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BASIC Phonetics | Understanding The International Phonetic Alphabet — Transcript

by English with Greg · 2,204 words · 387 segments · language en · Watch on YouTube

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0:00okay so you want to know how to say a
0:02word in
0:03english so you type it in the online
0:05dictionary
0:06and voila there it is there's the word
0:08in
0:09english but how do you pronounce it
0:12what can you do you can look at the
0:15phonetic transcription
0:17but there's a problem these have symbols
0:19which are scary
0:21that you don't know what they mean well
0:23listen
0:24i'm gonna make the international
0:26phonetic alphabet
0:27really really easy for you and at the
0:30end of this video i've got a little test
0:32for you
0:33and i'm pretty sure you are going to be
0:35able to look at the phonetic
0:37transcription of words
0:38and know exactly how to pronounce them
0:42so let's go
0:44[Music]
0:46now i'm greg from englishwithgreg.com on
0:49this channel i teach advanced british
0:51english pronunciation
0:52grammar and vocabulary to help you
0:54master english conversation
0:57and this topic was one that was
0:59requested by quite a
1:00few of my subscribers basic phonetics
1:04so let's go there are 44 sounds
1:08in english that means there are 44
1:10phonetic
1:11symbols that we need to know if we want
1:13to be able to
1:14look at a phonetic transcription of a
1:16word and know
1:17how to pronounce that word okay 44
1:20sounds a lot yeah well don't worry
1:23because 24 of those
1:25are consonants and for 16 of the
1:28consonants
1:29the phonetic transcription is exactly
1:32as you would expect it to be it is
1:35basically the letter
1:37that it usually represents in written
1:40english
1:40for example the t sound is like that the
1:42d sound is like that
1:44the g sound in greg is like that the r
1:47is like that the f is like that the b is
1:49like that so we don't need to worry
1:51about that
1:52if you read a phonetic transcription you
1:54can easily understand
1:5516 consonants without me teaching you
1:58anything
1:58so up to 24 consonants 16 are
2:02easy you already know them let's forget
2:04them
2:05we just now need to look at eight and
2:07six of those
2:09are scary but they're not too bad
2:12here are the scary six this one
2:15looks a little bit like an s right but
2:18it's
2:19not an s now this one instead is the
2:22shh sound that we have in shop
2:25or ship or wash shh
2:28so you can remember that because it's
2:30similar to an s and the sound is
2:32very usually written with an sh
2:36the next scary one is this now
2:40pronounce the last sound again shh
2:43and at the same time i want you to
2:45vibrate your voice
2:51that is this sound and you find this
2:54sound
2:54in words like treasure
2:57treasure or pleasure pleasure
3:01the next scary one is this wait a second
3:04that's that's
3:04two letters right well yes but it's
3:08actually just
3:08one sound and it's actually the sound
3:11that we use at the beginning and the end
3:13of
3:14church church and in a similar way the
3:18next scary one
3:19is this again it's like two symbols but
3:21it's actually
3:22one sound and we already know the second
3:25one
3:26i just told you it's so what happens
3:29when we put the d sound before
3:32you it sounds like
3:36it's the sound at the beginning of june
3:39and july or at the end of the word
3:42bridge bridge okay the next scary one is
3:46this
3:46but do you know in your language what
3:48the name of this
3:50greek symbol is it's theta in english
3:55theta
3:56[Music]
3:58and that's the sound that this
4:00represents
4:02feta like think or thirsty
4:05now this is the last scary one but in my
4:08opinion it's a little bit
4:10similar to the feta but it's not let's
4:13try vibrating
4:14our voice at the same time
4:19and that is this sound
4:23it's the sound in this and that
4:26okay so they were your six scary ones
4:28and there are two more which are
4:30not scary but confusing perhaps we have
4:33this and what happens when a word ends
4:36in g
4:37well it sounds like this shopping
4:41going it's a sound that starts being
4:44produced through the nose
4:47and finishes with a in your throat
4:52and that is this symbol if you see it it
4:54probably just means that the
4:56word ends with ng and the other
4:58confusing one is
5:00this because it looks like a j
5:03like june and july but actually
5:06this represents the pronunciation of
5:09the letter y like yes and young
5:13because as you know the sound in june
5:16and july
5:17is that one june
5:20july this one is
5:24yes young popular
5:27popular okay so we had 44 sounds
5:3124 were consonants there were only six
5:34scary ones and two confusing ones
5:37and the rest are vowels 20 vowel sounds
5:41what okay so of the 20 vowels
5:44eight are diphthongs and a diphthong is
5:47when two
5:48vowel sounds combine to make one
5:51other vowel sound they are easy
5:55if you know the other vowel sounds
5:58we look at those later they'll be easy
6:01once you learn
6:02the rest so from 20 we are down to 12.
6:04and of those
6:0612 5 are exactly as you would
6:09expect them to be in phonetics the ear
6:12of
6:12ship is written like this the o in
6:16bug is written like this the e
6:19in bed is written like this the
6:22r in hot is written like this
6:26which requires a little bit more
6:28imagination but no
6:30not too much and the ah sound in apple
6:33is written like this so again
6:36we need a little bit of imagination but
6:39hey the first part of that
6:40looks exactly like an a so it makes
6:43sense
6:44that that is the sound in apple one
6:46really important thing in phonetics is
6:48that if you see a vowel with two
6:50dots after it that simply means that
6:53it's a
6:54long vowel so that is the e
6:57of ship but that is the long version
7:01e of sheep that is o
7:04of butt and that is ooh of
7:07boot that is a like cat and that is the
7:11long version
7:12ah like cart again just a long version
7:16of that a vowel and that is r like pot
7:20and that is the long version or like
7:23port well that was an easy four and it
7:26only leaves
7:28three and one of those is this sound
7:31which i personally don't use
7:34in my region of england we don't use
7:36this i say cup
7:37much and but with this symbol cup much
7:41but
7:41and in the south of england they would
7:43say cup much but
7:45with that symbol that leaves two
7:48sounds and yes these are scary symbols
7:51and
7:51very very important sounds they are the
7:54schwa
7:55sound which is the most common sound
7:58in english it's everywhere it's in words
8:01which end e
8:02r o r o u r like better actor
8:05color it's in lots and lots of structure
8:08words like little grammar words like
8:10two like i'm going to the shops i want
8:12to be
8:13or four like that's for you for you
8:16listen it's absolutely everywhere
8:18where and when we use it is for a
8:20different lesson just know that this is
8:22the sound we make
8:23when we relax our lips we relax
8:27our tongue we relax the back of our
8:30mouth
8:31and we relax our throat and we just make
8:33a very
8:34very short noise with everything relaxed
8:38uh that is the schwa sound
8:42and the other scary one is this which i
8:45call the
8:45disgusting sound because it's well it's
8:48the sound you make when you think
8:50something is disgusting
8:52it's actually the long version of the
8:54schwa sound
8:55so if we say the schwa sound again uh
8:59uh if we make a long noise
9:04that is the disgusting sound and we find
9:07that
9:08in words like perfect nurse world
9:12this is a really really important sound
9:15but again
9:16where and when we use that is for a
9:18different lesson
9:19okay so the only thing that we need to
9:21talk about now is diphthongs there are
9:23eight
9:23diphthongs and hey there's only eight
9:26left
9:27and you thought phonetics was confusing
9:29now diphthongs might be scary because
9:31you're suddenly seeing
9:33two symbols very close together
9:36but really it's completely logical let's
9:39have a look at them this is one
9:41and as is the case with all diphthongs
9:44you will now recognize both of the
9:47symbols
9:48that make this diphthong in this case we
9:51have the
9:51short a followed by the schwa sound so
9:54what happens when you pronounce one
9:56sound immediately after
9:58the other sound ear ear ear so i mean
10:02what else could that be
10:03ear it's the sound of this ear
10:07it's the sound in the word beer or here
10:10easy next again say them together
10:14e a a a a
10:18easy it's the sound in a like a b c or
10:21the sound in
10:22day or they the next one again say them
10:24together
10:28it's the sound in boy and toy
10:39in mountain or brown cow now there are
10:42only
10:43two which need a little bit more
10:45imagination
10:46there's this one which is the schwa
10:48sound followed by the o
10:50o o words like go and vo
10:54o and the next one is this which is a
10:56followed by
10:58uh and this is the sound
11:01in words like air there
11:04and pear right there's one more which is
11:07kind of dying it's
11:08this one say them together
11:12and you will see this in words like
11:14tourist or paw
11:15so if we say it using that sound it
11:17would be tourist or pua
11:19i think normally nowadays people do not
11:21use that but instead
11:23they tend to favor the long o sound or
11:26that we find in words like four the
11:28tourist knocked on the door
11:30or or okay you wanted basic phonetics
11:33all i've taught you is
11:34six scary consonants two confusing
11:37consonants
11:38and two scary vowels and the rest is
11:41pretty simple
11:42am i right now there's one more very
11:45important thing
11:46that you need to know when you're
11:48reading phonetic transcription
11:49of a word and that is this fella it's
11:53just like a little apostrophe
11:55and the apostrophe is written
11:59before the stressed syllable
12:02it can really make it difficult for
12:04native speakers to understand you
12:06if you put the stress on the wrong
12:08syllable so that is a very important
12:10thing when you are reading a phonetic
12:12transcription
12:13of a word right let's have a look at the
12:16phonetic transcription of 10 words
12:18using the international phonetic
12:20alphabet
12:21and i want you to work it out and tell
12:23me what that word
12:25is are you ready let's go number one
12:31okay so the first sound is the scary
12:33symbol that is not an
12:35s but it's a shhh
12:47next one okay so it begins with this
12:52combination which is ch we then have the
12:55diphthong
12:55a che and then n chain
12:59you know the next one it's the d
13:00followed by
13:03change and what's at the end
13:06changing how are you doing
13:10next one okay what's the greek symbol
13:13it's the theta that is the disgusting
13:17sound
13:17er the zed is as you would pronounce as
13:21head
13:22z first and then the end is
13:25day thursday okay the next one
13:31not too complicated just two scary
13:33symbols in the middle
13:35remember the first one was and the next
13:38one
13:38is the schwa so in the middle we have
13:41je and the rest is easy vision
13:44vision next okay so don't be confused by
13:49the
13:49j in the middle we know now what that
13:51represents the
13:52uh sound the last sound is the schwa
13:55sound
13:56er so this is popular
14:00popular easy
14:03right the next one
14:06okay this is the symbol that i don't use
14:08but that's no problem the end has the
14:11scary one that's similar to the
14:12f sound and the end is the
14:16schwa mother
14:19mother okay the next one is an important
14:21one
14:23okay i don't think this is too difficult
14:25but look where the little apostrophe
14:28thing is
14:30it's in the middle which means that we
14:32stress the last syllable there
14:34it's after and then we stress
14:38after noon afternoon okay number eight
14:44not too difficult it has the o sound so
14:47so which can be written like this
14:50so or this so look at this
14:55right three sounds or
15:00walk do you see an
15:03l there no so it's a silent l we know
15:06it's a silent l but look at the phonetic
15:08transcription
15:09there is no l in this word so don't
15:12pronounce it
15:13walk and finally this one
15:18okay this has two sounds the m and a
15:20diphthong
15:21and the diphthong remember is the sound
15:23air air
15:25like there so the pronunciation of this
15:28is mer and that is how we pronounce
15:32this word mei so how did you do
15:36from those ten leave me a comment to let
15:38me know how many you got
15:40right if you like this video there are
15:42another couple of videos
15:43there which will really help you improve
15:45your british english pronunciation
15:47so watch one of those next thanks for
15:50being here and i'll see you
15:52there bye for now

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