How to pronounce the English Vowels Using Body Gestures | The Live English Show

Hey, everyone.

Welcome to the live English show. Every time I say it, I want to giggle a little bit. Bring it on. Waiting for you. Hey, Mary is here. Hi, Mary Fatma is here. Marcella Sumit, let me hear you. Have a good time. Okay, so it's so good to have you all. I'm gonna turn it down just a.

Bit.

Keeping the music on because I feel the funk. Ya. And I'm having a good time. I might change the song, I promise. Okay.

Yeah.

Jorge, how are you doing? I'm so, so happy to have you all here again. And I'm extremely excited because today. We have such a special guest and I'm going to introduce her in a sec. If you don't know her yet, you should because she was on my channel before and this is why she's going to be joining us again because you asked for it. She's not here yet, but she'll join us soon because I'm going to have today Samara Bay. Samara Bay is a French. She's a Hollywood dialect coach and the podcast host of the Permission to Speak podcast, one of my ultimate favorite podcasts. And if you don't know it yet, then go ahead and check it out and subscribe because it really does talk about how we show up with who we are with our voice and how we speak in front of people in a way that we feel like ourselves and authentic and like we deserve to be there. And it's not only for non native speakers, but this conversation is so important in particular for non native speakers because sometimes we feel like we don't belong because we don't speak the same language or we don't have the skill and the control that native speakers have. And it's so important to understand that at the end of the day, it's not about your English and it's not about the mistakes and it's not about the pronunciation. It's how you show up and what you have to give to the other person and just simply being present, listening, participating, communicating, because that's what matters, really. Like just at the end of the day, it's just about communication. So you will learn so much simply by listening to the podcast episodes there. So I highly recommend that you subscribe now before we bring her on, I want to tell you what this session is going to be all about. And I also want to hear from you a little bit what you'd like to learn and know. So I'm going to say hi to Estela from Argentina and Phil, first time here. Hi, Phil. Welcome. And Mara, my love, such a pleasure seeing you here. Alejandro, Hello. From Venezuela. Mexico. But living in the US Such a cosmopolitan crowd. Okay. And Mary is really happy, actually, Mary, I remember our conversation while watching her interview. We interacted in the chat, and. And I remember that you really, really liked it. So I think you're going to love this session. And Michael from Georgia is here as well. So. Hi, Michael. Now what. Would you. Let me ask you this when it comes to pronunciation. Okay, before we even begin, because today's session is all about pronunciation of vowels and in particular, like the conversation about pronunciation. And Samara is going to teach us a very unique technique of us teaching the vowels of English through body gestures. So this is something that I think you are all going to love so much. And I think she is about to.

Join us in a sec.

But before we bring her on, I want to ask you guys, what is your biggest struggle when it comes to pronunciation in particular, for those of you who have done a little bit of work and you've been watching videos on YouTube, maybe you've taken a class or two, or what is your biggest struggle when it comes to pronunciation of vowels? Okay. What is confusing to you? What is your biggest challenge? What do you love about it? So I'm waiting to hear from you, and I'm going to say hi to Jonathan that says transitions are really hard for me. Okay. Transitions. And I'm assuming the transitions. When you talk about transitions, you are talking about transitions between consonants, because that's a bigger challenge than transitioning between vowels.

So.

Okay, good. So we might address that as well. What else? Let me know. So fast worm versus warm, bed versus bad. Okay. Leandra is saying, so we have to. The confusing vowel pairs. Right? Like being able to distinguish between vowel pairs that you don't have in your native language. Okay, great. And Andrew says to make it automatic. So that means to be able to use it spontaneously, probably, if I'm understanding what you're saying to like, okay, you know how to say it. You know how to pronounce it.

Now how.

How can you use it freely without thinking about it and to use it consistently in a way that you sound clear. Okay. Juliet says vowels still.

Juliet.

Hi, Juliet. Good to see you. And let's see what else? Linking. Okay, so, okay. Using them spontaneously. T when the T becomes a flap. T. Okay, so that's a consonant. Good. We're getting some good stuff here.

And.

I find pronunciation tiring for my jaw. Okay, so we have a lot of stuff to talk about today. Okay, so why Wait any longer because I think we have a lot of work to do today. I'm going to bring on my dear friend Samora bae.

Woo.

Wait, I need to use my. I need to do this because then we'll hear an echo. How are you doing?

Ah. Should I do it too?

No, but I can't hear you. Okay. No, I'm good. That's it? You're good?

Okay. But we do have a little delay.

A little. We do.

I mean, we are on literally opposite sides of the world.

So that's the reason, probably. No, I think it's getting better. Or it will just cancel the whole thing. I mean, there are 300 people watching, so we'll just. Okay, guys, sorry.

No, no, I'm kidding. Also, my light stopped working today, so I'm trying to. I mean, I'm trying to get enough light. It's coming very much hot from the side. But, you know, as long as people can, like, see me and hear me, even if it's not a delay.

Perfect.

Yeah.

No, no, I think it's better now. The delay, I think. Guys, is it better? Let us know in the comments. Okay. We get a lot of welcoming messages here. Welcome, Samara. I've been listening to some.

Okay.

Juliet says that she's been listening to your podcasts. So, Juliet, what is the biggest takeaway that you have had from one of Samara's podcast episodes? Let us know in the comments. So people are. So people get to know. Get to know what she talks about. Okay. And how are you doing today? It's morning for you. How was your morning?

Morning. It's morning. I'm good. I. I'm awake. I got some coffee in me. I. The light thing was like, you know, an annoying snafu, as they say. I don't know if anybody knows nafu. It's an acronym for Situation normal all effed up. Although I heard that maybe I shouldn't be swearing on YouTube, so I'm not saying the F word.

You can do whatever you want on my channel. It's okay.

Thank you. Just, no one.

YouTube is not gonna present it to anyone because it's just going to take it off the algorithm. But it's okay. I don't care.

Well, thank you for giving me permission with, like, a major cave.

But no. Okay, so the light is good.

Caught the end of your introduction, but I definitely. I'm thrilled to get lots of questions. You know, I want to make sure that I give you guys today the sort of the generic, general way that I introduce all of the Vowel sounds, the pure vowel sounds of American English or of English, but also, like, you know, when I'm working with a one on one client, obviously I tailor it to them and answer their questions, and it's an interaction. So as much as this can be, I'm happy to do that.

And fantastic. So everyone who has a question, you can write it in the chat box. I'll try to collect them throughout the conversation. But if we don't answer it, feel free to post it again because sometimes you just get lost in the feed. That's one thing I wanted to say. And also, Samara, would you just introduce yourself to those who don't know you and just stumbled upon this broadcast?

Hi, everybody. My name is Samara Bay. As it says, I'm in Los Angeles, California, technically. Oh, my God, look at that. There's a chiro. I know, right? I have a podcast called Permission to Speak Pod, which you can find on any, you know, podcast platform. I am a dialect coach for television and film. So something I just did that's getting quite a lot of attention is Eurovision. So I called Rachel McAdam as well as Pierce Brosnan for the Eurovision Netflix movie, which I just saw that she did a interview on Good Morning America, and they asked about the accent, and she said that she worked with an incredible dialect coach named Samara Bay. I was like, ooh, you get a shout out. That's amazing to actually, you know, because it's. It's a little bit of a behind the scenes thing, but so, yeah.

And you worked with her on an Icelandic accent, right?

I did indeed. I did indeed.

Okay.

I wonder. Okay, so if anyone watching this who is originally from Iceland and has or have watched the.

Yes.

The show, then, like, let us know in the comments. What do you think?

And. And for anybody who's Icelandic watching, I would be happy to say that we ended up doing a very, very gentle version of the accent because Hollywood. So there's a gradation, right? Of course, there's like a stronger accent and somebody who's traveled more accent. And we ended up with, you know, something that Netflix approved. I work for producers. Like, it's a very funny job. So, yes, when I'm working with actors, obviously there's a one on one element. There's sometimes a being on set element where I'm just listening in to every take and if they're acting brilliantly but a little sound is off, I have to decide, is it worth going in and, you know, messing up the performance in between takes, or is it not? Can we fix it in post. I mean, you know, the Hollywood of it is all kind of delightful but subtle and weird and less about what, you know, you guys are probably here for, which is that the other thing I do is I work one on one with actors and one on one with non actors, either specifically on accent work or on what it is to speak publicly, regardless of accent work. And the last time Hadar and I spoke together, we spent a lot of time in that final category because the reality is whether English is your second language or not. And I can really say with authority, because I work with a lot of English as a first language Americans, regardless what it is to open our mouths and show up authentically as ourselves is a challenge in the modern world. And we get to sort of live in that challenge and as I say, give everybody a sense of permission to speak.

Thank you. And I, you know, I'm just like halfway into listening to the previous to your recent episode, which I highly recommend with Vivgrasko, and one of my favorite parts about it, I think I told you, first of all, like, this. There were a lot of interactions, really interesting interactions that kind of like, because Viv is. She's British, right?

And s' more is from the episode just dropped for anybody who's watching this in real time. Just dropped yesterday, Wednesday. And she's. She's a British writer and comedian and podcast host. So sort of like a podcast on podcast situation. But she has this podcast called how to Own the Room, which is, you know, a different. It's a metaphor, but it's a different way of talking about the exact same stuff that I'm talking about, which really is, what is it to open your mouth when you have to speak and share something that feels, you know, powerful enough that people listen to you? And so, yeah, we had a lot of.

And like, what was interesting is like, how you. How you both redefine public speaking, right? Like, how it's not what we perceive to be as like, okay, now let's learn public speaking. And she had, like, that negative approach to it, which I think.

I don't know how to say what I do. Because public speaking people have a lot of associations with, I think, which is basically like, we think of learning how to hold your hands. Maybe we learn, like, lower is better. Speak slowly, pace. Right? These, like, rules, rules which come down from on high and are made to make us all feel like we should be playing at some generic, powerful version of our sound. And of course, I'm here to say literally all the opposite of that. So, yes. She and I both were like, it's about speaking when you're being seen. So in a way, that's speaking in public or public speaking. But there's like, a missing term, because I think she and I both are dancing in this relatively new space of saying how we are perceived and how we perceive others. And all of this is sort of a social justice issue. And we can't just keep saying we want power to look and sound different and we want leadership to look and sound different without thinking about what our responsibility is there.

Absolutely. And I think that reflects a lot when we talk about speaking English as a second language, because it really is, you know, so public speaking. So we assume proper English would be the relevant, you know, the equal conversation here that, like, what we perceive to be as proper English. Right. Like, with a certain dialect, with a certain sound to it, voice quality. And we always tried to do that because we were taught that this is what we need to do to sound good, proper. Like, that's how you speak in public. Public being, you know, speaking English. And at the end of the day, if we try to take that paradigm that you have talked about and we apply it onto speaking English as a second language, I think showing up as yourself, like, being as, you know, feeling as comfortable as possible in that space, I think it's pretty much the same thing. Right. So it's not about assuming ideas of how you need to sound, but, like, trying to understand how you bring yourself to the situation, to the conversation, and staying authentic.

Sorry. Yeah. A huge amount of the themes of this podcast end up being. And the conversations you and I have end up being about how we sort of speak, scale up our favorite, most comfortable versions of ourselves. And look, not every room can handle that. And we are all, you know, human beings, like, picking up all kinds of messages when we get to the space. So I want to really honor that. But also, some of us turn off those sensors and just assume no one can handle the real me. And so, you know, I'm always. I'm always helping people give themselves permission to speak in such a cheesy language.

And at the same time. At the same time, to give yourself permission to speak, you have to have. And this is why I'm kind of like, leading into what we're here for. It's like, you want to have the best tools to know that you have the power to know what you need to do. Right. And this is why we learn pronunciation. This is why we need to understand how English is spoken. Because at the End of the day, you do want to succeed in it. You want to sound clear, and you don't want to live in this vague space of it's coming out of my mouth. I know it shouldn't sound like that, but I have no idea what to do, because that gap or that confusion is really what affects your confidence and, you know, how you show up. So I think that this is where pronunciation work starts, because a lot of people tell me, okay, so you talk all about it's okay to have an accent at the same time, your pronunciation and accent coach, how does that go together? And I say, like, it goes together because you have to have all the tools. And then you pick and choose, you know, from, you know, whatever you're given.

Exactly. I was just talking to a client about the idea of being intentional. Like, it's okay to get the sounds wrong, but to do it in a. It's okay. Obviously, it's okay to get the sounds and wrong obviously has quotes in it, but, you know, to speak with an accent and. But the hiding part is what, more than the sounds, determines whether or not you're really connecting with another person. And so when we're being intentional, when we're using our articulators to make a sound, even if it's a little bit off from general American, that is so much stronger than getting a sound pretty right or wrong. But hiding, kind of having, like, a mighty sort of melody where you're like, notices that I'm not a native speaker, right? Which is totally like that. That instinct behind is completely understandable. But I think part of, like, Hadar's admire, like, mission is to say, like, what happens when you. When you show up and how can we help you, you know, get there, right?

And we. If we need to translate what you're saying into something tangible, I would say that Haidae is really, at the end. At the end of the day, your voice, the level of your voice, right? Like, whether you can, like, stifle it or. And speak so low that no one can hear or understand. And we also talked about pitch, like, how expensive expressive you are. How much freedom do you give yourself speaking, emphasizing the words that you want to emphasize and, you know, even with the fear of, you might, you know, emphasize the wrong word. But still, you are putting yourself out there, getting uncomfortable. And. But while doing it. While doing it, we want. Our job is to give you the best tools to do that successfully. So you're like, you have the guts to do it because you know that at least you have that Knowledge. And this is why, what we're going to do. So tell us about this technique and what you're going to teach us today.

Okay, so there is a teacher in New York City named Kate Wilson. She's at Juilliard, which is a very prestigious acting school that, I don't know, famous people went to.

And.

I worked with her almost 20 years ago. I was right out of college. I was like. And she taught this. She taught what I'm gonna teach you guys a version of it. And it made so much sense because I had already had a little exposure to ipa, the International Phonetic Alphabet, and I kind of was already, you know, intrigued by this career path, although I hadn't chosen it yet for myself. But, you know, this makes IPA feel. I don't know. I don't want to make any assumptions about people's relationship to ipa, whether you have any relationship to it at all, or a loving one or a hating one or anything.

Let us know. Let us know in the comments. Like, put yes, if you're familiar with IPA and you know a little bit about it, or no, if you have no idea what it is.

So we know the basic. The basic one sentence on what IPA is, is. Is that for English, for example, if there's. If we have the letter A, anybody here who speaks English knows that A can have five different sounds. We talked about this last time. Unlike, you know, a language like, say, Spanish, where it's just very consistently one to one, this symbol equals this sound. We don't have that. So the IPA solves that by saying, now there's five symbols, and every symbol does have a sound, and it's a one to one ratio. So there's a lot of learning curve to learn all the symbols, a lot of them are Greek. A lot of them are diacritical marks, little dots and things, little squiggles in order to help you keep straight. Like, is this a more of a forward sound or backwards sound or length and all that stuff? But the main thing is, once you get over that hump of learning all these new symbols that look a little like math, you can decode anybody's accent, including your own, and you can talk intelligently suddenly about, oh, I see, you keep switching from this A, which we don't have in English, to this A, which we do, but not this A. Right? Like, it solves it.

That's the essence of dialect work, right? Like just mapping out all the sounds and then deciding this is how you say it. If you switch it, you have a dialect.

Yeah, totally. And if anybody wants to go to my. My Instagram, which I'll, you know, share. I just posted a. A photo of one. Of one of my sound. I mean, you know, a sort of a version of a sound change sheet for Rachel McAdams that I used to. For Eurovision. I mean, it's, It's. It really demystifies. Demystifies the whole idea of accents and. And it is hard to feel like an embodied human while thinking about symbols. So the beauty of Tate Wilson's work is that it puts it into the body and it's a bit referential to Kristin Linklater, who I don't have a huge amount of experience with, although her book is right over there. But Kristen Linklater just passed away a week or two ago and was a lion in the voice world and had. I think this was evolved. This evolved into the symbols. And then the end of my story before I jump into them is like eight years after I worked with Kate Wilson, I got my first teaching job at Pace University in Manhattan. I was in my late 20s and I was teaching the BFA, the undergrad acting students, dialects for the stage. So that meant that, you know, they were mostly Americans, although with from a lot of different backgrounds. And. And we were going to work. I was my first time getting to teach the IPA and get. Hopefully get people excited about all the stuff I'm talking to you guys about in terms of, like, it's a secret code. Simples are hard, but then worth it. Just like learning music. And then beyond that, once you know that, then, oh, I'm showing them.

I pulled it out. This is what it looks like, the ipa, if you can.

In a way, I should point out that the IPA really only comes up here with the T and the th. There's the voiced and the voiceless th, as you guys probably know, there's the th sound and also the sound in English. So this, because I was doing this for Rachel, who doesn't know ipa, I mostly wrote this out phonetically, just with sounds. And I put a little. A little symbol over the R to symbolize a rolled R, which I just made up that symbol, but there you go. So you've got. And then we had a th over the ee, and I wrote a little symbol there so that she knows a V sound. And then underneath that I put a little circle with a line through it, which is a Greek theta for vith. So it wasn't viz. Yes. Oh, my God. We get. Amazing. I had multiple Icelandic actors giving me different answers. So I kept crossing out and being like, okay, your recording literally does not match. And then it turns out one of the island actors I had asked to translate for me literally was like, let me just give you my own translation. I'm going to retranslate it. I was like, that wasn't. But no. And then there was an actual sound change sheet which is like all these sounds. Switch to all these sounds for Icelandic. And the idea being, you know, this is the sort of secret code to switch from this to this. And it's a relatively simple path. And then, of course, the hard part is feeling like a human while doing it. I lost my train of thought when we showed that.

I'm sorry, I had to. It's so good. So back to teaching the vowel. So you walked into the classroom that had you thought it was all American students learning different dialects.

When I found out that that's what I had to do, or that's what I had the opportunity to finally do, I called Kate Wilson and I said, it's been like five or six years since I was in your classroom. I remember, like, half of them could I take you out to coffee, and you could just sort of remind me of the other half. And she said, no, it is your job to evolve them for yourself.

So.

Good. And so I have. So now I don't actually know what is and what isn't just mine, but. But I taught these for 10 years, and it's also been. What. You know, a lot of the fancier movie stars I've worked with, for whom English is their second language, are really dedicated to using these. I think because of these physical gestures. It's just really. I don't want to over talk it, but it's a bit demystifying, which is, I think.

Okay. Okay, so let's begin it. Someone was asking, okay, two questions. What is ipa? So can you tell us talk like. Well, yeah, I'll just say International Phonetic Alphabet. So first of all. And these are the symbols that we saw on the page. And also, how many IPA symbols are in English? Well, actually, what you might want to ask is how many sounds do we have in English? Ooh, I have this one.

Right?

I think I might have it.

This is the Edith Skinner, who is a deeply problematic person, and I'm happy to talk more about that, but she's also no longer with us. But this book is the bible for theater kids. Certainly. I don't know about non theater people, but the entire. What's funny is the wait. Sorry. The whole book is really thick, but it's Mostly examples. The entire. Not entire. That's not nice. The primary information that you need is all in these two, basically two pages. So this. I never really understood this symbol, so I kind of came up with my own way. But this is about forward and backward sounds in the mouth. Last time we talked a bit about how oral placement has been sort of a useful way in for me. But this is all the vowel sounds, and then over here is all the.

By the way. Yeah. Which is also like, if you're interested in that, if you just Google IPA and that's. I have that book.

I just want to tell you on Instagram.

You can just Google IPA American English or IPA vowel chart. In particular. We're talking about the vowel chart now. I also have a video where I walk you through the chart just for the people watching and you can download the chart too. So just Google American English.

Yeah, I'm thrilled.

Masterclass. I have it on.

I'm not at all surprised because it does feel like. I mean, what I've always told clients is looking at the chart alone without somebody sort of helping you through it. It's not self explanatory.

Right. So basically what we're going to do now is we're going to walk through all of these vowels, or most of these vowels, at least the relevant ones, and you are going to talk about the vowel and also show us how you teach it using the gestures.

I'm committed to doing this. I hope this works for you guys. But I'm committed to doing this as loosely and sort of joyfully as I tend to do with my clients, rather than, you know, sort of making sure I'm going step by step in some more way, because this is how I work. And, you know, part of the success that I have had has been in finding a sense of freedom and joy around this work rather than like, get out your books and, you know, there's right and wrong.

Right, exactly. Plus, it's us. I mean, there is nothing too serious about, like, just you and I doing this together.

Like, I'm like, yeah, like you guys chime in to see us. Not. Not us.

I have.

Yeah, okay, okay, whatever. I can sort of.

Are we gonna start. Are we gonna start with like, high front vowels first or how is it for those who know the chart?

Or. I am going to let you guys tell me afterwards what we did, but truly, it will make sense. But here's my request. You can see me from the waist up. You guys, Will you. Those of you watching this, even watching it not in Real time. Will you do yourselves the favor of standing up and doing this with me? So part of the deal with doing.

These, I'm going to do it with you as well. But then my head is.

Yeah, Hadar, you are an exception if you'd like to be an exception. But I have to say I have made some very intimidating clients do this and remind them that including, by the way, CEOs of like billion dollar tech companies who were hiring me for accent work. So then they also don't have an acting background. They're not comfortable. I mean, partly why I got hired is that it's kind of combination of accent work and public speaking. It's very liberating to remember that we all were 5 year olds once. We all still have it in us to be silly. And I say that very seriously. Okay, so the first sound is oo. When I learned this from Kate Wilson, she was very, very pregnant. And it was like this. She had this like earth mama quality we can all see. We don't. If we have a mirror near us, we can all see ooh. Right? It's the same as the W sound, right? Ooh. And as you at home can attest, this exists in basically every language. Right? So it's kind of what I call one of the three U sounds. If. If it helps to think about letters of English, often it's oo. Right? Letters of English. I mean, God bless as usual. I'm here to apologize on behalf.

You should. I think I told you that last time.

This is part of the idea is that when we're talking about this sort of thing, it is helpful to think about it in terms of sounds, not in terms of letters. Of course, then there is this annoying translation into like. But now I'm looking at a word and it's written in letters. So how do I say it out loud? I hear you. But for now we can get a little soft brain about it and just think about sound oo. So this is like do, do you do do. Is there a word in Hebrew you can give me with an ooh?

Well, Hebrew would be shorter and the tongue is lower. Like do, do, do, do, do.

Okay, great. So for English, we can have.

For.

For English, this is, as you can imagine without having to learn the diacritical marks, a long sound, but one that's great about English is that length is really determined. In my mind at least. Length is determined by intention. What do we want to do with that word do? I just made the word do long and not go. What do we want to do with that word, but theoretically, I could make it into your Hebrew word. Right, right, right.

Can you talk also about. About the transition? Because there is somewhat of a transition there. Because it's not du. Even if I make it long, let's say, take the Israeli ooh do. It's still not the same. Right. Like, there's something there. Can you talk about that?

I think, like, forward and less like, lip roundy, too. Because you can think about. You think about this. This American stereotype that we don't move our mouth very much. You know, you can say do and get. Get away with it. Right. So although I'm saying ooh, you can also go ooh. I think that's the difference. I also feel that, like, that it's easier to transition out of it, because ooh is obviously a bigger movement that you then have to move out of. And if you don't do that.

Right. I think. I think the transition. I think the transition is also a part of what creates the sound. So you don't start. It's like the starting point and ending point of the ooh sound is not the same. Like, you start with your lips a little more relaxed.

Do.

And then you push it all the way forward, which is what we.

The other thing is, if you have the word doing, you know, a lot of people, I mean, especially, like, the stereotypical French thing of, like, doing, doing. I tell everybody there's just a secret dog dad. Mm.

Yeah.

Because that forces you to make doing right.

Right. And that is. Someone was asking about transitions. Someone was asking about transitions. And this is such a great tip. When you transition from a back vowel into another vowel, and then you have, like, another sound coming in, which is.

The W, which is only to say it's not that, like, you have to learn some outside sound. It's only to say that if you're doing the sound right, you necessarily pass through a W to get to the next one. That's how I share it. So that you got doing. And there's only two of them that come up with a vowel at the end of one syllable, vowel at the beginning of the next, and the other is bing with a Y sound. B ying. Right.

Okay.

Secret wise. Secret W's. Edith Skinner will tell you. Get rid of those secret wise. Right. But you know what? She had a very British influence and was right. Was particularly at her peak in the 1950s. So feel free to have a slightly British 1950s accent. If you're working on your general American. It's a choice. So ooh. Oo. And then the next U sound is so it's like somebody is punching you in the stomach. And you can see, right. It's already more relaxed. A little tension down here. This I consider. For those of you who have any experience with French, this is definitely a sound that exists in French, right? Je. Je ma'. Appel.

Je has a little bit of a.

Kissy look, but otherwise, not in a lot of languages. This one's hard as a result of that. Right. If this doesn't exist in your language, it's hard to even hear it. I think I just lost hadar. Finally, I've taken over. I'm here.

I just need to reconnect my camera. Can you hear me?

Yes, Yes, I can hear you.

I can't see you, so keep going. I just moved something here, so keep going.

Okay, I'm drunk on power. And now I'm just going to take over your channel. All right? Hi, guys. So if you've got OO and your next sound is. It's really hard to hear if you've never done that sound before. Right? Just acknowledge that and then start listening for it. In American English, it is the sound in the word book. Book. Not book, book, but book. And it's a short sound. You can tell that, right. If you've got oo. And so there's not really any need or. Or opportunity even to lengthen it. Book. Cookie. Would. Could. Should.

Look.

That one comes up a lot.

You're with you?

Yep. Okay, you're back. Hi.

Okay.

And I don't know.

Oh, no.

Oh, my God.

I'm here. I'm here. I'm just. I'm just fixing my camera. It's gonna take another.

Okay, cool. As long as everybody's okay. Hi. I've taken over, so. Oh, hi.

Hi. Okay. It's just my other camera died for a sec. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm here, I'm here.

All right, so. So. So this sound, if you guys want to practice out loud, right, What I find really valuable is just to have them right next to each other. You've got oo.

Oo.

And try to go back and forth. And my favorite example of a phrase to keep these straight is do good. So you've got do. Oo. Do.

Do good, good.

So if they match. If they match, do good, we will understand you. We will understand you. But you're doing the same symbol for both, and I would love for you to feel that there's a bit of a distinction between those. Right?

Good. Do good.

And then the third.

So Good.

And then the third and final of the U sounds, if it's helpful to think in terms of that, is cup. This is actually the IPA symbol. It's like an upside down V. So, ah. You can see my mouth is pretty wide open. Ah. It's the soft palate, if you're paying attention, is quite relaxed. Collapsed, if you want to be dramatic about it. So instead of energizing the soft palate in there and creating a dome, which is where we're going next, you're very relaxed.

Ah.

And this is such an American sound. It does exist in other languages. Yes. But here's why I say it's such an American sound. Two main reasons. One, it is the sound we think out loud. So Hadar, I don't know if you've mentioned to people before the idea of a resting sound, but. Right. Every language. And for those of you at home, you know, think about, what sound do you think out loud with? Right. And for American, English is our sound. It's very relaxed. We all really like it in Hebrew.

It's totally.

Like, right here.

And it's so. Yeah. And it's so hard. I just wanted to stand up and fix the setup for a sec. And it's so hard to shift from that.

Eh.

To. But this is a dead giveaway. Like, once you. You get in the. Once you. You are able to switch between the. And the. That's a huge change. Totally.

I mean, not that we're going for not having giveaways, but it is helpful if you. If you are trying, like, you know, I spoke French relatively badly well in my 20s, and I spent a summer there. And I do remember really actually trying to think out loud, not to have my inner thoughts, but to have the sound that came out to signal I am not done with my thought be. Because that really does help your.

It's the placement. You know, I feel, by the way, like. I feel it. It really is. Those placements, even in your neutral position, it really does help when you get the right placements. Because, for example, I feel that if I spend the day speaking English, then it's much easier for me, you know, by the end of the day. But if I speak Hebrew for, like, three, four days, like a full week without speaking English, my placements change, and then it's kind of like, harder to get back on track. Now it's a little easier because I do speak English every day. But when I, you know, before that, I think. So even if you just shift, that helps you become more aware and more in control. Of your tongue. Anyway, so we were at.

So the second part of why ah is such a great one to work on, besides this thinking out loud sound is that it is the secret to so many words in English that are spelled so many different ways that we use all the time. Examples include what? What? Love.

Love, mother, mother, brother, brother, Money.

Money does. So now OE does.

Blood.

Yeah, but what does. Yeah, what does make money? Right, right. What's another good one? I mean, I like to also say the F U C K word, but I don't want to. But there you go. I mean, blood flood.

All of those double O. Blood flood. That's also a lot of those double O's.

But some of them are ooh. But yes, right, Totally.

No, no, but specifically for blood and flood.

Cup. Totally. So when you have cup is sort of the go to. Obviously C U, P. But just know that that short U sound writt that U is just only one of many ways because sometimes you see people write it, especially on the Internet, C U Z instead of B, E, C, A U, S, E. That's because also if you want to memorize these symbols, this one is an arrow pointing in what direction? Right. Also by the word. By the way, the word none and one none. So I actually read some lovely academic academic article about how when typeset was happening like hundreds of years ago, a U next to an N was too hard for the I because of the letters all B. So they actually used. Started using O's to help keep it straight. And that's why so many words with O's are actually A. So thanks. Thanks for those lovely choices they made that we're talking about hundreds.

They had no idea what they were doing. They were like, okay, just let's fix it for now.

Like, I mean, I probably share that. To remember that generation, if we're trying to come up with rules based on spelling, we're mostly just wasting our time. You know, I had this rule when I was teaching in my. In my. My acting students. With my acting students that spelling is irrelevant, which it's not, you know, entirely irrelevant. I don't want to throw everything out, but I will say that the reason I said spelling is irrelevant is to help people sort of stop that thought process of I'm gonna figure out why these O O s are like this, but these oo's are like this. Right? Yeah, it's. God bless. So OO ah and often U and are easier to find. And this little in between Y1 is harder. Right. And I really, really just Encourage you to listen to your favorite speakers of English. Suppose you girls will just listen to me and, you know, start to really notice that. Right.

Good. Would.

Should look good. Right?

Okay.

And as I said, if you go to Luke, we will still understand you. But look. Really opens it up. Yeah, look.

Which one is your favorite? Let us know. The do the good or what was the. The name?

Cup.

Just a cup. You use cup as well.

I think of it as, uh. If that helps at all. Yeah, okay.

Yeah, I call it the cup sound too.

So then what happens if your soft palate that I said is very collapsed for this sound, by the way, the word dumb as well, and the good old duh. Duh, Right. If you energize your soft palate that's really relaxed for that sound, and you make a dome in there like you. Like you're about to yawn, you get the next sound, which is ah, Ah. So you've got like a little string is coming out of your solar plexus, right. So you can see with my mouth open. Ah, Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah. This is one of the two O's that we have in English. So the annoying thing is we don't have the O that everyone else has. We don't have O. It just doesn't exist in English. And it's why when we. When Americans, you know, come across a foreign word that has O in it, we inevitably, like, get it kind of wrong. I mean, there's a stereotype of Americans learning. Learning Spanish, and instead of hola, saying bless. Right. We just don't know how to make an oh. So there you go. Instead of an O, we have two different O sounds. One of them is ah. Honest, ah, Ah. And we're going to talk about how much it sounds similar to an ah sound in just a moment. Honest. Not gotta. I gotta go. Gotta. Right? So if you're noticing you. You at home are noticing that you see that O, you're hearing what I'm saying, but you still are rounding your lips because it just feels like that would be proper. I gotta gotta go. Then I want you to practice for the first time ever to really trust there is no lip rounding at all. Ga. I gotta go. I gotta go. Yeah. It is not possible. Not possible. Ah.

Ah.

There you go.

Not possible.

And for those of you listening in on what I just said about how there's two O's, just to totally finish the, you know, the story on that, the second O is a diphthong. A diphthong, which I'm sure you Know if you've been following Hadar's amazing videos, is two of these pure vowel sounds smushed together. One and then the other. What I'm doing right here is the pure vowel sounds, which are the building blocks. And then, of course, if you have a building block and a building block and you put them next to each other and ask, you know, somebody to go from one to the other, you get this blend that happens. And the second O sound is. And that is a blend of into. And. And Edith Skinner would tell you it's like 90% that first one. So diphthongs are not 50% one sound, and then 50% you turn a street and go down the other one. It's a little tiny tail at the end of a straight line. I also think of these pure vowel sounds as straight line sounds because your mouth does the same thing heading out, right? So you've got. And then a tiny little oo at the end. O. O. Oh, no. Oh, no.

I find that it's exceptionally difficult to say the sound when. Not less when it's at the end of the word, but more when it's at the beginning. Like don't, for example, or only. So people tend to just keep it as that first. Oh. Or reduce it.

Yeah, only, Only, Only. Here's the thing. If you have an O in your language and you are being told that there is no o in English, what you're not exactly necessarily realizing is that on a physical level, to make a diphthong will take more time. So your natural rhythm is. Wants to move on to the next sound only. And I'm here to say trust, right? As you practice this on your own, trust that it actually takes an instant longer than you're used to. And so your brain is going. Your body and your brain are going like, oh, right. Oh, oh, oh.

So sometimes it would be good just to work on prolonging it and even exaggerating it, right? Until you get comfortable, right? You get comfortable with saying something that is not that.

Oh. Oh, really short.

Nice.

Love it.

Oh, totally. It's a good one.

Carla says. Carla says I have a little of a hard time with full and fool, which is exactly the do Good. That one.

Full.

Full. So. So, Carla, do it with a. With the gestures, right? Like so Wouldn't you. Can you. Can you demonstrate that with. What is it.

Good? Full. Full. Full. I'm a full fool.

Good.

And fun. So you've got all three of them. Fool. Full. Fun.

Fun.

I wish I could say fall, but fall is not a Word So sorry doesn't help. Okay, so you've got honest. And now I should just go on to the next one because if you've noticed that ah, honest sounds a lot like ah father, you're doing great. You're right. And there are. They are technically different only in that the ah sound, ah, father, is longer and ah is shorter. And 50 years ago, Wendy Dick Skinner was writing this book, there was. You could tell the difference. Aw had a little bit more of this shape, a little more tension here. Aw, honest, honest. If you watch an old movie, maybe even a black and white movie, you'll hear Americans say honest. Aw, little more. But now it's more relaxed. And when you say aw, honest, ah, gotta, like I was saying earlier, gotta go. You can absolutely imagine that it's spelled G A H ga gotta not naht. But I'm not. Right, But I'm not. So I have.

This is when. When I first got introduced to all the sounds of English, I. I did it in a speech class in a theater school. And we learned with speak with distinction. And I learned about the honest vowel. And it took me quite a while to understand that it doesn't exist in American English. And there is no such a sound like that. The oz and father that I only associated with words pronounced spelled with a. Right. It took me a while to get that. And until today, when I introduce my students the oz and father sound, I say father and I ask them to come up with more words with ah. So they think for a little bit and then all the words that they come up with are words spelled with a, like maybe car, that is the R vowel spa. But they know, by the way, there.

Are not a lot of words in English that have that ah sound.

Exactly. So. So it takes them a little while because there aren't a lot of options. But then I say it's. You can't. You don't even retrieve it. Because the words with or categorized as O. Right. Like so they don't even think that this is an option because I already introduced it as an ah sound, not an O sound. But like you just said here, this is. It is categorized as an O for English speakers, like in one of the O's. But for non native speakers, it's definitely categorized as an ah sound.

Beyond what you're saying, which is also an important point. The other, the other, like zoom out way of talking about this is everybody here being really honest with your ah. Ah, honest with yourselves about what your goal is. Because if you want to learn standard American that is an older sound. Standard American is an accent that was standardized in, you know, either the 1920s or the 1950s, depending on, you know, if you're talking about a more general sound or a more transatlantic sound. But either way, general standard American. Sorry, I shouldn't say general standard. That's complicated. Standard American is an accent that American acting students learn in acting school and sometimes newscasters learn. You know, it is a way of unregionalizing our accent and speaking in the most open, pure, energized version of every vowel sound. It's great to know it is an accent. It is not a neutral, non accent. That's not a thing. But what I'm usually coaching, whether it's for actors or for non actors, is more of what I call contemporary American or modern American American. And that is a nice opportunity to acknowledge. If we're. If we want to learn some standard that is meant to be sort of the most proper version of English, then sure, you can have a distinction between ah, not I'm not, versus ah, father. Well, you're welcome to. It's. It's subtle, but you're welcome to it. To separate them, keep them separate. But for general American, which is how I speak, smush them together. They're the same in one category. It's already hard enough. English has so many more vowels than a lot of languages. Right. Like, whatever you can merge, let them merge. Merge it.

Everything.

Yeah. So now that we're in awe for a moment, as I keep saying, father. Water. You could say it might be an aw, but we're gonna head there in a second. My name Sama. Samara. English, at least Samara. And then it's like so many words that have come in from other languages that we Americans say with an ah, like Taj Mahal. Latte.

Latte. Right.

Pasta. Salsa. I know. It's so gringo.

Salsa.

Right. Because we don't have the ah. So we go to aw. I like to say Lady Gaga. Right, Right.

Entrepreneur or entrepreneur.

Oh, yes.

Entree. Entree.

Right, Absolutely. Ah.

Ah.

So the one that I'm referencing, the other one that I just sort of half reference, that I sometimes skip over because it's also going away, but I'll reference here because we're being completists, is aw. Now, if you guys are still standing or if you haven't stand back up. Not you. Okay. Everybody at home, I. Trust me, this really does help. So you've got this aw sound like. It's like a spiral is coming out of your center. Aw. How cute. Aw, right. Definite tension on the side. I love that. I love that. Yeah. Again, it's still a straight line sound because it doesn't change from when you start it to when you end it. But the feeling of it is sort of like you're spiraling out. This is in words like law and pause.

Law. Two vowels. Okay, we, we didn't talk about patterns, but you can say usually that here we have usually two vowel letters.

Maybe this is one of the very few, this is one of the very few where spelling helps. A U, a W and a L. Ball. Right. Ball versus bali. Bali ball, which isn't a word. Ball, isn't it? But ball, ball and bally, there's a tiny distinction. Here's what I really want to say. This aw sound for younger generations of Americans is also going away. Aw. Also going ah. Also, also. Right. So if this aw sound feels like either you don't hear it or if you hear it American, you don't really hear it, that's great. Trust your ear. Trust your ear. And you can choose. But you can choose to use it or not. I mean, but I like to point out, especially for actors, when what we're talking about, when we're talking about accents is what story we are telling, which all of us can think about accents that way. What story we're telling about who we are, who we want to be, what our story, you know, what our history is. If you are watching a legal drama on television and you have a judge who's in their 60s, 70s, and they say it's the law. Aw, up and down shape. It's the law. And then you have a 22 year old who just got out of whatever 24 year old who just got out of law school. Law school. Law school. Like la la la la la. Right. So they're both American English. They are both American English. It's which story, what you want to tell and how sort of old fashioned you want to sound.

And I like this, like what I, what I like to do with this. I say that I usually like to teach just one sound and say all of this is included. So it's not a lot of work. So they categorize it as one and it's easier for them to pronounce.

When I work, by the way, just said all of this for anybody who wants to listen back. You're all was, that's exactly this instead of all of this. Right.

But at the same time I say, because there is this, this sound, if you do end up going more towards your o Ish sound.

Right.

Like, if people do say, especially when there is a dark L, like tall ball. Right. Like, they go more into that neutral O sound that exists. It's okay, right? Because it does resemble the all vowel sound.

No, and it's true, I think that having a. Having a dark L or an end, I just call it an end of word L or end of syllable L is. Is a place where your mouth already. The aw might help to get there. It's sort of an on the way sound.

Yeah.

But there's kind of not a wrong, which is what you're saying. And I. That's. Yeah, that feels great.

They have like. And anyway, like, this is what we're trying to say too, that even when we talk about a specific vowel, because there is such variation and versatility and how in people's mouths and how they pronounce sounds, there isn't this one precise, exact sound, sometimes it deviates a little bit and still under the umbrella of one specific sound. So there is more freedom if you don't get it right. Like, don't get obsessed about it. Just find the right placement as long as you're clear and under. And as long as you understand, I think, the categories or the different sounds not just for your own pronunciation, but also to understand different speakers.

Right.

Like native speakers and different dialects of that specific. You know, like native.

Yeah, absolutely.

Speakers.

So I want to wrap this up, and we are at the point where we're just in our head range now. So we had. Ooh, Now we've got our final A sound. Ah, Apple. As I said, I think last time, I do sometimes like to actually say this more like an apple is heading out of your mouth. Because I don't want people to feel like this sound is ah. Right. Ah is another one of these ones like, that just doesn't exist in a lot of other languages. And it is hard to trust that it is as. As I lovingly say, ugly as it is. But I say that because when you don't trust that A is as forward and kind of like as it is, you're gonna start to relax it down into ah. If you have that in your native language or ah. Right. And if you say bad and trust that it's ah, bad, that is American. And if you don't quite trust it and you're like, that sounds a little too aggressive. Ah, bad becomes ah, bad, bad, bad. Or.

Or bed, an eh sound, because they don't open the mouth a lot. So it's a bed joke.

Right.

And I think that. Yeah. So it's either. I think it shifts because that ah sound is right there in between those two sounds. Like the ah and the eh. I love the apple thing. And the ugly sound. Yeah, yeah.

And there. And. And as I. As I. Actually, I'm not sure if I mentioned last time, but I like to point out to clients, because I want to be very honest, if we're talking about general American, that this ah sound. Edith Skinner would not tell you this, but this ah sound has a secondary version, if we're being honest, that happens in front of an N, M or ng.

Right.

Most of Americans. Not all. For most of Americans, which is that the ah sound, as in example, actually becomes an ah sound. So it gets a little diphthongy and becomes example. So if you thought A was ugly, allow me to offer an even more ugly one, which is. It's not essential, but if you start to notice, I mean, I think a great example is standard. Standard American. Right. Every time.

Standard.

In this, I have said a. Stan. I am capable of saying standard because I went to acting school and learned how to say standard American Candle scandal. But Americans, I have to teach this to Americans if they need it for any reason. And none of them believe it. And they go to awe. They're like, it's a scandal. I sound so British. And I'm like, first of all, that's not how the Brits would say that. But also, they can't even distinguish between a flattened A that happens in front of an NMG and a general A that happens in Apple. Right. And I have to say, try to match Apple. Apple. Apple to standard. Standard. Standard. And it's a real challenge for Americans. And it was for me, too. We grew up in Northern California. We have this flat. A. Right. Beautiful. Lovely. Were you gonna say something?

No, just beautiful.

Okay, so the final one after A is I. I. These are hard. Right? They're tiny. They're right next to each other. But is, of course, the hardest because it doesn't exist in a lot of other short I sound. I think of it as an IH.

Sit.

Sit. Sit. Right. Sit. It doesn't matter.

So let's. Let's play out. Let's play out. Let's say I'm gonna be my most Israeli self. Okay? So I'll be.

Yes. Oh, this is a good one for Israel. For Hebrew.

Yeah. Seat. Seat.

Seat. Right. So that's this third one. E, E. Seat. Right. Seat.

Okay. Seat. Right. So if I need to shift, what do I do?

Sid. So, I mean, I don't have a. I don't have a lot of good, like, inside the mouth. I think for me, it feels like it comes from right here. It's weirdly forward. And I think this is the other big difference for me. If you think up and downy, you get ih. And if you think side to sidey, it's a lot easier to get to. Eh. Okay, great.

Up and down.

IH is really relaxed. Sit.

Sit.

In the same way that we were talking about. Ooh. Kind of works best when you don't really do that much, do you? Sit. Sit. Look at my mouth.

Right, Sit. Right.

If you're doing something, it's probably too much and you're probably heading towards. Right. But also, just practice. It's the same thing with Ooh. And it's not magic. It's just, can I hear the distinction? Can I do that with. And then do that one back and forth? Can I trust that there really is a difference? Right, so sit. It is. Sit. And then you've got set. E set. And then you've got. So if you notice, this is why it's related to Kristen Linklater. This is why it's related to Kristen Linklater and all of her work, which is much more about the voice, not the articulators, is that we started with O, which feels very earthy. Ooh. And we went all the way up to. Right. So it does have kind of a feeling of progression, not front to back, as you asked initially, but just in terms of sort of an association we have. And for anybody who has experience with chakra work, it's really related to the sounds that are related to these different parts of our body, which I didn't even know until I took a sound bath class, and I was like, whoa. It's all the same thing.

I never thought about it, you know?

So. Wait.

Okay, so what's the difference in terms of the gestures between.

There's no difference. I really. I really. I really slept on the job on this one. It's whichever side you want. If somebody wants to come up with.

You'Re just, like, running.

Running out of ideas.

So you're like, no.

Really? No one's ever needed it. Because at the end of the day, you know, like, okay, there's something going on. They're both forward, both short.

Right. I noticed, though, that you did this a little lower because the jaw drops a bit more.

So the.

Eh, No, I like it.

I like it. You take it and run with it. As Kate Wilson said, it's yours now. So There you go. And then there's one that I skipped because it doesn't feel like it happens naturally in the progression. But I'm going to say it because of a question that happened before we started, which, depending on how much of Hadar's videos you've watched, I'm just guessing, there is a whole discussion to be had about R. So we skipped at the beginning. We skipped talking about vowels versus consonants. What is the definition of a vowel versus a consonant? My definition, everybody's definition is that a vowel, your mouth stays open. There is an uninterrupted flow of air. Ah, eh. Eat all of these ones that we've done. Whereas consonants shape that into something meaningful. People say the vowels hold the emotions. Right. When you get terrible news. Ah, right. And the consonants take that into something intelligible to communicate. Actually, emotions communicate things too, if we're being honest, but you know what I mean. So what does that mean when it comes to an R? Well, R's are the beginnings of words and beginnings of syllables in English are consonants. They have a little line under them in IPA and they're called real R, as in red consonant. Something's closing around in order to create a shape or a vibration. In this case, everything. Right. I think of ours as everything working in concert to make this like a motor. Rs at the ends of words and ends of syllables are spelled with the same letter and thus are confusing as F, U, C, K, But. But they are not the same. They are a vowel. And if you match the er from red into the ER from father.

You.

Get more than you need. You get an accent. I call it pirate or. I like pirate action. I love accent.

Yeah, I love it.

There's a. There are parts of the US that have a hard ride. Texas is one of them. Northern California is one of them. So sometimes my R's are certainly harder than even Skinner would have approved. Right. So I can definitely accidentally say, like, especially when I'm being funny, like, I don't know, it's my father. But that's unnecessary, really. What's the definition of a vowel? Your mouth stays open. How do you get an R at the end of a word or end of a syllable for your mouth to stay open and a little more. There's a little more relaxation than you expect and a little more feeling of out. So father. And this is the schwa, which we can totally talk about separately. But the reason I bring it up.

Someone was just asking, the kind of someone who was just asking about the schwa by the way.

Totally, totally. I'm happy to talk about it, but, like, we're already at an hour. I don't know how much people, like, want to. You know. But. But I do want to say that when it's an. When it's a syllable that gets the emphasis, those little schwas never, never, never do. Right. The schwas are always unstressed, as we all hope to be. When it does get the emphasis, as in the word murder, where the second syllable is a little schwa, but the first syllable gets an energy punch. That's this lovely sound that somebody mentioned earlier. Earlier with the word warm versus worm.

Worm versus warm.

Yeah, yeah. So this is. Here's your symbol for it, I like to say, like, smog falling over Los Angeles. By the way, I said Los Angeles with a big open. Ah. Because I was being fancy. Otherwise I'd say Los Angeles. Los Angeles. Right. Los Angeles. Very fancy. So, anyway, which is the little three symbol in ipa? This is. You are. You can think of it as. It shows up all over the place. And it is a valuable. It shows up here when we're doing the pure vowels because it is a vowel. So don't let that spelling of an R make you feel like you have to kind of do this energetically. Early. Early.

That's so good. That's like. I think that idea, I never talk about it, that the jaw has to drop for the stir sound. I call it the stir sound. But what you said also, don't be deceived by the spelling because of the R, but also not because of like. Because there is also. You can have like, four, five, six different spelling patterns. Sometimes an I as in girl or an O as in world. World.

Right.

Sometimes ea as early. And all of these can be deceiving. Sometimes you want to read it phonetically firm. Right. Like. Or airly. And that's the same idea. So that's that, you know, if you.

Can just hear any native speaker or if you have a dictionary that says it out loud. Close your eyes. Try to really close your eyes. Right, right. Yeah. Right. And there is a danger also with these pure vowels, that because of the spelling, we think they're diphthongs and we start to blend them, like, eerily early. Right. Or something like that. Right into this. Er, Early. Right. It's not a thing. It's spelled that way. I totally get why you would do that. Trust that it's a pure vowel, which means it doesn't bend, it's just a straight line. Yep, there you go. That Is the vowels. Yeah, I mean, you know, and then everybody, of course, gets to sort of try that on and figure out like, you know, what questions arise. And, you know, I really kind of confidently can say I've heard them all. So I'm happy to take them in either now or, you know, of course, later. So I'm also happy to go on YouTube and answer, you know, any questions in post.

So about the schwa, about the schwa. Do you have a gesture for it?

No. No. Here's my gesture for a schwa. Although that's not the sound, that's an eh sound. Yeah.

I call it the introvert. Like the schwa. I don't want it.

Yeah, yeah.

I'm gonna let other people shine. I'm just gonna take a step back.

Right, that's right. Which is such an incredibly useful sound for English. I mean, you know, obviously some languages who. Some languages where Spanish comes to mind, but a lot of languages where the vowel sounds remain. I like to call it the integrity of the vowel sound. The vowels just don't change, regardless of if it's in a syllable that gets emphasis or a syllable that doesn't, or in some languages like French, where there's pretty much weight, there isn't really an emphasis issue, but the vowels stay the same. And in English, good luck. With a few exceptions. With a few exceptions because, you know, a lot of those little in between words get smaller. But I think it's very common for somebody to say, I gotta go, and just accidentally turn that into a schwan. Say gotta go. And we actually remains open. Why?

Right.

Who knows? I gotta go.

Yeah, gotta. Which is something that I sometimes do when I reduce it.

Right.

Like, and you pointed it out that, like, sometimes I reduce it to. Because I tend to reduce a lot of stuff that, you know well.

And then counter example is. I'm sorry, a counterexample is the word gonna, as in I'm gonna go. Right. Of course, you can be more formal if you want and say, I'm going to go the way that it's often written, going to. But we almost never do, even in a formal context, unless we're being extremely clear, need to pull rank, you know, I'm fancier than you. Or speaking to a small child, perhaps, I'm going to go almost never. Except for those, you know, do we. Do we fully.

So let me ask you something about this that I was.

Let me get to the end of this. So instead we say I gunna G U N N A, if that helps. Or g O, N, N A is how it's often spelled, but it's an a cup sound. I'm gonna go. And in fact, in the context of a larger thought, it reduces even more and becomes a schwa. I'm gonna go. It's like gna. I'm gonna go.

When would people use gonna?

Right.

Going to. Okay, that's very formal. No one uses it really. But a lot of times people do say going to. Going to, which is another form or another reduction of going to, but it's not gonna. Can you think of when and why and how maybe when it's more.

I think. I think it's an in between formality place and I think, well, I'm gonna say something bold and then you guys can tell me if. If you disagree. I think it's rarely used except by foreigners.

Goinda.

I think it's a hat tip to. It's written going to or it's right to say going to or My teacher told me because I don't trust I can. So I would suggest for anybody at home trying. I'm gonna go and see how that works for you. And there's a. There's like 20 different versions. I mean, if we're being honest and especially in a more and more and more casual way. I M, N A. I'm gonna. I'm gonna go.

I'm gonna.

I'm gonna go. What happened to the G? Right. And there's. And there's definitely one that's more coded. There's. There's one that's more coded for African American that Kanye made famous with. Ima. Ima. I M, M A. Right. I'm gonna stop you right there. Right. Ama. Amina. I'm gonna. I'm gonna. I'm going to. I'm going to.

Going to.

There you go.

Yep.

I mean, I would argue with sort of gradations of formality, but really I think there's sort of two. I think there's. I'm going to. And I'm gonna. For sort of general American so that you don't drive yourself crazy.

Right. I love it. So good. Like we. I think we should do a session just about that. Like the reductions. How much the levels of reductions. There was a really good question.

It's the one other page that's really useful in speak with dist. Not that I'm like trying to hawk this book, but I want to honor it by saying that I said there's only two pages that are useful, which is the vowels and the consonants, but the other major Page that's very useful is a few pages on stress. Stress within a sentence, also known as intonation. But really it's about the fact that words like the, on their own or when emphasized, have an sound. It is the place to go, it is the thing. But otherwise we all know the word the almost never ever, ever gets that kind of an emphasis and instead reduces to a schwa.

Right. There is a question here from Carla and she asks.

Just the same as warm and worm. No, because the R changes everything. So wander. Ah, good example. So we don't have a lot of awe. Wander, wander, wander. And then wonder. Cup. So you can see that O N now. You can see now because I said that thing, that typeset. Right. It probably was originally spelled with a U, W, U N. Wonder. Hey, this is another good one that comes up all the time. And even Americans get it wrong sometimes. Singular woman. Plural Women. Woman. Oh my God, the spelling. Come on. The second syllable, the man versus men is what changes in the spelling in the sounds. That is not what changes.

Right.

Singular woman. Good. All right. This one. Woman. Second syllable is either a schwa or a short I sound woman. Woman. Often that. That there's a schwa or short I sound option. It's so tight, so entirely subtle. I would not work. Worry about it. Right. Edith Skinner called that short I sound the diamond of good speech. Because if you do that instead of a schwa, it's a little more forward and sort of, you know, sparkly. So like passion with an in question versus passion. Right. If you can't hear the difference. That's right. And I usually say the schwa.

Exactly. And no, like go for whatever is easier. And the schwa is easier for. For most people. So. Totally.

And you're right, doing feels more intentional, like you're doing something instead of not doing something. Great. Passion in. In. In that those show up all over the time, all over the place. Right, right. We were talking about wonder. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Women. Right. So. So if the singular is good. Woman. The plural is women, which is short I sound, short I sound or short I sound. Schwa. Women. Wi.

Women. Women.

I hear people all the time doing like the greatest blend of like five different vowels because they don't want to pick one. Woman. I hear you. So here you go. Say it loud and proud.

Women.

Right. And if you go to we, we mean also. Fine, we'll understand you.

Good, good. And also when you say the woman or woman, it's not woo. It's not the oo sound. It's a Woman.

Good. Good book.

Okay. Mariana is asking, how do you pronounce.

The names Thomas or Oscar? Both of them are the short O sound that sounds just like an Ah. Ta. Ta. H. Thomas. Ms. Is one of those options where you can do a short I sound. Or schwa. I'd go with schwa. So all the energy goes in the first syllable. Ta, Thomas.

Ta.

Thomas. And then Oscar. Very similar. Ah, Oscar. That ar is just like an E. An er, which is that schwa. We didn't talk about this fully, but schwa comes in two. In two. In two. In two colors. One of them is. And one of them has a tiny bit of an R quality. Right. And that's what your little ers are. They never get the emphasis. So Oscar. Ah, Oscar. Right.

And there's no a there. Right. A lot of times, especially in Spanish. Oscar.

Oscar.

Right.

Ah.

No. Ah, Oscar.

No. That ar in English is another example, as I said, of an er. And those show up in words that don't just have er. Flavor is a good example. It is not flavor just because it's spelled an O. I'm so sorry. Motor. Same with motor. Also an error. Motor.

Oh, Carla was asking again about the name of the book. I just want to say something about it. It's fantastic.

But do you mean this one, though, or do you mean the other one?

No, I think the. The speak with distinction. I think I just want to say that most of the examples. There are so many example words that people don't really use. Like, you can't. A lot of the example words there are not. Like. Are going to be very confusing sometimes because they're not commonly used. So I might go and search for.

You know, I'm gonna throw something bold out there, but perhaps hadar. And I can come up with a short version of contemporary word combinations that would sort of replace, you know, PID. PID. Pages 27 through 384. And. And you can put it up on your website for, you know, for some. Some.

That'd be amazing. No, it's just like a four pager. We can come up with a four pager.

That's the thing. I mean, I do those for my clients. You know, you probably do, too. If they. If they have one sound that, like, continues to be a sticking point. We just come up with a bunch of words, and often it's words from something they're already working on. If it's an actor, it's the text. If it's a public speaker, from their own speech. But, you know, I have A monologue I use all the time. That's from Silver Linings Playbook for Bradley Cooper's character. And he says, I don't want any meds. Doctor, it starts with that and that ah sound. And doctor, if people need help with that short O sound, it's all over the place in that one. It ends with. But I learned in the hospital, ah, is that you have to do everything you can. You have to work your hardest. And if you do, if you stay positive. Ah, ah, ah. Positive, you have a shot. Ah, ah, ah. Shot at a silver lining. Hardest phrase ever. Ever. Silver lining.

Silver lining. Yeah. So I think. Anybody else this is. Let's see if we have any more questions, but I'm just going to tell a short story about this book.

Oh, sorry. Yes.

No, no, I remember. This is why I don't recommend it to my students necessarily. I mean, the explanations are great and there are some sounds that people don't use, like the honest. But I remember that we used to go around and everyone would have to read one sentence and I would kind of like, check what my sentence is or sentence.

I like, cross stuff out in grad school, in anger, I cross stuff out. I was like, no one uses that now. I still have it like 15 years later. And I'm like, oh, I see, foreigners use that.

Yeah, it's just.

It's just like.

And the examples there.

And anyway, I would get that sentence.

I would be like, okay, I need to read number 18. I'd be like, what is this? Like, what does it even say? Like, what does it even mean?

Hot copper coffee. The hot coffee. Yeah.

Be like, why? Why do I need to read this? And I would be so stressed about, like, getting the words right that I don't even know what words. Like, no one uses it. Sorry. Serious. Started working. Anyway, this is why I don't recommend it. It's just like it creates anxiety. There. There are such great resources online these days for words that people actually use. So I would recommend that.

Yeah, the only thing I'd say, the only addendum I would say is there is something to some of the sort of poetry at the end, not even necessarily the choices, but the reminder that sometimes learning a poem that, you know, poetry has a lot of different. Obviously there's a massive range. But something that does happen a lot with poetry is that the poet is playing with sounds. So when you have this repetition of sounds and. And sounds into sounds, it can be helpful. One of the ones that I'm thinking of is we are the music.

Makers.

We are the dreamers of dreams working on voiced endings. What it is to not off. Right.

I remember this one.

Right. We are the music makers all the way to a real Z. We are the dreamers of dreams, of dreams wandering by our own sea.

Dreams by sea breakers.

Desolate streams.

Desolate streams.

World losers. World losers and world forces on whom the pale moon gleams. But we are.

I love this line. Yeah.

Of the world. The world forever.

Forever, it seems.

Yeah. So some of those. Right. Hadar, how did we find each other? I don't know. I love it. I know you guys are also. Well, we'll put. Put in the notes. Who. That's Baha'. I. Forget the name of the person. Anyway, so we are at an hour 26.

Yeah. I think it's time to play out some music here and. Well, we probably have a lot of questions, so how do you want to deal with that?

Like, maybe I'm happy to stay on for a little bit also. I imagine that you might edit this a little bit afterwards. I don't know, you know, but it's live and that's it. It's live. It's right.

It stays. No editing.

Who needs to edit?

Okay, there was a really good question. Wait, I'm trying to find it. Okay.

Ah.

Can you see it?

I'm confused with the semi vowel. Oh, the glide.

Yeah, Yeah. A concept. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Adding a. Yes. So they get. And then you say one year ago instead of one year.

Yeah. So the Y. The Y is technically. It's technically, at least in the way I was a consonant. But yeah, it's a weird one. You're totally. I'm interested in calling it a semi vowel. It's, you know, one of the glides where there's just a weird sense of movement. Right. Y. Y. I would just sort of practice getting that Y sound.

Yeah.

As I said, it's in beat. Ying. Right. Y. Y, Y.

Sometimes I tell my students to say ew. Like, by the way, when I learned linguistics.

Yeah.

He talked phonetics. He talked about the fact that the height, E, E, and the. Yeah. They hold the same position of the tongue, so technically they just take a different space. And I think that for the yes sound, there is a little bit of a movement there with the tongue.

But that's why it's called. It's literally moving. Right.

It's moving there.

Yeah. Right. And it's true. If you want to think of it as starting with an E, and then over time, as you get more confident with it, you can sort of Start later in the sound. Start voicing later in the sound. So you still go to the E in your. In your mouth, but you don't actually add sound to it. Just. Just like Spanish speakers need to work on if they want to get the S sound that doesn't start with an E. Right. Especially. But instead just special. Right, Right, right. Yeah. It's subtle. Totally. And if the Y doesn't exist in your own language, it is just one to also hear for. How does that happen?

Okay, I have another good question.

Withdraw. I mean, this transition from the th to the draw with the withd. Yeah. I mean, we didn't talk about the th because it's in consonant land. But, you know, the hard part about a th, and I don't know if you're from country, but the hard part about a th. Right. Is that it doesn't exist in almost anybody's language. And it's hard to believe that your tongue actually has to come out of your mouth. My secret for teaching the th secret makes it sound very dramatic. What I like to tell people is that in our mind, it's this. The right. We have this fear that it's about how much our tongue has to be out. The secret is it's how little our tongue has to be out. But if it's not out at all, if it's hidden inside of the teeth, the. You'll get. You'll get a different sound. You'll get a D or a. You know, as soon as the tongue is outside the mouth, just the tiniest, tiniest bit outside the mouth. Teeth on both sides. Right. So with. With, by the way, the word with is one of the few words that's super optional if it's with or with. You'll hear people say both. With is here. So you'll hear the with more often into a D with. And actually it's into a J, let's be honest, into a J with draw. Because doctor always makes. Almost always makes a jerk. So the only secret. When you have consonant combinations that are hard. The only secret I have found to actually work. I'm sure you have some other thoughts on this, is to just do it as slowly as possible and knit it together. Connect this one to this one, this one to this one, and allow your muscle memory to learn. Because in our head, we think it's going to be this long process. Our muscles are just telling us, do it 10 times. Give me a chance to do it 10 times. Slowly. Yeah, slowly. Slowly. Organically. Speed it up organically. Not like, oh, God, I have to get faster. But just go. With. With what's the energy there? Right. Withdraw. The draw is the. Is the emphasized syllable, so the width is small so that you can get the withdrawal. Withdraw.

Right. Draw. This is such an important point. Like, people want results really fast and they know how it's supposed to sound and they get what they need to do, yet they don't give their tongue the time to catch up with what they know needs to happen. Right. Like, and to develop that new muscle memory.

And often it's what you said. But I think of it the opposite way, which is that our mind creates more drama and our tongue is ready. It just needs. Needs. It needs 10 seconds. It needs going over this.

I love it. Yeah.

And our mouth is like, I'll never again. I mean, our mouth. Our brain is like, I'll never again. Yeah.

Why are you so slow?

A lot of this is like, how do I relax my brain? I mean, that's also public speaking. How do I relax my brain so that all of the mean things I could possibly tell myself. I don't.

Right. We should do a role playing where.

You are the brain and I'm the.

Tongue or vice versa.

Be like, wait a minute. Just a snake. Like, come on. I am excited if anybody here wants to give us any other notes on additional videos that we can make. Because obviously. Yeah, I mean, you know, there's a number of possibilities.

Every Thursday.

No.

Well, I think that we should. What do you. 9:00am for you. Okay, so let us know what else you would like to learn from us and we'll have Samara back and anything else you'd like to share or say or before we wrap up?

No, I'm looking, I'm looking.

I'm looking for my song burning question.

Okay.

Any. Any burning with a.

With an accent.

With a.

With a hard R accent. Burning, burning, burning.

Right when the tongue.

With more relaxation. Burning.

I'm just gonna look it up. Hold on. Okay, so let's see. I'm looking through the questions. I was doing exactly it, but can you see the questions?

Oh, I don't know. Maybe not. I mean, no. I guess.

Okay, what are the most common? Okay, so I think there are a bunch of them. So we will go into. To the comments or we will collect the comments and then we'll just create a show out of answering your question. Talking about pronunciation. Maybe next time we can talk. Maybe next time we can talk about consonants. That'd be nice.

Totally different consonants. I don't. I've never come up with physical gestures for the consonants, mostly because I don't need to. Almost never, almost no one wants to go through every single consonant. I really hone in on the ones that are struggling, you know, people struggle with, which is really based on, you know, obviously, what language is your native language and what sounds exist in that and don't exist in English and vice versa.

Yeah, exactly. All right, hold on. Samara. Yes, Try. Can you hear it? No, you can't. I'm going to try to play music here.

Now you're on mute while you're on mute, and I'm not. I'm going to tell everybody. Follow me on Instagram at Permission to speak. Oh, yeah, Permission to speak. Pod. I'm there. I'm happy to interact. Let's talk. And this coming week's podcast episode next Wednesday is on accent bias, especially as it relates to African American English, which is something we all need to get honest about. Honest.

I love it.

I can't wait.

Okay, perfect for us. We're going to share it, and let's dance it out.

Have a good time.

Tomorrow, Bab.

Oh, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.

Women doubt.

Dance it out. Oh, my God. Yep. Okay, everyone, thank you so much for being here. We love having you. I love having you here. Go follow her.