English is tough stuff

Paul   Fri Mar 16, 2007 12:34 pm GMT
Hi there
I'd like to ask - anyone who is a native speaker of american english - a favour!!!

I found this poem on the Net and I think it would be really nice to work on it with my students in class. What I would like to ask you, then, is to record yourself reading this text and send it to my mailbox. It'll be great if there were more people interested in providing me with his or her own recording (just to be clear - I AM INTERESTED ONLY IN REAL AMERICAN ACCENT)

thanks in advance
here's my email address: pawel@skamet.com

and here's the poem:
---------------------
Dearest creature in creation,
Study English pronunciation.
I will teach you in my verse
Sounds like corpse, corps, horse, and worse.
I will keep you, Suzy, busy,
Make your head with heat grow dizzy.
Tear in eye, your dress will tear.
So shall I! Oh hear my prayer.

Just compare heart, beard, and heard,
Dies and diet, lord and word,
Sword and sward, retain and Britain.
(Mind the latter, how it's written.)
Now I surely will not plague you
With such words as plaque and ague.
But be careful how you speak:
Say break and steak, but bleak and streak;
Cloven, oven, how and low,
Script, receipt, show, poem, and toe.

Hear me say, devoid of trickery,
Daughter, laughter, and Terpsichore,
Typhoid, measles, topsails, aisles,
Exiles, similes, and reviles;
Scholar, vicar, and cigar,
Solar, mica, war and far;
One, anemone, Balmoral,
Kitchen, lichen, laundry, laurel;
Gertrude, German, wind and mind,
Scene, Melpomene, mankind.

Billet does not rhyme with ballet,
Bouquet, wallet, mallet, chalet.
Blood and flood are not like food,
Nor is mould like should and would.
Viscous, viscount, load and broad,
Toward, to forward, to reward.
And your pronunciation's OK
When you correctly say croquet,
Rounded, wounded, grieve and sieve,
Friend and fiend, alive and live.

Ivy, privy, famous; clamour
And enamour rhyme with hammer.
River, rival, tomb, bomb, comb,
Doll and roll and some and home.
Stranger does not rhyme with anger,
Neither does devour with clangour.
Souls but foul, haunt but aunt,
Font, front, wont, want, grand, and grant,
Shoes, goes, does. Now first say finger,
And then singer, ginger, linger,
Real, zeal, mauve, gauze, gouge and gauge,
Marriage, foliage, mirage, and age.

Query does not rhyme with very,
Nor does fury sound like bury.
Dost, lost, post and doth, cloth, loth.
Job, nob, bosom, transom, oath.
Though the differences seem little,
We say actual but victual.
Refer does not rhyme with deafer.
Feoffer does, and zephyr, heifer.
Mint, pint, senate and sedate;
Dull, bull, and George ate late.
Scenic, Arabic, Pacific,
Science, conscience, scientific.

Liberty, library, heave and heaven,
Rachel, ache, moustache, eleven.
We say hallowed, but allowed,
People, leopard, towed, but vowed.
Mark the differences, moreover,
Between mover, cover, clover;
Leeches, breeches, wise, precise,
Chalice, but police and lice;
Camel, constable, unstable,
Principle, disciple, label.

Petal, panel, and canal,
Wait, surprise, plait, promise, pal.
Worm and storm, chaise, chaos, chair,
Senator, spectator, mayor.
Tour, but our and succour, four.
Gas, alas, and Arkansas.
Sea, idea, Korea, area,
Psalm, Maria, but malaria.
Youth, south, southern, cleanse and clean.
Doctrine, turpentine, marine.

Compare alien with Italian,
Dandelion and battalion.
Sally with ally, yea, ye,
Eye, I, ay, aye, whey, and key.
Say aver, but ever, fever,
Neither, leisure, skein, deceiver.
Heron, granary, canary.
Crevice and device and aerie.

Face, but preface, not efface.
Phlegm, phlegmatic, ass, glass, bass.
Large, but target, gin, give, verging,
Ought, out, joust and scour, scourging.
Ear, but earn and wear and tear
Do not rhyme with here but ere.
Seven is right, but so is even,
Hyphen, roughen, nephew Stephen,
Monkey, donkey, Turk and jerk,
Ask, grasp, wasp, and cork and work.

Pronunciation -- think of Psyche!
Is a paling stout and spikey?
Won't it make you lose your wits,
Writing groats and saying grits?
It's a dark abyss or tunnel:
Strewn with stones, stowed, solace, gunwale,
Islington and Isle of Wight,
Housewife, verdict and indict.

Finally, which rhymes with enough --
Though, through, plough, or dough, or cough?
Hiccough has the sound of cup.
My advice is to give up!!!
-------------------------
Paul   Fri Mar 16, 2007 5:29 pm GMT
I hope there will be at least ONE person to help me with it ?! )
I would really appreciate that
Uriel   Sat Mar 17, 2007 4:05 am GMT
That was cute. Unfortunately I don't have access to a microphone. (And gosh, apparently I've been saying "aerie" all wrong all these years!)
Dude Who Knows   Sat Mar 17, 2007 5:41 am GMT
Why do you want Americans to read the poem? It seems designed with British English in mind. Anyway, I don't have a microphone either, but if I come across one I will go ahead and record my voice.
Guest   Sat Mar 17, 2007 1:52 pm GMT
maybe his or her students are learning American English. They want to be exposed to an American accent ....it would not take too much time to record it and upload it on the net if one is willing to do that.
Paul   Sat Mar 17, 2007 10:25 pm GMT
that is correct - this is for students of American english.
Roger   Mon Mar 19, 2007 8:49 am GMT
Pawel,

Just out of curiosity, did you get any feedback? If so, could I get those samples from you? It's such a lovely poem. I'm interested in American accent, as well.

You can write to me at: pawelnowak11@wp.pl

Roger
Paul   Tue Mar 20, 2007 3:36 pm GMT
Unfortunately, no one has helped me yet ... but there is still some hope that someone will :)
Guest   Tue Mar 20, 2007 4:04 pm GMT
it's nice ! I would also like have it in audio form so mayvbe someone could record it and paste a link here so that everyone could get this
myself   Tue Mar 20, 2007 4:28 pm GMT
Hi Paul,

Great this poem. I want to work on it. It will take time but the result will be nice, with a bit of a hint of US accent of course.

It will be great. Thanks again.

Cheers. Myself.
adriano   Tue Mar 20, 2007 8:54 pm GMT
i join the request
Roger   Wed Mar 21, 2007 9:10 am GMT
Paul,

This may take some time to get someone in here with his voice sample. Your poem is really nice. Your students will get a good stuff to work on.

Roger

P.S. Hope you don't mind me asking this, but I'm just curious to learn about where you live. Is this Poland? Am I right?
Paul   Thu Mar 22, 2007 9:10 am GMT
that is correct Roger :)
Roger   Fri Mar 23, 2007 12:06 pm GMT
Paul,

Nice to hear from you. So, I was correctly guessing your origins. My next guess is that we both share the same name [in Polish]. It happens that just like you I live in Poland [Warsaw]. I love American accent, and put a great effort in improving it. I’m just wondering about your ways of improving American pronunciation. Would it bother you if I asked you to share some of your experience? I may say a little bit about my own, in return. What do you think?

Hope that “Myself” will make his appearance soon.

Roger
Paul=Paweł   Fri Mar 23, 2007 6:25 pm GMT
I gotta say, you are good at this guessing ;)

Although I was always aware of those "sound" differences between british and american accents, I have just recently began paying attention to my own way of speaking and pronauncing certain words. phrases and sentences. I wish I had started applying the things I know now much earlier -when I was still in my teens. That is why, mastering a good american (or any other) accent at my age isn't quite possible, though I should admit that I do not have any sort of complexes :) (at least they are not overwhelming). I believe that the fact that I listened to many american bands in my teenage years (even though I did not understand what they sang) contribiuted to my not-so-bad accent to some extent.
Now, as I am actually working on improving it, I listen to some of my most favored songs and read lyrics along with the tracks. But I wouldn't say every single band/song is appropriate for this purpose.
I work with dictionary a lot - transcribing every single new word I get to know, plus virtually every words I already knew. This is quite tyring and demands from "you" extra effort to remember extra information (by which i mean those signs) but this really pays off.
If only I can spare some time, I watch the FRIENDS series. I ain't so sure if this is THE best way of working on your accent, but surely it gives you something - you can watch them speak (so you observe) and you can stick to your favorite actor and try imitating his or her way of speaking. Generally, watching american stuff of any kind is good. Unfortunately, I don't have much time for that.

There are those programs to work with. I am sure you know some instances of this kind. I am "working" (this may be way to big a word for that :) ) with two tools ... "Improve your american english accent" by Charlsie Childs and American english pronunciation - it's no good unless you're understood" - unfortunately, the second one only during classes and I don't have cds of my own (I couldn;t find them on the net either :) )

well, that's pretty much what I do for improving my accent - it may seem like a lot, but it's not. At least I feel like I don;t spend enough time on this. But this is due to other activities, which take up all of my time.

ok, hit me back
Paweł