-create that motion. Knowing the right way is not enough. You need to train your muscles to react in a certain way, which is a long, error-prone process. First you make a lot of mistakes, then fewer and fewer, until you are error-free.
Copying and transforming sentences is an easy job for the brain.

By contrast, in languages, knowing the right way is enough. If you can remember and understand a sentence in a foreign language, you can repeat it without any mistakes. If you remember two correct sentences, you can transform and combine them into another correct sentence. There is little room for mistakes.

Now of course things are a bit more complicated than that:

* If you are just beginning to write or speak in a foreign language, it will perhaps take you 30 seconds to produce each sentence (you will make a lot of edits or, if you're speaking, you will stutter and start over). That's because it can take a long time to recall things, especially if they are not in your "active memory". But even if you're slow, your sentence can be error-free or almost error-free if you are careful.
*

As noted before, the key to producing correct sentences is remembering correct examples. To build your own sentences in a foreign language, you need thousands of words, hundreds of grammatical structures and dozens of idioms. Furthermore, you must know which words are used in what contexts. For example, end can mean stop (e.g. We must end the project), but you cannot say I have decided to end seeing her (you must say: I have decided to stop seeing her).

There are thousands of "exceptions" like that in any language. So, although there is only a short way between theory and practice, the theory is huge. However — and this is crucial — the theory can be acquired without producing mistakes (by reading and listening).""""
Estel   Mon Feb 16, 2009 1:53 am GMT
Understandable most of the time. But there are certain parts where it gets a little hard to understand.
Another Guest   Tue Feb 17, 2009 7:35 am GMT
There were definitely times where it just sounded like unintelligible muttering. One example is "not an 'unknown' area like research or marketing". Some observations:

1. “Not” seems to be pronounced as “nuh”, both dropping the “t” at the end and using a different vowel.

2. The whole point of saying "an" instead of "a" is to keep it from running into the next word. You're supposed to pause between "an" and the next word (the same goes for "a").

3. In fact, in general, you could use more pauses. Pausing too much is better than not pausing enough. The entire phrase “not an unknown area” takes you less than two seconds to say, which is WAAAY too little time for your listener to process what you're saying. I'd recommend slightly less than a second for stressed syllables, and about half a second for unstressed.

4. Also, you pronounced "an" as having the same vowel as the beginning of "unknown". I suppose this is a subtle point even for hearing and native speakers, but "an" can have different pronunciations, and usually one is chosen so as to not have the same vowel sounds as the next word. It's especially bad here, where the first consonant is an “n”, the same as in “an”. An example of an even more advanced issue is when you say “a motion” and pronounce “a” as “uh”. Some people pronounce “emotion”: as “uhmotion”, so that creates ambiguity (hopefully I'm not intimidating you with all these considerations).

5. You need to work on distinguishing between “r” and “w”.

6. “Area” comes out completely mangled.

7. “Marketing” comes out like “mauxing”. You've changed some consonants and lost one syllable completely.

8. You often don't pronounce the “g” in “ing” words.

Hope I didn't scare you with all these criticisms!
fruity   Tue Feb 17, 2009 8:03 am GMT
Thanks for your comments :).

"1. “Not” seems to be pronounced as “nuh”, both dropping the “t” at the end and using a different vowel.
I guess that's because I don't want to say the 't' too harsh as how is in my own language. In my own dialect the 't' oftenly looks like a 'd' especially if other words are coming after it. Will have a look at this issue.

"2. The whole point of saying "an" instead of "a" is to keep it from running into the next word. You're supposed to pause between "an" and the next word (the same goes for "a")."

Simply a part of number 3, in fact speaking too quickly.

"4. Also, you pronounced "an" as having the same vowel as the beginning of "unknown". I suppose this is a subtle point even for hearing and native speakers, but "an" can have different pronunciations, and usually one is chosen so as to not have the same vowel sounds as the next word. It's especially bad here, where the first consonant is an “n”, the same as in “an”. An example of an even more advanced issue is when you say “a motion” and pronounce “a” as “uh”. Some people pronounce “emotion”: as “uhmotion”, so that creates ambiguity (hopefully I'm not intimidating you with all these considerations)."
Hmm weird if I say them myself, in unknown it sounds more like 'uh' than 'an' does. But maybe that's some thing in my hearing that those two can come differently to me or so.. WIll have a look at it for sure.

"5. You need to work on distinguishing between “r” and “w”. "
In my native language the 'r' is a problem as well, I say it like a French 'r' as in 'rouge'. And if I look at the lips of someone speaking English it looked like he was using a 'w'-like something to me. Not sure yet how to change this. :(

"6. “Area” comes out completely mangled. " Because of pint 6, or both point 6 and 3?

"7. “Marketing” comes out like “mauxing”. You've changed some consonants and lost one syllable completely. "
Spoken too quickly I think :). I know it's 3 syllables.

"8. You often don't pronounce the “g” in “ing” words. "
Hmm, I try to say it the same as in my language which means 'ng' are one nasal sound.. I'll have a look at it if it's spoken differently and how in English.
Anton   Tue Feb 17, 2009 11:22 am GMT
Mostly, quite understandable, but why are you in such a hurry? Try to speak a little bit slower.
Native speaker of RP   Tue Feb 17, 2009 4:12 pm GMT
fruity,

Very impressive! To be honest I found your pronunciation better than most non-native speakers. You have a talent for it.

Now and again there were a couple of words I didn't quite catch because they didn't sound clear (I think it was because of your hearing problem), but I would say your overall pronunciation is excellent. As others have mentioned, keep the pace nice and calm, remember all the consonants e.g. the first time your said "enough" you forgot the "f" of the gh, but the next time you said it perfectly.

Without having read the text, I understood 90-95% of your recording.

Well done, I'm impressed. What's your native language?
fruity   Tue Feb 17, 2009 11:33 pm GMT
"What's your native language? "

I'd say, what do you think? :)
Native speaker of RP   Wed Feb 18, 2009 12:41 am GMT
You didn't really sound foreign to me, so I'd guess something close like Welsh (so grew up with exposure to some English), Scots, Dutch, Danish/Swedish/Norwegian?

Maybe you mean sign language = 1, English = 2? That's my bet.
fruity   Wed Feb 18, 2009 2:13 pm GMT
I'm Dutch...

About my hearing, I got a hearing loss of 60dB around 1000-3000Hz. I have a lot of trouble hearing consonants. Especially the 'f' is a problem in Dutch.

About the 'r', I'm really interested how to do it then.. Seriously, I've had (Dutch) logopaedics when I were a child. And they couldn't get the 'g' and 'r' right. I've solved the 'g' myself, but the 'r' is a problem that remains. So at the moment my 'r' in Dutch is like a French 'r' instead of a 'rolling' one.

So, what's a good way to pronounce the English 'r' in 'great' or 'red'?
Native speaker of RP   Wed Feb 18, 2009 4:42 pm GMT
So you're Dutch, ok.

"f" as I expect you know, is when you put your top front teeth against your lower lip and breath out quickly. I don't think it's voiced until the following letter such as "i" in "fifty"

English "r" is difficult for a lot of non-natives. It's not exactly like a "w" because in "r" we don't bring the lips together like we do for "w". To say "r" I put my top teeth between my lower teeth and inner lip, then lift them up quickly, opening my mouth and voicing at the same time.

By the way, in English we usually call logopaedics "speech therapy."
fruity   Thu Feb 19, 2009 12:02 am GMT
Thanks, I think I get the 'r' now a bit. It always seemed to me the lips were getting close so the sound would go towards a 'w'.

About the consonants, well most of them are not a problem to say, but to hear all that kind of consonants are a problem, just to name a few:
b, d, f, j, v.

When I take out my hearing aids I can't hear any difference between bet, vet and jet for example. I'm lucky if I can hear them already. Still with hearing aids I'm not able to listen to someone speaking a foreign language without seeing his lips, and even in Dutch it's difficult for me. I hate calling someone on the phone or listening to the news on a radio.

Just one more question,

The words 'rare' and 'area' both have the same sounds before the 'r'. (Second 'r' in rare). How to make this happen?
For area I think I'm able to do it, but rare?

First r is no problem, but the second one? And to keep it one syllable? Or should I move my mouth in a physical impossible way? :)
Native speaker of RP   Thu Feb 19, 2009 6:39 pm GMT
Hi fruity,

I'm not a speech therapist, so please don't think I'm giving you professionally trained advice. I'm doing this by analysing my own speech. _________________________________

fruity wrote:
"Thanks, I think I get the 'r' now a bit. It always seemed to me the lips were getting close so the sound would go towards a 'w'."


me:
Yes, the lips do get close to each other because the lower jaw goes up so that you can get your upper teeth between the lower teeth and inner lower lip BUT the lips don't touch like they do in "w". "w" is a lip movement, "r" is more a jaw movement.

------------------

fruity wrote:
"When I take out my hearing aids I can't hear any difference between bet, vet and jet for example".


me:
"b" is made by closing your lips and opening them while voicing.
"v" is made by putting your upper teeth on your lower lip and then pulling your lower lip out/teeth back into your mouth while voicing.
"j" is hard to explain: the tip of the tongue goes to the roof of your mouth, the lower jaw is quite high so the tongue is also in contact with the lower mouth. When you release the pressure, you voice.

--------------------------

fruity wrote:
The words 'rare' and 'area' both have the same sounds before the 'r'. (Second 'r' in rare). How to make this happen?
For area I think I'm able to do it, but rare?
First r is no problem, but the second one? And to keep it one syllable? Or should I move my mouth in a physical impossible way? :)



me:
I speak a non-rhotic version of English. Non-rhotic means we don't always pronounce "r" even when it's in the spelling. For example "poor" and "paw" sound the same in London, but in rhotic accents (for example in most of the US) they pronounce "poor" with an "r" sound. That means that in RP (the standard English of southern England) we don't pronounce the second "r" of 'rare'. We say it like "raya" (so like "air" with an "r" at the beginning).

In answer to your other question about 'rare', yes you can certainly pronounce it as one syllable. That's how a lot of native speakers say it including me. So, luckily there's no need to move your mouth in a physically impossible way :-)
fruity   Fri Feb 20, 2009 12:11 am GMT
Native speaker of RP:
"b" is made by closing your lips and opening them while voicing.
"v" is made by putting your upper teeth on your lower lip and then pulling your lower lip out/teeth back into your mouth while voicing.
"j" is hard to explain: the tip of the tongue goes to the roof of your mouth, the lower jaw is quite high so the tongue is also in contact with the lower mouth. When you release the pressure, you voice.
---------------------------------------------------

I know how to use them, but I can't hear the difference between them without hearing aids, and most of them are the same like here. Just the j is a bit different, you make a kind of a 'dzj' sound before compared to us. Don't know how to say it..

I just gave that info to let you know how bad my hearing is. With hearing aids I hear the differences, but consonants remain a problem, and sounds always come distorted to me, because the damage is in the cochlea.


Thanks for the information on 'r'. I'll have a look at it the coming days. :)
Native speaker of RP   Sat Feb 21, 2009 11:08 am GMT
"j" and "g" are often very similar: "general"; "jab". (The "g" can also be completely different though: "get" )

It's the first version you're talking about, and yes, it's like "dzj". It's sort of like a voiced "ch". Can you say 'ch' as in "chips" or "chat"? Voice that, then you'll have "j"

The info on your hearing is interesting, but it's really hard for me to imagine not hearing certain sounds because my own hearing is normal. It must make listening/understanding and speaking really difficult, but despite that your recording was good, so you're going about it the right way.
Miami   Thu Feb 26, 2009 7:43 am GMT
I had a very hard time understanding you ><" But, even though it was hard to understand and hear, it was comprehendable...(spelling?)