English Pronunciation - vowel changes in stressed and unstressed syllables

English pronunciation.

I'd like to teach you another very important rule about English pronunciation that a lot of my students have problems with a lot of people make this mistake listen carefully I'm going to say some words in two different ways which one sounds correct to you special special problem problem pilot pilot the second word was the standard correct accent so what I want to teach you today is about what happens to the vowels AEIOU they change sometimes and very often this sound a can sound completely different

for example land and land these are two different sounds this is a and this is a listen land England I didn't say England why not why did I change the vowel because of the importance of the rule of stress and reduction in English

you always have to ask yourself which part of the word is stressed and when you know the answer then you have to reduce everything else around it and when you reduce the vowel AEIOU can sound like this ah so the spelling doesn't matter that makes English really difficult actually because a lot of people who don't know this rule will pronounce every vowel equally they will say banana we have 3 ha 3 a's in english we don't keep everything the same length we stress one and we reduce the rest in this case banana the second syllable is stressed so we would say it like this but now no so it's a add up banana the spelling

the same but the sound changes completely let's look at a few more examples of that look at this II Men a man but look at this this e and this e are totally different we don't say see stem we say system the first syllable is stressed the second syllable is reduced so if I take my rubber band see stem two syllables watch system system system this e becomes this sound up it's a reduced vowel so let's try this word which one is correct problem or problem problem stress the first one reduce the second one same thing man make it big ah man but what happens to these A's with Japan and Brazil the first syllable is reduced and the second syllable is stressed so this will sound like up and this a will sound like a so we don't say I am from Japan or Japanese Japan Japan Japan make this one disappear it's almost non-existent it's very very very short Japan same thing with this what do we say Bry see you I am from Brazil no this is no longer ah it's ah Brazil Brazil

so you see you always have to ask yourself which syllable is stressed when you find out try to reduce the vowels around them and make them sound like up now I would like you to try this exercise by yourself ask yourself which syllable should be stressed that means the vowel should be long and which syllable should be reduced unstressed so the vowel

disappears let's practice some names of some countries look at the first name Sweden two syllables which one is stressed the first one okay what happens to the second one sweet mmm Sweden Sweden so don't say I am from Sweden say I'm from Sweden how do we say this what happens to the eye and the you do we say Belgium or do we say Belgium so the eye and the you sound exactly the same as the e in Sweden Sweden Belgium the next one you try it which one is reduced okay if you said Finland you're correct the a is reduced Finland

don't say Finland okay one more how about this one did you get it right did you say Jordan Jordan don't say he is from joy done reduce that a and say Jordan okay now let's practice some sentences repeat after me that's a special method that's a special method that's a modern system that's a modern system

the doctor said it was a common problem

the doctor said it was a common problem

Lincoln and Edison are famous Americans

Lincoln and Edison are famous Americans

any vowel a e i o or you can be reduced and it can sound like up in an unstressed syllable if you keep practicing this concept of stress and reduction it's going to greatly change the sound of your English and you're going to sound more natural and more like a native speaker thanks for watching remember this

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